Background: College students often do not retain what they learn in Statistics in order to apply it in Experimental Psychology. Self-explanation, that is, elaborating on what one is trying to learn by asking questions, making inferences, etc., improves learning and may improve retention. Objective: The purpose of this study was to determine…

This study investigated the strategies students in general chemistry and analytical chemistry courses used before and after instruction to solve a volumetric analysis problem in which the molar ratio was not 1:1. Questions like this have historically been very challenging for high school and undergraduate students. Student writing on open-response…

Idea evaluation has been identified as a critical step in the creative problem-solving process. Yet, it is unclear how exactly individuals evaluate and compensate for weaknesses in their creative ideas. In the present study, both qualitative and quantitative methods were used to identify the compensatory strategies that undergraduate participants…

The work presented in the following chapters was undertaken with the goal of understanding and improving education in organic chemistry. Initial work, described in Chapters 1 and 2, focuses on students' ability to explain and rationalize the outcomes of organic chemistry reactions. Chapter 1 explores the relationship between assessment emphasis…

Students and educators often face time constraints, making it essential to develop interventions that are both easy to implement and have a substantial impact on learning and performance. One promising strategy is retrieval practice, particularly in the context of physics education, where many students struggle with basic knowledge. Prior research…

The Jeong (2020) study found that greater use of backward and depth-first processing was associated with higher scores on students' argument maps and that analysis of only the first five nodes students placed in their maps predicted map scores. This study utilized the jMAP tool and algorithms developed in the Jeong (2020) study to determine if the…

The ability to properly evaluate one's own academic progress has long been considered a predictor of academic success. However, its distinctive role in the context of computational mathematics remains underexplored. Grounded in social cognitive theory, this study investigates the critical role of self-regulated learning (SRL) strategies in…

Why do people shift their strategies for solving problems? Past work has focused on the roles of contextual and individual factors in explaining whether people adopt new strategies when they are exposed to them. In this study, we examined a factor not considered in prior work: people's evaluations of the strategies themselves. We presented…

Use of modeling as a learning strategy in introductory science courses could serve to support the persistence of all students, including those who identify with a traditionally underrepresented ethnic minority (URM). If students find inherent value in working on modeling-type problems then this authentic practice would aid in transforming personal…

Why do people shift their strategies for solving problems? Past work has focused on the roles of contextual and individual factors in explaining whether people adopt new strategies when they are exposed to them. In this study, we examined a factor not considered in prior work: people's evaluations of the strategies themselves. We presented…

Many studies have used fraction magnitude comparison tasks to assess people's abilities to quickly assess fraction magnitudes. However, since there are multiple ways to compare fractions, it is not clear whether people actually reason about the holistic magnitudes of the fractions in this task and whether they use multiple strategies in a flexible…

Self-explanation, a learning strategy where students explain to themselves the steps taken in a worked example, is an effective learning strategy in early cognitive skill acquisition. However, many physics students produce self-explanations of low quality. There is also a lack of guidelines for what students should seek to explain when studying…

Epistemic beliefs, epistemic cognitions, and self-regulation processes have a significant role in students' learning. Through this study, I investigated the role of mechanical engineering students' epistemic beliefs and epistemic cognitions involved in self-regulation processes while working on tasks with different difficulty levels. In this…

This study focuses on computer-based formative assessment for supporting problem solving and reasoning in mathematics. To be able to assist students who find themselves in difficulties, the software suggested descriptions - diagnoses - of the encountered difficulty the students could choose from. Thereafter, the software provided metacognitive and…

This article details a 'puzzling' teaching and learning method to engage undergraduate nursing (BSN) and exercise sciences (BSES) students in physiology or medicine Nobel Prize-winning discoveries, while reviewing course material through the "Puzzling Physiology and Nobel Laureates" (PPNL) game. The qualitative evaluations of 117…