{"id":6952,"date":"2023-02-05T08:00:29","date_gmt":"2023-02-05T13:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/braindevs.net\/blog\/blog\/?p=6952"},"modified":"2023-02-04T10:08:18","modified_gmt":"2023-02-04T15:08:18","slug":"starting-class-with-prequestions-benefits-problems-solutions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/starting-class-with-prequestions-benefits-problems-solutions\/","title":{"rendered":"Starting Class with “Prequestions”: Benefits, Problems, Solutions"},"content":{"rendered":"

We\u2019ve known for many years now that retrieval practice works<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\"Hispanic<\/a><\/p>\n

That is: after we have introduced students to a topic, we might REVIEW it with them the next day. However, they’ll remember it better if we ask them to\u00a0try to RETRIEVE ideas and procedures<\/em> about it.<\/p>\n

As Dr. Pooja Agarwal and Patrice Bain write<\/a>, we want students to \u201cpull information out of their brains\u201d (retrieve) not \u201cput information back into their brains” (review).<\/p>\n

Sadly, we know that students\u2019 intuition contradicts this guidance. They really want to reread<\/em> or review their notes<\/em>, rather than ask themselves questions<\/em>.<\/p>\n

In this (very sad) study<\/a>, for instance, Dr. Nate Kornell and Dr. Lisa Son found that students think review works better than retrieval even when they do better on quizzes following retrieval<\/em>!<\/p>\n

Yes, even the experience of learning more doesn\u2019t persuade students that they learned more.<\/p>\n

YIKES.<\/p>\n

The More Things Change\u2026<\/h2>\n

Let\u2019s take this retrieval practice idea one step further.<\/p>\n

I wrote above that answering questions helps students learn\u00a0AFTER they have been introduced to a topic.<\/p>\n

But: does answering questions help students learn a topic even BEFORE they study it?<\/p>\n

On the one hand, this suggestion sounds very strange. Students can\u2019t get these \u201cprequestions\u201d right, because they haven\u2019t yet studied the topic.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, we\u2019ve got research showing that this strategy works!<\/p>\n

In one of my favorite studies ever<\/a>, Dr. Lindsay Richland found that \u201cprequestions\u201d help students learn. And, she then worked really hard to disprove her own findings. When she couldn\u2019t explain away her conclusions, she finally accepted them. *<\/p>\n

Similarly, a more recent study<\/a>\u00a0suggests that learning objectives framed as questions (\u201cWhere are mirror neurons located?\u201d) helps students learn more than LOs framed as statements (\u201cYou will learn where mirror neurons are located.\u201d).<\/p>\n

Although this prequestion strategy hasn\u2019t been studied as much as retrieval practice, I do think it has enough research behind it to merit teachers\u2019 respectful attention.<\/p>\n

However, I do think this approach has a practical classroom problem\u2026<\/p>\n

Sustaining Motivation<\/h2>\n

For the most part, my high-school students are an amiable lot. If I ask them to do something \u2026 say, answer retrieval practice questions \u2026 they\u2019ll give it a go.<\/p>\n

And, they almost certainly want to get those questions right<\/em>.<\/p>\n

In a class discussion about Their Eyes Were Watching God<\/em>, for instance, we might compare Janie\u2019s three \u201chusbands.\u201d\u00a0If I ask a student the following day to list some points of comparison from memory (retrieval practice!), they\u2019ll feel that they ought to remember an answer or two.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s try this logic with prequestioning.<\/p>\n

Imagine I ask my students this prequestion: \u201cWhy do you think the novel\u2019s protagonist will have the nickname \u2018Alphabet\u2019?\u201d<\/p>\n

My students will gamely try some answers.<\/p>\n

However, I worry that \u2013 over time \u2013 they\u2019ll start losing interest.<\/p>\n

They almost never get these answers right.<\/p>\n

And, there\u2019s no “penalty” for getting them wrong, or reward for getting them right. (We don’t want students to focus on rewards and penalties, but schools typically work this way…)<\/p>\n

From the student perspective, in other words, the whole prequestion strategy feels like an exercise in futility.<\/p>\n

Why should they bother to think seriously about these un-answerable questions? They feel like wasted mental effort…<\/p>\n

Two Solutions<\/h2>\n

First<\/strong>: I\u2019ve tried in the past to solve this problem by using the strategy infrequently<\/em>.<\/p>\n

