Techniques Used in Learning Math

STUDENTS PREFERRED LEARNING TECHNIQUE IN COPING MATH DIFFICULTIES

A Junior High School Research Paper Presented to The Junior High School Research Committee

In Partial Fulfillment of the Course Requirements In Research 9 (Quanti-Qualitative Research) Members: Cairo, Lindy Raymund A. Cabizares, Ingrid P. Flores, Charry Jane C. Labaya, Godwin M. Ocampo, Brian L. Santiago, Patriciah R. Valle, Vincent C.

1

Approval Sheet This research entitled “STUDENTS PREFERRED LEARNING TECHNIQUE IN COPING MATH DIFFICULTIES” prepared and submitted by the Grade 9 (JUSTICE) - Group number 2 in partial fulfillment of the requirements in Research is hereby recommended for approval.

February 29, 2020 Date

Accepted as partial fulfillment of the requirements in Research

2

Table of Contents

Approval Sheet

ii

Acknowledgement

iv

CHAPTER I

5

Rationale

5

Theoretical/ Conceptual Background

8

Theoretical/ Conceptual Framework

10

Statement of the Problem

11

Significance of the Study

12

CHAPTER II

13

Related Literature

13

Related Studies

17

CHAPTER III

29

Research Design

29

Respondents of the Study

29

Data Gathering Procedure

29

Research Environment

30

Research Instrument

31

CHAPTER IV

32

CHAPTER V

34

Summary

34

Findings

34

Conclusion

34

Recommendation

36

BIBLIOGRAPHY

41

Appendix A - Letter to the School Principal

38

Appendix B–Research Instrument

39

CURRICULUM VITAE

44

3

4

Today, some students may have difficulty in getting through their problems in certain subjects, whereas some may have just the breeze in completing or solving their topics. It is because they have their own way on how they would like to learn things, or in other terms, they have learned or mastered a learning technique to help them cope with subjects that they find difficult such as Mathematics, Science, etc. Teachers or even parents want to help those students that are struggling in understanding and coping with their studies and in which it can also help improve their skills in using studying strategies and also remove those bad habits or their ineffective ways on how they learn, resulting in small gains in their performance.

Parents become concerned and confused when their children struggle in school. Many times children begin school performing well but then as time progresses, their grades begin to fall, and parents are left wondering what happened and how to deal with it effectively. Children struggle academically for numerous reasons, but children can overcome their struggles when parents and teachers work with them. There are multiple reasons why students have problems in learning or understanding a certain subject. They may have learning disabilities, social problems, boredom in school, etc. With these problems present in students it may let them have a difficult time to seek help to people such as teachers. As class sizes in education are increasing, it creates

5

a significant challenge for teachers, for they will be having a hard time to attempt to support or help individual students which may leave other students helpless.

Fortunately for students, scientists were able to create learning techniques to help struggling students. According to the Association for Psychological Science (APS) stated on August 16, 2012, psychological scientists have developed and evaluated the effectiveness of a wide range of learning techniques meant to enhance academic performance. In this report, Dunlosky., reviewed the effectiveness of 10 commonly used learning techniques and classified their utility from low to high on how useful the techniques are when applied to a subject, and due to how hard it is for one student to master or learn such technique. Though the meta-study did not specifically provide a 1-10 ranking in terms of most effective to least effective study method, these

“learning

techniques”

ranged

from

its

worst

technique

which

is

the

“Highlighting/Marking/Underlining” to its best which is the Distributed practice. Each learning technique may not be applicable to all subjects, but if used correctly with its suitable subject, it may just help you with the problem. Difficulties are often unavoidable but the important part is the learning process.

Learning techniques would really play a huge role in our world especially to the lives of students, it would be a game changer for those who are having a hard time understanding or learning things.

The real-world guidance provided by this research is based on psychological science, making it an especially valuable tool for students, parents, and teachers who wish to promote effective learning. Although there are many reasons why students struggle in school, these learning techniques, when used properly, should help provide meaningful gains in classroom

6

performance, achievement test scores, and many other tasks students will encounter across their lifespan.

