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Popular belief holds that much of what is taught in classrooms is forgotten shortly thereafter. However, there is evidence from numerous studies that long-term retention for knowledge taught in school is substantial. These studies are reviewed, and several variables that affect the ability to remember are discussed. The article concludes that (a) students retain much of the knowledge taught in the classroom; (b) retention decreases over time as a function of the length of the retention interval but the forgetting curves for knowledge taught in school do not decline as rapidly or asymptote as low as the curves observed in traditional laboratory studies; (c) increasing the level of original learning differentially affects retention performance; (d) both instructional content and assessment tasks affect learning and retention, with one of the most consistent effects being that recognition tasks are retained at higher levels than recall tasks; (e) most instructional strategies that promote higher levels of original learning do not result in differentially better retention (however, several exceptions are discussed); and (f) while higher ability students learn and remember more than lower ability students, there is no evidence for differential forgetting. Implications for research and teaching are discussed.

Sciences (ARI) has been investigating soldiers' retention of skills and knowledge learned during training. How well a soldier remembers what was learned in training influences how well a soldier can later perform a task and determines the frequency with which retraining needs to occur. Understanding the nature of skill retention thus has important implications for both Army training and personnel policy.The research reported here summarizes over 25 years of work on the topic of skill retention. The report emphasizes research performed by ARI, but also includes relevant research by other military and academic laboratories. Products from ARI research include a model for predicting skill retention, endorsed by TRADOC and applied numerous times, most recently to the 'peace support operations' tasks trained to troops deploying to Bosnia. This research has also led to personnel policy changes, such as increasing the window (from 12 months to 24 months following active duty) for the initial recall of soldiers from the Individual Ready Reserve in the event of a mobilization. We plan to continue research on skill retention issues, focusing on the digital skills required for the decentralized, fluid, fast-paced operations of the future.

Three experiments examined students' long-term retention of knowledge learned in college courses. In Experiment 1 retention was measured 4 and 11 months after the term ended. Students retained a great deal of what they originally learned, and there were no differential forgetting effects as a function of level of original learning. Experiment 2 compared retention for recall test items and 3 types of multiple-choice test items: recognition, comprehension, and mental skills. Students performed poorer on recall items, but there were no differences among the multiple-choice items measuring the other types of tasks. Experiment 3 analyzed retention for student tutors. Tutors retained more after 4 months than the students they tutored. This suggests that tutoring, a type of overlearning, has positive effects that are maintained over time.

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