Training time and programed instruction.

The hypothesis was tested that training time can be reduced by means of programed instruction, without loss in training quality. 226 USN and Marine Corps trainees in electronics fundamentals served as Ss. A matched group design was used in which a 31% time saving on the part of the programed instruction group was an integral part of the experiment. On the 2 measures of learning, which followed the instruction, the programed instruction group scored significantly higher (p     

A comparative study of programed and conventional instruction in industry.

"Programed textbooks containing 719 frames were prepared covering the introductory 15 hours of a 16-week course for trainees in a 7070 Data Processing System servicing course. Achievement test scores for six experimental classes (n = 70) who used these programed texts were compared with those of two control classes (n = 42) taught by the lecture-discussion method. Significant gains in achievement and reduction of training time were found for the experimental classes. Student reaction to programed instruction as measured by a questionnaire was found to be favorable." From Psyc Abstracts 36:04:4KC25H. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Changes in attitudes of learners when programed instruction is interpolated between two conventional instruction experiences.

5parallel forms of a 26-item Likert-type attitude scale were administered in counterbalanced order to 70 airmen studying radiation detection and 53 airmen studying camera repair. Both courses included several wk. of lecture, a programmed unit, and several more wk. of conventional instruction. Students' attitudes were significantly more favorable during the programed unit in both courses. Changes were considerably more pronounced for the 17 highest ability students. (15 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A study of computer-assisted instruction in industrial training.

To test the feasibility of remote computer-assisted instruction as an industrial training technique, 79 newly hired electronic technicians received their required training in basic data-processing principles through programed texts, the standard method used for this presentation. 25 equivalent students received the same training through a keyboard-operated terminal device linked remotely to an IBM 1440 computer system. No significant differences in examination scores were obtained; however, there was a significant saving (approximately 10%) in the time required to complete the course. On an attitude questionnaire administered subsequent to the courses, both groups rated their respective method of instruction as approximately equal to regular classroom techniques in terms of effectiveness and desirability. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

An industrywide study of programed instruction.

In November 1963, this Association completed a study of the effectiveness of a 1625-frame, self-instructional text on life insurance fundamentals, developed in cooperation with the American Institute for Research. The 2 X 2 X 2 factorial design involved: use of a review book, availability of confirmation for each response, and response mode. Over 1500 people in 7 companies in classroom and field settings participated as well as home office employees in an 8th company to study 4- and 16-week retention. The use of a comprehensive review program resulted in slightly and reliably greater achievement on both immediate testing and retention tests 4 and 16 weeks later. Trainees receiving confirmation of the accuracy of their responses were generally, and sometimes significantly, inferior in achievement to trainees not receiving confirmation. Trainees did not differ in achievement or attitude toward the program depending on writing, saying their answers, or choosing either of these response modes; those who said their answers took less time than the others. Pretest individual differences were not reduced by exposure to the programed texts. (28 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effect of programmed instruction related to motivation, anxiety, and test wiseness on Group IQ test performance.

To investigate the efficacy of a cognitive approach to problems of motivation, anxiety, and test wiseness, programed texts were used to condition verbal repertoires relevant to each of these problems. Five 6th-grade classes (118 Ss) were administered the Otis-Lennon Mental Ability Test in a pretest–posttest design. Each class received one of the following conditions: control condition, motivation program, test wiseness program, or a combination of all 3 programs. There was a significant effect only on raw scores. Comparing the combination group with the control group, both IQ and raw score gains were significant. Lower IQ level Ss made greater raw score gains than did upper IQ level Ss. (22 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Dependency responses to televised instruction.

This study compared anecdotal responses of 375 college freshmen exemplifying both effective and ineffective instruction in both televised and conventional classroom instruction. Thus, each S gave 4 anecdotes. When treated in the manner of the Flanagan critical incident technique by 4 independent judges, the anecdotes were classified into 2 broad categories: (a) those behaviors describing essentially active initiation by the learner with a focus on self were included in the self-dependent classification, (b) those critical phrases describing essentially passive participation by the learner and focused outside the self were included in the other-dependent classification. The Ss responses to effective conventional classroom instruction were significantly self-dependent. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Automated teaching methods using linear programs.