Conducting this study would allow parents, students or teachers to be informed what learning techniques other students prefer to use in order for them to learn or solve their problems, and would also allow us to identify which of the learning techniques would be compatible with different subjects. Students would be able to choose from a variety of techniques. Like for instance the visual kind of learning technique where a person prefers to use pictures, images, or spatial understanding or the verbal kind where a person uses words both in speech or in writing.

7

The students would be able to test out techniques that would be more suitable for them so they could improve in a particular subject where they would tend to have problems with. There would be a tremendous change in the field of education especially with students easily coping with a certain topic because of the technique they’re using.This study targets to determine the students preferred learning technique. The student would be able to identify which technique would be more suitable for their taste. The student would slowly but gradually improve their technique if used correctly. The student would be able to overcome the problems they are facing with the help of the learning technique they will be using.

In this study the researchers will be talking about the background of our study which is Students preferred learning techniques in coping math difficulties.

On the month of August 16, 2012, John Dunlosky had realize that there’s got to be some sort of technique that would help students in their studies especially in mathematics, and within that realization of his, he has come up with 10 techniques that would essentially help students cope with their studies, namely, Elaborative Interrogation, Self- Explanation, Summarization, Highlighting, The keyword mnemonic, Imagery use, Rereading, Practice Testing, Distributed Practice, Interleaved Practice. These techniques however weren’t discovered by John Dunlosky, he just gathered them and named each technique with the help of Psychologists/Scientists from the organization Association for Psychological Science (APS) but John Dunlosky was the one who contributed lots to their research but on this study the researchers have decided to choose the 5 most used learning techniques by students and that is Self explanation, Practice Testing, Highlighting, Elaborative Interrogation and Imagery use.

8

Self explanation just like from the name itself, it is the practice of thinking out loud.

You talk to yourself as you work on a problem, in order to force a conscious awareness of the process your mind is going through. ... Perhaps one way to describe both techniques is that your mind is watching (monitoring) your brain. Next one we have is Practice Testing, Practice testing refers to any form of testing for learning which a student is able to do on their own.

Examples

of

this technique include

practicing

recall

through

flash

cards,

or

completing practice problems or tests. Highlighting involves students marking what they consider to be important parts of material being learned while reading, typically by underlining or using a coloured marker. Active highlighting helps student performance more than passive highlighting (someone else has highlighted what the students read). Now, Elaborative Interrogation, is a strategy within this broad idea, and it involves asking “how" and “why" questions and finding those answers (1). Students can do this independently, with the teacher helping, or in pairs of groups. ... Students may also produce incorrect explanations in answer to their own questions and finally, Imagery use, imagery use is a stress management technique, where you use your imagination to picture a person, place, or time that makes you feel relaxed, peaceful and happy. Imagery use is slightly different from other stress management techniques, in that it relies on the use of all of your senses.

The researchers would then find out which learning technique is effective in coping math difficulties for students.

9

CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

10

STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM 1. What strategy is suitable in coping difficulty in Mathematics for Grade 9 level?

2. How do these learning techniques help students?

11

SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY The following people are the beneficiaries of this study: Students – they would benefit from this study since it would allow them to be informed that every learning technique has their own applicable subject in which it would help them understand a problem, and would also let their learning and understanding skills improve.

Parents – they would benefit from this study since it would lessen their burden of always helping and worrying about their children about how they would learn or improve their learning skills

Future researchers – they would benefit from this study since this may serve as their “building blocks” or their research or may give them additional information regarding on what learning technique is fit for a certain subject for each grade level

Admin - they would benefit from this study since it would allow them to inform the teachers to use these learning techniques to improve their students’ learning skills

Teachers – they would benefit from this study since these will allow them to improve their student’s learning and understanding skills depending on their students’ preferred learning technique

12

This chapter shows the related literature and studies after the thorough and in-Depth.

Search done by the researchers. Students had been struggling for the past few years to pass a test.

Most of the College students had been suffering due to the finals. Study shows that 50% of the students fail College. The researchers are constructing a research paper to help the 50%.

