Writing is considered the most arduous academic task in school. Many students struggle with motivating themselves to engage in text production due to the enormous cognitive load it requires. In this pilot study, we used a simple electronic device that emits silent vibration signals at programmed intervals to help five sixth graders to stay focused…

Background: According to the personalization effect in multimedia learning, the use of personal and possessive pronouns in instructional materials (e.g., 'you' and 'your') is beneficial. However, current research suggests that the personalization effect is inverted for emotionally aversive content (e.g., illnesses). Objective: This study…

Universities face the challenge of constantly improving the quality of higher education and changing the learning behaviour of students, from passive reactive learning to active self-regulated learning. Learner-centred, constructively designed learning tasks offer a great opportunity here. This paper investigates to what extent the learning…