THE INFLUENCE OF SPONTANEOUS STRATEGY USE ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF PROVIDED AND GENERATED SELF-TEST QUESTIONING
Abstract
The present investigation was concerned with the development of questioning strategies among spontaneous and non-spontaneous strategy using students across three grade levels: fifth, eighth, and eleventh. On the day prior to the administration of the experimental treatments, the students at each grade level were screened for spontaneous use of an overt study strategy, such as underlining or notetaking. The students were asked to read a 10 paragraph text-like passage and recall the passage information, after which they were given 10-minutes of additional study time to interact with the text using any study activities they wished in order to increase their recall. Students who engaged in an overt study activity during the extra study interval were classified as spontaneous strategy users. The results indicated that the number of spontaneous strategy users significantly increased with age. The second experimental session assessed the effects of experimenter-provided conceptual postquestions, student-generated postquestions, and no postquestions on the recall of superordinate concepts and subordinate details from a text-like passage. A separate analysis was conducted for the effects of spontaneous strategy use on performance at the lower grade levels. Recall efficiency was also measured. The results indicated that at each grade level provided conceptual postquestions significantly enhanced the recall of both main ideas and factual details. They also produced more efficient recall of main ideas per unit of time spent studying than simply reading the passage. The student-generated postquestions, on the other hand, only increased recall of factual details and did not increase recall efficiency compared to only reading the passage. The students asked to generate their own self-test questions produced mainly factual questions. Contrary to prediction, spontaneous strategy use was not shown to influence the effectiveness of the questions at any grade level. Students classified as spontaneous strategy users, however, consistently outperformed the no-strategy students in recall of both main ideas and factual details. Several possible explanations were suggested to account for these findings.
Degree
Ph.D.
Subject Area
Literacy|Reading instruction
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