School is for learning. But ironically, one of the things that people don’t really learn to do well in school is to learn, according to Psychological Science in the Public Interest (8th of January,2003) Many students are being left behind by an educational system that some people believe is in crisis. Improving educational outcomes will require efforts on many fronts, but a central premise of this monograph is that one part of a solution involves helping students to better regulate their learning through the use of effective learning techniques. Fortunately, cognitive and educational psychologists have been developing and evaluating easy-to-use learning techniques that could help students achieve their learning goals. In this monograph, psychologists discuss 10 learning techniques in detail and offer recommendations about their relative utility. The psychologists selected techniques that were expected to be relatively easy to use and hence could be adopted by many students. Also, some techniques (e.g., highlighting and rereading) were selected because students report relying heavily on them, which makes it especially important to examine how well they work. The techniques include elaborative interrogation, self-explanation, summarization, highlighting (or underlining), the keyword mnemonic, imagery use for text learning, rereading, practice testing, distributed practice, and interleaved practice. According to Youth Central Study (24th of August, 2003) Isn't only for the

13

night before a task's expected or the night before a test. It's rarely too soon or past the point of no return to grow great investigation propensities. The sooner you get into a decent report groove, the simpler everything will be and the more your odds of getting great imprints will improve.

There are 4 tips Youth Central has given. The 1st one is Pick a place and time everyone has their own idea about the best place and time to study. Whether it's your bedroom at night or the library after school, find a study space and a regular study time that works for you and stick with it. 2nd is to study every single day when you study a little every day, you will analyze things in your mind on an ongoing basis. This will help you understand issues. It also allows you to stop last minute cramming pressure. 3rd isto discover your learning style most of us preferred a way of learning. Get to know what type of learning with which you are the most comfortable and practice the best ways to learn. 4th is to take breaks while you’re studying. It’s important to take breaks, especially if you feel tired or frustrated. In reality, being distracted of some sort could reduce your efficiency.

According to Examined Existence, students are taught rote memorization and told to absorb it for arbitrary tests without being taught how to effectively absorb the material. And it seems as if the methods we were actually taught in school aren’t all that effective. In a meta-analysis published several years ago, 10 of the most popular learning techniques were studied and their effectiveness were ranked. The methods were categorized as low, moderate, or high in terms of utility in absorbing learned material. Highlighting/marking/underlining, summarizing, and rereading—-all popular study methods taught in school—-registered as low utility. Practice testing, practice testing doesn’t need to actually be an actual test and in a testing environment. In actuality, you can test yourself anytime, anywhere, and with anything. You can

14

test yourself in your head by asking yourself questions and answering them. You can also test yourself by using flash cards. You can test yourself by doing practice problems without the aid of notes or textbook material. And yes, you can test yourself by setting yourself up in a testing environment.

Practice testing is highly effective because it is reasonable with time demands, doesn’t take a whole lot to learn how to do, and works for all types of tasks and subjects. Elaborative Interrogation, elaborative interrogation is not highly suggested by most psychologists since this method is particularly efficient with time as one study on self-paced learning showed that elaborative interrogation took 32 minutes (reading + elaborative interrogation) compared to 28 minutes for the reading-only group. This is particularly good news as reading is generally monotonous thus elaborative interrogation done during reading can enhance learning by taking away the monotony. As for self explanation it is a close relative of elaborative interrogation.

This method involves the participant explaining and recording how one reaches an answer or conclusion. This is actually a popular method for solving abstract problems and similar to the requirement in many math classes to show your work. This was found to be more effective when done during the initial learning stage, instead of after learning. A strength of this learning strategy is that it can be applied to a whole variety of tasks and subjects. However, studies show that this method does require some training and is one of the more time consuming methods of study. Additionally, there have not been too many studies that have tested long-term retention of the material learned through self-explanation; most studies administered testing minutes after the conclusion of the tasks. Highlighting is one of the most popular methods for students in college.

Although an extremely popular method of learning, highlighting ranked rather low on this

15

study’s utility scale. This technique is popular because it is very easy to implement and requires very little training. Most studies analyzed in the meta-analysis showed no noticeable improvement in test scores by highlighting over simply reading the information. Although highlighting, underlining, and marking materials is often paired with other methodologies of learning, the study evaluated highlighting on its own merit. Thus the reason that highlighting does score a higher utility score on this meta-analysis is because its effectiveness and applicability is limited to certain information and tasks. And finally Imagery use, This method is different from keyword mnemonics as this method forms a mental image of a whole sentence/concept, instead of a single keyword. The authors stated that: Developing images can enhance mental organization or integration of information in the text, and idiosyncratic images of particular referents in the text could enhance learning as well (cf. distinctive processing; Hunt, 2006). Moreover, using one’s prior knowledge to generate a coherent representation of a narrative may enhance general understanding of the text; if so, the influence of imagery use may be robust across criterion tasks that tap memory and comprehension.