186 freshman engineering students studied elementary probability by different teaching methods. Multiple choice teaching machines, free-response teaching machines in individual booths, free-response teaching machines in a classroom, programed textbooks requiring overt responses and providing correct answers, programed textbooks requiring no overt responses, "programed" lecturers, and standard lecturers were compared. No significant differences were observed between the performance of the students learning by any of the programed machine, programed textbook, or programed lecturer methods: all of the programed methods were significantly better than the standard lecturer. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Interactions of learner characteristics with the difficulty level of the instruction.

Investigated 152 college students' learning from programmed materials varying in redundancy and difficulty level. Measures employed were the Test Anxiety Scale, Achievement Motivation subscale (Personality Research Form), and Scholastic Aptitude Test Verbal and Quantitative subscales and total score. Ss with high achievement needs and low fear of failure did increasingly better on the posttest as the instructional difficulty increased from 6.9 to 40.0% errors. The low-need-achievement, high-fear-of-failure group's performance decreased with an increase in difficulty. Cognitive ability interacted with instructional variables, so that the group scoring high on the Scholastic Aptitude Test performed better than the low when the instruction entailed more errors and less time on task. Qualifications, implications, and the need for considering relevant learner characteristics when prescribing optimal instruction are discussed. (19 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Embedding reading comprehension training in content-area instruction.

This study evaluated the effectiveness of comprehension training embedded in a program that taught science content to 2nd graders. The program included instruction about the structure of compare-contrast expository text, emphasizing clue words, generic questions, graphic organizers, and the close analysis of well-structured text exemplars. This program was compared with a program that focused on the science content but included no compare-contrast training as well as with a no-instruction control. Regular classroom teachers (14 from 4 schools), randomly assigned to treatment, provided the instruction; 215 students (7-8 years old) participated. The study replicated acquisition and transfer effects found in an earlier study, that is, transfer to compare-contrast text with content related and unrelated to the instructional content (with no loss in the amount of science content acquired). The program also led to better performance on written and oral response measures and on 1 of the 2 measures involving authentic (less well-structured) compare-contrast text. These findings support and extend previous findings that explicit instruction in comprehension is effective as early as the primary-grade level. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A comparison of single and multiple strategy instruction on third-grade students' mathematical problem solving.

The purposes of this study were to assess the differential effects of a single strategy (schema-based instruction; SBI) versus multiple strategies (general strategy instruction, GSI) in promoting mathematical problem solving and mathematics achievement as well as to examine the influence of word problem-solving instruction on the development of computational skills. Eighty-eight 3rd graders and their teachers were assigned randomly to conditions (SBI and GSI). Students were pre- and posttested on mathematical problem-solving and computation tests and were posttested on the Pennsylvania System of School Assessment Mathematics test, a criterion-referenced test that measures student attainment of academic standards. Results revealed SBI to be more effective than GSI in enhancing students' mathematical word problem-solving skills at posttest and maintenance. Further, results indicate that the SBI groups' performance exceeded that of the GSI group on the Pennsylvania System of School Assessment measure. On the computation test, both groups made gains over time. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Enhancing creativity: A comparison between effects of an indicative instruction “to be creative” and a more elaborate heuristic instruction on Chinese student creativity.

This study consisted of an experiment conducted with a sample of 180 Chinese high school students, designed to scrutinize the effects of prompting and instructing students to be creative in their creative performance in the domains of art and literature. The results of the study reveal that students’ creativity benefited from receiving appropriate strategies or more elaborate instruction (as induced by instructing), but not by merely being motivated (as induced by prompting) to be creative, regardless of the task domain. Gender differences in creativity were found only in the domain of literature, in favor of female participants. Implications of the findings are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Which students benefit from self-paced mastery instruction and why.

Based on an attribute-by-treatment interaction paradigm, the determinants of 217 female college students' achievement were compared under conventional and self-paced mastery examination schedules in an anatomy and physiology course. Measures of general scholastic ability (e.g., Minnesota Scholastic Aptitude Test) did not interact with method, but prior preparation in science did. Ss with less science preparation showed greater achievement under self-paced mastery testing than their counterparts under conventional testing. This compensation was explained when study habits were explored. Under self-paced testing, study time was inversely related to amount of science background. Self-pacing Ss with less background reported greater textbook usage and indicated that unit test results aided in planning study effort. No such relationships were found for Ss in the conventional course. (38 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Computerized instruction and the learning process.

