Student questioning : a componential analysis

This article reviews the literature on student questioning, organized through a modified version of Dillon's (1988a, 1990) componential model of questioning. Special attention is given to the properties of assumptions, questions, and answers. Each of these main elements are the result of certain actions of the questioner, which are described. Within this framework a variety of aspects of questioning are highlighted. One focus of the article is individual differences in question asking. The complex interactions between students' personal characteristics, social factors, and questioning are examined. In addition, a number of important but neglected topics for research are identified. Together, the views that are presented should deepen our understanding of student questioning

Eight guidelines for the design of instructional videos for software training

Purpose: Video has become a popular means for delivering "how to" information about a wide variety of software tasks. With video rapidly becoming a major instructional method, the question arises of their effectiveness for software training. This paper provides a set of eight guidelines for the construction of instructional videos for software training. Method: The guidelines present a concise view on how to design an instructional video for software training. They are based on a considerable body of research on how people process visual and verbal information and how to support these processes. Each guideline is described, illustrated, and supported with research findings from various disciplines. Results: The guidelines were tested in three consecutive empirical studies. In these studies a set of instructional videos for Word's formatting options were designed. The effects of the video instructions were compared with a paper tutorial (Van der Meij & Van der Meij, in preparation). We found that the video instructions yielded more favorable appraisals for motivation, higher skills proficiency immediately after training, and better skills retention after a one-week delay. Conclusions: The guidelines offer patterns that could further advance the theory and practice of the design of instructional videos for software training. A limitation of the study is that we concentrated on instructional video that serve a tutorial function. For video that function as a reference guide not all the guidelines are equally important, and also some new guidelines may be called for

Screen captures to support switching attention

The study set out to validate the supportive role of screen captures for switching attention. Forty-two participants learned how to work with Microsoft Excel with a paper manual. There were three types of manuals: a textual manual, a visual manual with full-screen captures, and a visual manual with a mixture of partial- and full-screen captures. The findings show that participants in all conditions looked up from the manual to the screen on about 97% of the cases in which such a switch was called for rank order analyses showed that users of the visual manuals switched attention significantly more often than did users of the textual manual. No differences were found between conditions on learning effects and training time

Designing and evaluating procedural instructions with the four components model.

Procedures form the heart of user instructions, tutorials, reference guides, job-aids, online help, way-finding instructions, medicine prescriptions, and so on. This paper summarizes the four component model, which is intended to integrate best practices and research outcomes

Animated pedagogical agents effects on enhancing student motivation and learning in a science inquiry learning environment

This study focuses on the design and testing of a motivational animated pedagogical agent (APA) in an inquiry learning environment on kinematics. The aim of including the APA was to enhance students’ perceptions of task relevance and self-efficacy. Given the under-representation of girls in science classrooms, special attention was given to designing an APA that would appeal to the female students. A review of the literature suggested that the best design solution would be an agent who was female, young, attractive, and “cool”. An experiment compared three conditions: agent (image and voice), voice (no image), and control (no image and no voice). The research question was whether students’ motivation and knowledge changed over time as they worked in the inquiry learning environment, and whether condition and gender affected such changes. Participants were 61 third-year students (mean age 14.7 years) from a secondary school. Gender was distributed evenly within and across conditions. A significant main effect of time on self-efficacy was found, with self-efficacy beliefs increasing significantly for both boys and girls. In addition, there was a significant interaction between time, condition, and gender for self-efficacy. About halfway during training, girls’ self-efficacy beliefs significantly increased in both experimental conditions and decreased in the control condition. For boys the opposite pattern was found. Girls also gave higher appraisals for the agent. Students in all three conditions realized significant knowledge gains, which did not differ by gender. The discussion critically considers the need for, and design of motivational scaffolding in inquiry learning environment

QuikScan Formatting as a Means to Improve Text Recall

Purpose – QuikScan is an innovative text format that employs three prominent signaling devices – summaries, headings, and access cues – to make the reading of medium-to-long texts more productive. The experiments reported in this paper aim to examine the claim that QuikScan contributes to text recall. Design/methodology/approach – In two consecutive experiments a QuikScanned text (experimental condition) was compared to a non-QuickScanned text (control condition). In Experiment one, 41 university students read the text and then answered ten open recall questions. In Experiment two, 58 university students read the text and then wrote a summary and answered four recall questions. Findings – In Experiment one, a statistically significant overall effect on text recall favoring QuikScan was found. Detailed analyses revealed that QuikScan mainly affected the readers' responses to higher-order questions (d = 1.24). Experiment two showed that QuikScan led to significantly higher recall scores for the summaries. Just as in the first experiment, a strong effect on the higher-order questions was found (d = 1.27)

Effects of practice with videos for software training

This study investigated the contribution of practice in learning from Demonstration-Based Training (DBT) videos for software training. An experiment with three conditions is reported: practice followed by video (practice-video), video followed by practice (videopractice), and video only. The combination of practice and video was expected to enhance learning more than the video only condition. Also, practice-after was expected to be more effective than practice-before. The 82 participants, elementary students (mean age 11.2), achieved significant learning gains, reaching moderate to high levels of success on the immediate and delayed post-tests, and the transfer test. No practice effect was found. Also, there was no difference in test performance between practice conditions. The discussion advances several options for enhancing the effectiveness of the DBT-videos

Assessment of the minimalist approach to computer user documentation

The minimalist approach (Carroll, 1990a) advocates the development of a radically different type of manual when compared to a conventional one. For example, the manual should proceed almost directly to procedural skills development rather than building a conceptual model first. It ought to focus on authentic tasks practised in context, as opposed to mock exercises and isolated practice. In addition, it should stimulate users to exploit their knowledge and thinking, as opposed to imposing the writer's view and discussing everything that users should see or know.\ud \ud In the first part of the paper the construction of a tutorial based on the minimalist principles is described. A parallel is drawn with constructivism with which minimalism shares important notions of instruction. In the second part, an experiment is described in which the minimal manual was tested against a conventional one. The outcome favoured the new manual. For example, minimal manual users completed about 50% more tasks successfully on a performance test and displayed significantly more self-reliance (e.g. more self-initiated error-recoveries, and fewer manual consultations)