However, the psychologists suggest that the method is rather limited in nature. This method, like the keyword mnemonics method above, does require some training to do effectively. Studies of imagery use have only been limited to texts that are rather easy to imagine, and not abstract concepts, such as topics that are more mathematical and scientific in nature. But even studies with image-friendly reading shows that the results are a mixed bag.

Some studies show students benefited, while others did not. Though there is evidence of benefit when imagery is used for just one sentence, a study of this method using long text found that imagery used in text learning had no noticeable benefit on high school students. Overall imagery

16

use for text learning receives a low utility score because of its variability in result, and the fact that it only works for short image-friendly text. Additionally, a large amount of training is required to use the method.

Although these learning techniques are ranked from best to worst, it is not stated that students have to go for the best learning technique to cope with mathematics, they have to go for the learning technique in which they prefer and are comfortable with so that coping with mathematics wouldn’t be difficult for the students.

17

REVIEW OF RELATED STUDIES

The capacity to examine adequately is fundamental in a medicinal degree. Right off the bat, having a successful method for learning is critical to finishing medicinal school, to adapt to the huge volume of data educated. Besides, drug and medical procedures are vocations that require steady adaptation; best practice is constantly changing and it is critical to have the option to incorporate these progressions into your clinical practice. Thirdly, setting up productive learning methods while at medicinal school will be useful to you as and when you approach participation assessments, where concentration must be fitted around clinical responsibilities.

Contemplating adequately relies on 2 factors: the substance you mean to concentrate and how you learn. Learning styles traditionally fall into 4 gatherings as indicated by the VARK model (Visual, Aural, Read/Write, and Kinesthetic) yet medicinal understudies appear to be multimodal in their learning style1. This infers diverse learning procedures regularly credited to certain learning styles might be gainful to understudies of other learning styles and consequently endeavoring to decide your one of a kind learning style may unite your strategies for study.

Comprehensively, study is separated into "Book Work" and "Handy Work." As a restorative understudy, this means "Composed Papers" and "Clinical Exams," individually, in spite of the fact that there is regularly critical coverage. Independent of what is to be contemplated, a plan must be viewed as first. A strong arrangement and correction timetable are basic to progress upon assessment. To start with, discover the date of your assessment/s, at that point work back to derive to what extent you need to get ready. As of now, you should likewise think about the arrangement of the assessment, either by perusing advantageous material offered by the restorative school or by requesting direct records from understudies in the years above

18

you who have encountered the assessment and can give additional tips and data. These snappy errands guarantee that your planning and imminent investigation is appropriate to the assessment you will do.

Some prefer to commit explicit days of the week to specific themes and others, various times in a day and this will change from individual to individual. It is perhaps best to actualize a blend of the 2, where there is an underlying square session to set up the nuts and bolts, trailed by various union periods after some time to go over and strengthen your learning2. For enormous points, it is frequently simpler and additional time effective to attempt to set up an example of discovering that includes standard, little times of work. Exchanging between subjects when contemplating may likewise help in compelling learning.

According to the Association for Psychological Science, if simple techniques were available that teachers and students could use to improve student learning and achievement, would you be surprised if teachers were not being told about these techniques and if many students were not using them? What if students were instead adopting ineffective learning techniques that undermined their achievement, or at least did not improve it? Shouldn’t they stop using these techniques and begin using ones that are effective? Psychologists have been developing and evaluating the efficacy of techniques for study and instruction for more than 100 years. Nevertheless, some effective techniques are underutilized—many teachers do not learn about them, and hence many students do not use them, despite evidence suggesting that the techniques could benefit student achievement with little added effort. Also, some learning techniques that are popular and often used by students are relatively ineffective. One potential reason for the disconnect between research on the efficacy of learning techniques and their use in

19

educational practice is that because so many techniques are available, it would be challenging for educators to sift through the relevant research to decide which ones show promise of efficacy and could feasibly be implemented by students (Pressley, Goodchild, Fleet, Zajchowski, & Evans, 1989).