If my students don\u2019t experience this quirky frustration too often, I hope, they won\u2019t mind participating in this odd ritual.<\/p>\n

Recent research, however, offers a second<\/strong> solution \u2013 a more honorable solution than mine.<\/p>\n

In this study<\/a>, by Dr. Steven Pan and Dr. Michelle Rivers, prequestions consistently helped students learn.<\/p>\n

However, students didn\u2019t really notice the benefit of prequestions \u2013 even when they learned more from answering them<\/em>. (This result sounds a lot like the Kornell and Son study about retrieval practice; students don\u2019t register the benefits they experience.)<\/p>\n

So, Pan and Rivers tried several solutions. Specifically, they found benefits to a multi-step approach:<\/p>\n

Step 1<\/strong>: have students learn some info with prequestions, and some without.<\/p>\n

Step 2<\/strong>: give them a no-stakes quiz on the info.<\/p>\n

Step 3<\/strong>: let them see that they remembered information better after prequestions.<\/p>\n

Step 4<\/strong>: next time, ask students to recall how well they remembered after answering prequestions.<\/em><\/p>\n

In other words: students need to experience the benefits and to have them repeatedly pointed out<\/em>. This combination, probably, helps students believe that prequestions really do help.<\/p>\n

This insight (probably?) helps with the motivation<\/em> problem that has been troubling me in the past.<\/p>\n

In other words: students who believe that prequestions will help are much likelier to participate in the curious mental exercise of trying to answer questions whose answer they can\u2019t yet know.<\/p>\n

TL;DR<\/h2>\n

When students answer questions about information they\u2019re about to learn, they remember that information better \u2013 even if they get the answers wrong.<\/p>\n

This strategy might be effective in the short term, but hamper motivation over time. After all, why should students even try<\/em> to answer questions if they\u2019re unlikely to know the answer?<\/p>\n

To counteract this motivational problem, take students through Pan & Rivers\u2019s procedure for them to experience and remember the benefits that prequestions provide.<\/p>\n

We don\u2019t have LOTS of research on this strategy, but we do have enough to make it a plausible approach.<\/p>\n

\n

* Sadly, the “prequestion” strategy has frequently been called “pretesting.” Of course, the presence of the stem “test” both confuses the strategy (there’s no testing!) and disinclines people from participating (who wants more testing?).<\/p>\n

So, let me emphasize: “prequestions” are simply questions. They’re not a test.<\/p>\n

BTW: I’ve recently seen the word “pretrieval” as a way to avoid the “pretest” moniker. You might like it better than “prequestions.”<\/p>\n

\n

Agarwal, P. K., & Bain, P. M. (2019).\u00a0Powerful teaching: Unleash the science of learning<\/i>. John Wiley & Sons.<\/p>\n

Kornell, N., & Son, L. K. (2009). Learners\u2019 choices and beliefs about self-testing.\u00a0Memory<\/i>,\u00a017<\/i>(5), 493-501.<\/p>\n

Pan, S. C., & Rivers, M. L. (2023). Metacognitive awareness of the pretesting effect improves with self-regulation support.\u00a0Memory & Cognition<\/i>, 1-20.<\/p>\n

Richland, L. E., Kornell, N., & Kao, L. S. (2009). The pretesting effect: Do unsuccessful retrieval attempts enhance learning?.\u00a0Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied<\/i>,\u00a015<\/i>(3), 243.<\/p>\n

Sana, F., Forrin, N. D., Sharma, M., Dubljevic, T., Ho, P., Jalil, E., & Kim, J. A. (2020). Optimizing the efficacy of learning objectives through pretests.\u00a0CBE\u2014Life Sciences Education<\/i>,\u00a019<\/i>(3), ar43.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We\u2019ve known for many years now that retrieval practice works. That is: after we have introduced students to a topic, we might REVIEW it with them the next day. However, they’ll remember it better if we ask them to\u00a0try to RETRIEVE ideas and procedures about it. As Dr. Pooja Agarwal and Patrice Bain write, we […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":6958,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[15,203],"class_list":["post-6952","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lb-blog","tag-classroom-advice","tag-prequestions"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6952","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6952"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6952\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6959,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6952\/revisions\/6959"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6958"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6952"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6952"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6952"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}