The effect of instruction method and relearning on Dutch spelling performance of third- through fifth-graders

Abstract

In this study, we compared two instruction methods on spelling performance: a rewriting instruction in which children repeatedly rewrote words and an ambiguous property instruction in which children deliberately practiced on a difficult word aspect. Moreover, we examined whether the testing effect applies to spelling performance. One hundred eighty-six Dutch elementary-school students (grades 3, 4, and 5) participated in this study. A mixed design was used in the present study, with age group and instruction as between-subject variables and relearning as a within-subject variable. We showed that after a 2-day retention interval, the rewriting condition outperformed the ambiguous property condition on spelling performance in all grades. The effect of relearning type was not significant nor was the instruction × relearning interaction. An error analysis showed that relative to the rewrite instruction, the ambiguous property instruction led to more errors on the non-practiced part of the words. By contrast, the rewrite instruction and ambiguous property instruction did not differ with respect to the errors on the practiced part of the words. The findings provide strong evidence for the superiority of a rewriting study instruction over an ambiguous property study instruction with respect to the performance on a delayed spelling test. Results from the conditional error analyses suggest that the beneficial influence of rewriting emerges because rewriting requires children to process the whole word rather than only a part of the word.Résumé La présente étude comparait deux méthodes d'instruction d'orthographe: celui de réécrire, dans laquelle les enfants écrions des mots répétèrent, et d'exercer avec des parts difficile d'un mot dans laquelle les enfants exercent les aspects difficiles des mots. De plus, on examine l'effet de tester en la performance orthographe. 186 enfants de l'école primaire de Pays-Bas (classes 3, 4, and 5) participaient en cette étude. Les résultats montraient que Eur J Psychol Educ (2011) 26:61-74 après une rétention de deux jours, les enfants de toutes des classes faisaient moins de fautes orthographes quand ils avaient eu l'instruction de réécrire que quand ils avaient eu l'instruction de exercer avec des part difficiles des mots. Il n'était pas un effet de tester et il n'était pas non plus un effet de l'instruction × tester. Une analyse de fautes orthographes montrait que, en comparaison de l'instruction de réécrire, l'instruction d'exercer avec des parts difficile d'un mot tournait a plus des fautes en le part du mot que on n'avait pas exercé. Au contraire de ceci, les deux méthodes d'instruction ne différaient pas à propos des fautes en le part des mots qui on avait exercé. Les résultats procurent l'évidence que l'instruction de réécrire est meilleur que l'instruction d'exercer avec des parts difficile d'un mot. Les résultats d'analyse des fautes suggèrent que l'instruction de réécrire est meilleur parce qu'il faut que les enfants exercent tout le mot au lieu de une part de mot seulement.

Rethinking the Use of Tests: A Meta-Analysis of Practice Testing

“…Testing effect studies have been conducted with participants of diverse age groups in diverse populations that range from elementary or preschool-aged students (e.g., Bouwmeester & Verkoeijen, 2011; Fritz, Morris, Nolan, & Singleton 2007) to elderly adults (e.g., Bishara & Jacoby, 2008; Tse, Balota, & Roediger, 2010). Most testing effect studies have been conducted in unimpaired populations for all age and education levels, but some have examined atypical populations associated with memory dysfunction (e.g., Sumowski, Chiaravalloti, & DeLuca, 2010).…”

The benefit of retrieval practice over elaborative restudy in primary school vocabulary learning

“…Possibly in our study it was more helpful in terms of final test performance to process the target word and its definition through pure restudy, rather than to elaborate on the target word. Hence, it may be that the elaborative restudy condition failed to outperform the pure restudy condition due to a lack of transfer-appropriate processing (e.g., Blaxton, 1989;Bouwmeester & Verkoeijen, 2011a;Morris, Bransford, & Franks, 1977;Thomas & McDaniel, 2007).…”