Toward meeting this challenge, Psychologists explored the efficacy of 10 learning techniques (listed in Table 1) that students could use to improve their success across a wide variety of content domains.1 The learning techniques psychologists consider here were chosen on the basis of the following criteria. Psychologists chose some techniques (e.g., self-testing, distributed practice) because an initial survey of the literature indicated that they could improve student success across a wide range of conditions. Other techniques (e.g., rereading and highlighting) were included because students report using them frequently. Moreover, students are responsible for regulating an increasing amount of their learning as they progress from elementary grades through middle school and high school to college. Lifelong learners also need to continue regulating their own learning, whether it takes place in the context of postgraduate education, the workplace, the development of new hobbies, or recreational activities. Thus, psychologists limited our choices to techniques that could be implemented by students without assistance (e.g., without requiring advanced technologies or extensive materials that would have to be prepared by a teacher).

Some training may be required for students to learn how to use a technique with fidelity, but in principle, students should be able to use the techniques without supervision. Psychologists also chose techniques for which a sufficient amount of empirical evidence was available to support at least a preliminary assessment of potential efficacy. Of course, psychologists could not review all the techniques that meet these criteria, given the in-depth nature of our reviews, and

20

these criteria excluded some techniques that show much promise, such as techniques that are driven by advanced technologies. Because teachers are most likely to learn about these techniques

in

educational

psychology

classes,

psychologists

examined

how

some

educational-psychology textbooks covered them (Ormrod, 2008; Santrock, 2008; Slavin, 2009; Snowman, McCown, & Biehler, 2009; Sternberg & Williams, 2010; Woolfolk, 2007). Despite the promise of some of the techniques, many of these textbooks did not provide sufficient coverage, which would include up-to-date reviews of their efficacy and analyses of their generalizability and potential limitations.

Accordingly, for all of the learning techniques listed in Table 1, psychologists reviewed the literature to identify the generalizability of their benefits across four categories of variables—materials, learning conditions, student characteristics, and criterion tasks. The choice of these categories was inspired by Jenkins’ (1979) model (for an example of its use in educational contexts, see Marsh & Butler, in press), and examples of each category are presented in Table 2. Materials pertain to the specific content that students are expected to learn, remember, or comprehend. Learning conditions pertain to aspects of the context in which students are interacting with the to-be learned materials. These conditions include aspects of the learning environment itself (e.g., noisiness vs. quietness in a classroom), but they largely pertain to the way in which a learning technique is implemented. For instance, a technique could be used only once or many times (a variable referred to as dosage) when students are studying, or a technique could be used when students are either reading or listening to the to-be learned materials. Any number of student characteristics could also influence the effectiveness of a given learning technique. For example, in comparison to more advanced students, younger students in early grades may not benefit from a technique. Students’ basic cognitive abilities, such as working

21

memory capacity or general fluid intelligence, may also influence the efficacy of a given technique. In an educational context, domain knowledge refers to the valid, relevant knowledge a student brings to a lesson.

Domain knowledge may be required for students to use some of the learning techniques listed in Table 1. For instance, the use of imagery while reading texts requires that students know the objects and ideas that the words refer to so that they can produce internal images of them.

Students with some domain knowledge about a topic may also find it easier to use self-explanation and elaborative interrogation, which are two techniques that involve answering “why” questions about a particular concept (e.g., “Why would particles of ice rise up within a cloud?”). Domain knowledge may enhance the benefits of summarization and highlighting as well. Nevertheless, although some domain knowledge will benefit students as they begin learning new content within a given domain, it is not a prerequisite for using most of the learning techniques.

The degree to which the efficacy of each learning technique obtains across long retention intervals and generalizes across different criterion tasks is of critical importance. Our reviews and recommendations are based on evidence, which typically pertains to students’ objective performance on any number of criterion tasks. Criterion tasks (Table 2, rightmost column) vary with respect to the specific kinds of knowledge that they tap. Some tasks are meant to tap students’ memory for information (e.g., “What is operant conditioning?”), others are largely meant to tap students’ comprehension (e.g., “Explain the difference between classical conditioning and operant conditioning”), and still others are meant to tap students’ application of knowledge (e.g., “How would you apply operant conditioning to train a dog to sit down?”).

