THE TESTING EFFECT: APPLICATIONS IN COMPOSITION PEDAGOGY By Adam Danger Channel A Project Presented to The Faculty of Humboldt State University In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts in English: Teaching Writing Committee Membership Dr. Corey Lewis, Committee Chair Dr. Suzanne Scott, Committee Member Dr. Nikola Hobbel, Graduate Coordinator May 2014 ABSTRACT THE TESTING EFFECT: APPLICATIONS IN COMPOSITION PEDAGOGY Adam Channel This project advocates for the use of frequently-administered, low-stakes tests to enhance student learning of the disciplinary content of composition. Though there is widespread disdain for the role of standardized tests in education today, not all forms of testing are the same, and some forms of testing can be very effective teaching tools. Tests should ideally be locally generated with relevance to class content, frequently administered, and low-stakes, with feedback provided shortly after testing. This project lays the groundwork for how testing can dovetail into the student-centered dialogic classroom, a common practice in composition today. Theories of human learning (including the testing effect and the spacing effect) show that active retrieval is the best way to ensure long-term retention and understanding. Frequent tests provide active- retrieval opportunities for students, which should enhance learning and retention. The project concludes with how to build tests specifically for the instruction of first-year college composition. ii TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ........................................................................................................................ ii TABLE OF CONTENTS ................................................................................................... iii TABLE OF FIGURES ........................................................................................................ v CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCING TEST-ENHANCED LEARNING .................................. 1 Retrieval-Based Learning ................................................................................................ 1 Composition History and the Move Away from Testing ................................................ 5 The Banking Model of Education ................................................................................... 8 Critiques of Standardized Tests and High-Stakes Assessment ..................................... 11 CHAPTER 2: THE STUDENT-CENTERED COMPOSITION CLASSROOM ............ 15 Moving towards a Dialogic Classroom ......................................................................... 15 The Writing Process in a Dialogic Classroom .............................................................. 23 Building Writing Fluency with Journal Writing ........................................................... 27 The Dialogic Classroom and the Academic Discourse Community ............................. 29 CHAPTER 3: HUMAN LEARNING ............................................................................... 35 The Physiology of Learning and Memory .................................................................... 35 Cognitive Definitions of Learning and Memory ........................................................... 41 Three Theories of Learning ........................................................................................... 47 Social Constructivist Theories of Learning and Testing ............................................... 53 CHAPTER 4: THE TESTING EFFECT AND THE SPACING EFFECT ...................... 61 iii What is the Testing Effect? ........................................................................................... 61 Studies Reporting a Testing Effect................................................................................ 64 The Spacing Effect ........................................................................................................ 80 CHAPTER 5: TEST-ENHANCED LEARNING IN COMPOSITION ........................... 89 Indirect Benefits of Testing ........................................................................................... 89 Testing and Grades ........................................................................................................ 96 The Benefits of Tests According to Three HSU Professors.......................................... 98 Building, Administering, and Grading Tests .............................................................. 103 Recognition and Free-Response Questions ................................................................. 107 WORKS CITED ............................................................................................................. 113 iv TABLE OF FIGURES Figure 1: “Neuron” ........................................................................................................... 36 Figure 2: “Neuronal Communication” .............................................................................. 38 Figure 3: “Stage Theory of Memory” ............................................................................... 42 Figure 4: “Performance on Immediate and Delayed Tests” ............................................. 66 Figure 5: “Testing Schedule Shows a Forgetting Curve” ................................................. 68 Figure 6: “Study-Test-Study-Test (STST) Most Effective Learning Strategy” ............... 70 Figure 7: “Proportion Correct in Immediate and Delayed Recall” ................................... 73 Figure 8: “Word Recall on Immediate and Delayed Tests” ............................................. 74 Figure 9: “Student Performance Averaged across Unit Exams” ...................................... 77 Figure 10: “Hypothetical Forgetting Curve 1” ................................................................. 82 Figure 11: “Hypothetical Forgetting Curve 2” ................................................................. 86 Figure 12: “Hypothetical Forgetting Curve 3” ................................................................. 87 v 1 CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCING TEST-ENHANCED LEARNING Retrieval-Based Learning This project argues that student learning will be enhanced if teachers frequently administer low-stakes tests. This chapter will first define what a “test” is. It will proceed to describe a brief history of testing in composition, and finally it will rationalize the current lack of testing seen in composition practice today. Primarily, this chapter argues the lack of testing is due to three widely held misconceptions: (1) tests promote the “banking model of education,” (2) tests do not encourage critical thinking, and (3) all forms of tests are subject to the same deficiencies as standardized tests. What we know about the cognition of learning has considerably advanced in recent decades. Today we have a research-based theory of learning that is grounded in physiological and empirical data gathered from brain-imaging and cognitive studies. Despite this, there remains a schism between the laboratory and the field, a gap between theory and practice (see . Recent advances in cognitive science and studies on memory and learning do not seem to have had a significant impact on composition pedagogy. This thesis argues that two theories of learning in particular are of the utmost importance but remain widely unknown: the testing effect and the spacing effect. Put simply, these theories hold that long-term retention is improved through repeated testing over time. 2 Composition practice today relies on a varied set of skills and knowledge; students’ learning and retention of this course content can be enhanced through the introduction of frequently-administered low-stakes tests. It is important to define what is meant by the word “test” in this project, especially because for many people the term carries negative connotations. “Test” or “testing” makes many people think of summative high-stakes assessment or top-down administered standardized tests. Both of these types of testing have serious deficiencies that will be elaborated on later in this chapter. Testing, however, can come in many different forms. For the purposes of understanding how tests operate cognitively, in this project the terms “tests” or “testing” are defined as “an induced act of retrieval”—any sort of material or question which necessitates a “retrieval” action on the part of the reader. Retrieval is the process of accessing information stored in the memory and articulating it, generally in response to an inquiry. You are asked a question, and you provide a written answer: that is the meaning of a test in this project. In order for us to understand how taking a test can enhance learning, it is important to distinguish between two types of learning: passive and active. Cognitive research would describe reading a textbook or reviewing class notes as “passive learning,” because reading is an input-only activity (Roediger and Karpicke 181; Knight and Wood 298). Learning through a lecture is similarly defined as passive learning for the same reason. However, if one was to convert their notes and annotations into flash 3 cards that they could test themselves on (with the possibility of failure to recall), that would be considered “active learning” because it would require an act of retrieval on the part of the learner. As another example, when we read the statement, “Black holes are the remnants of the gravitational collapse of a star,” our brain connects that to existing knowledge structures and schemata. We can read that same statement numerous