Deliver examples with fading (completion strategy) and random (interleaved) sequencing, and promote active processing via self-explanation, subgoal labeling, and comparison¶

Strategy · All strategies
Evidence · 5 claims (2 for, 3 mixed) · 3 studies (3 review), q2 · 0 of 3 report an effect size · 4 claims rest on one study

Description¶

The review's design and delivery recommendations: use completion problems with increasingly more learner-completed steps as a bridge from examples to problem solving, preferably backward fading; sequence problems randomly rather than blocked by type, which increases training load and lowers training performance but improves learning and transfer; foster active processing by prompting self-explanation, making subgoals explicit through labeling or visually isolating step sets, comparing different solution methods, and completing partially worked-out examples.

Design Implications¶

Context¶

Requirements¶

• Self-explanation prompts presuppose students are capable of providing high quality self-explanations; if not, provide instructional explanations and fade them out as they become redundant

Constraints¶

• Random sequencing increases cognitive load and decreases performance during training, though it leads to better learning and transfer; instructional explanations can hamper learning once redundant

Target Learners¶

• novice to intermediate learners in structured domains

Target Learning Goals¶

• schema construction
• transfer to novel problems

Affordances¶

• Cognitive Load Worked Example Explanation

Claims¶

• Structuring worked examples to emphasize subgoals, via labels or visual segmentation, enhances transfer to novel problems [+M]
• Studying worked examples is more effective and more efficient than problem solving for novice learners (the worked example effect) [+W]
• Example–problem pairs and examples-only are more effective than problem–example pairs for novices, with no significant difference between the first two [~W]
• Expertise reversal: high-guidance worked examples become ineffective or detrimental once learners have developed cognitive schemata [~W]
• Erroneous examples benefit learners with more prior knowledge, while correct-only solutions better serve low-prior-knowledge learners [~W]

Related Strategies¶

• Extending game-based worked examples with practice problems, fading, self-explanation, verbal instruction and subgoals

Examples¶

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Key Sources¶

• Tamara van Gog & Nikol Rummel. (2010). Example-Based Learning: Integrating Cognitive and Social-Cognitive Research Perspectives. Educational Psychology Review. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-010-9134-7