Discusses developments in the field of computer assisted instruction (CAI), focusing on the Stanford Project, initiated in 1964 under a grant from the Office of Education to develop and implement a CAI program in initial reading and mathematics. A progress report deals with the reading program with particular reference to the past school year, when for the first time a sizable group of students received a major portion of their daily reading instruction under computer control. The first year's operation must be considered essentially as an extended debugging of both the computer system and the curriculum materials. Nevertheless, some interesting comments can be made on the basis of this experience regarding both the feasibility of CAI and the impact of such instruction on the overall learning process. Parts of the project addressed include the CAI reading curriculum, problems in implementing the curriculum, and some results from the first year of operation with first grade students. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Problem-solving instruction and problem-solving transfer: The correspondence issue.

R. E. Mayer and A C. Wittrock (1996) have raised the specificity-generality issue as it applies to the teachable aspects of problem-solving transfer. Simply put, do the instructional practices that foster more efficient acquisition-learning of problem-solving strategies automatically foster more efficient problem-solving transfer? On the basis of the present findings the answer is "no." Four instructional conditions differing in levels of specificity produced different levels of acquisition. However, when the same students engaged in a delayed problem-solving task, comparable levels of problem-solving transfer performance were observed. In this case, a general approach to problem-solving instruction produced significantly poorer acquisition-learning performance but equally good problem-solving transfer performance. Results are discussed within the context of investigating prior knowledge (F Dochy, M. Segers, & A M. Buehl, 1999) and the identification of source memory (A. Koriat, M. Goldsmith, & A. Pansky, 2000) as a viable tool in this effort. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Computerized instruction and the learning process: Erratum.

Reports an error in the original article by Richard C. Atkinson (American Psychologist, 1968[Apr]). The last sentence of the first column on page 231 should read as follows: (b) Items for which the correct answer is an adjective are more difficult to comprehend than items in which the correct answer is a noun or verb; similarly, verbs are more difficult than nouns. (The following abstract of this article originally appeared in record 2005-10451-001). Discusses developments in the field of computer assisted instruction (CAI), focusing on the Stanford Project, initiated in 1964 under a grant from the Office of Education to develop and implement a CAI program in initial reading and mathematics. A progress report deals with the reading program with particular reference to the past school year, when for the first time a sizable group of students received a major portion of their daily reading instruction under computer control. The first year's operation must be considered essentially as an extended debugging of both the computer system and the curriculum materials. Nevertheless, some interesting comments can be made on the basis of this experience regarding both the feasibility of CAI and the impact of such instruction on the overall learning process. Parts of the project addressed include the CAI reading curriculum, problems in implementing the curriculum, and some results from the first year of operation with first grade students. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Does discovery-based instruction enhance learning?

Discovery learning approaches to education have recently come under scrutiny (Tobias & Duffy, 2009), with many studies indicating limitations to discovery learning practices. Therefore, 2 meta-analyses were conducted using a sample of 164 studies: The 1st examined the effects of unassisted discovery learning versus explicit instruction, and the 2nd examined the effects of enhanced and/or assisted discovery versus other types of instruction (e.g., explicit, unassisted discovery). Random effects analyses of 580 comparisons revealed that outcomes were favorable for explicit instruction when compared with unassisted discovery under most conditions (d = –0.38, 95% CI [?.44, ?.31]). In contrast, analyses of 360 comparisons revealed that outcomes were favorable for enhanced discovery when compared with other forms of instruction (d = 0.30, 95% CI [.23, .36]). The findings suggest that unassisted discovery does not benefit learners, whereas feedback, worked examples, scaffolding, and elicited explanations do. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Additional notes on the case method of instruction.

Asupplement to the report by Castore and Berrien (see 25:98) which tends to confirm their findings regarding students' feelings toward the case method of instruction. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Automated instruction.

"One of the major differences between the SDC teaching machine and others is the great flexibility that is achieved by using a small, digital computer as the control mechanism for the teaching." An example to illustrate its characteristics is presented. The "most important problem in the teaching machine area is not the design of the machine itself but rather the design of good instructional material. It is felt that not enough research has been done to demonstrate the way in which instructional materials should best be prepared; similarly, there has not been enough research to demonstrate the conditions under which this type of automated education can yield good results." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)