Indeed, Bloom and colleagues divided learning objectives into six categories, from memory (or

22

knowledge) and comprehension of facts to their application, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation (B. S. Bloom, Engelhart, Furst, Hill, & Krathwohl, 1956; for an updated taxonomy, see L. W. Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001). In discussing how the techniques influence criterion performance, psychologists emphasize investigations that have gone beyond demonstrating improved memory for target material by measuring students’ comprehension, application, and transfer of knowledge.

Note, however, that although gaining factual knowledge is not considered the only or ultimate objective of schooling, psychologists unabashedly consider efforts to improve student retention of knowledge as essential for reaching other instructional objectives; if one does not remember core ideas, facts, or concepts, applying them may prove difficult, if not impossible.

Students who have forgotten principles of algebra will be unable to apply them to solve problems or use them as a foundation for learning calculus (or physics, economics, or other related domains), and students who do not remember what operant conditioning is will likely have difficulties applying it to solve behavioral problems.

Psychologists are not advocating that students spend their time robotically memorizing facts; instead, psychologists are acknowledging the important interplay between memory for a concept on one hand and the ability to comprehend and apply it on the other. An aim of this monograph is to encourage students to use the appropriate learning technique (or techniques) to accomplish a given instructional objective. Some learning techniques are largely focused on bolstering students’ memory for facts (e.g., the keyword mnemonic), others are focused more on improving comprehension (e.g., self-explanation), and yet others may enhance both memory and comprehension (e.g., practice testing). Thus, our review of each learning technique describes how it can be used, its effectiveness for producing long-term retention and comprehension, and

23

its breadth of efficacy across the categories of variables listed in Table 2.

The review for each technique can be read independently of the others, and particular variables of interest can be easily compared across techniques. To foreshadow our final recommendations, the techniques vary widely with respect to their generalizability and promise for improving student learning. Practice testing and distributed practice received high utility assessments because they benefit learners of different ages and abilities and have been shown to boost students’ performance across many criterion tasks and even in educational contexts.

Elaborative interrogation, self-explanation, and interleaved practice received moderate utility assessments. The benefits of these techniques do generalize across some variables, yet despite their promise, they fell short of a high utility assessment because the evidence for their efficacy is limited. For instance, elaborative interrogation and self explanation have not been adequately evaluated in educational contexts, and the benefits of interleaving have just begun to be systematically explored, so the ultimate effectiveness of these techniques is currently unknown.

Nevertheless, the techniques that received moderate-utility ratings show enough promise for us to recommend their use in appropriate situations, which psychologists describe in detail within the review of each technique.

Five techniques received a low utility assessment: summarization, highlighting, the keyword mnemonic, imagery used for text learning, and rereading. These techniques were rated as low utility for numerous reasons. Summarization and imagery use for text learning have been shown to help some students on some criterion tasks, yet the conditions under which these techniques produce benefits are limited, and much research is still needed to fully explore their

24

overall effectiveness. The keyword mnemonic is difficult to implement in some contexts, and it appears to benefit students for a limited number of materials and for short retention intervals.

Most students report rereading and highlighting, yet these techniques do not consistently boost students’ performance, so other techniques should be used in their place (e.g., practice testing instead of rereading).

The Psychologists’ hope is that this monograph will foster improvements in student learning, not only by showcasing which learning techniques are likely to have the most generalizable effects but also by encouraging researchers to continue investigating the most promising techniques. Accordingly, in our closing remarks, psychologists discuss some issues for how these techniques could be implemented by teachers and students, and they highlight directions for future research.

In the following series of reviews, the psychologists’ consider the available evidence for the efficacy of each of the learning techniques. Each review begins with a brief description of the technique and a discussion about why it is expected to improve student learning. The psychologists then consider generalizability (with respect to learning conditions, materials, student characteristics, and criterion tasks), highlight any research on the technique that has been conducted in representative educational contexts, and address any identified issues for implementing the technique. Accordingly, the reviews are largely modular: Each of the 10 reviews is organized around these themes (with corresponding headers) so readers can easily identify the most relevant information without necessarily having to read the monograph in its entirety. At the end of each review, psychologists provide an overall assessment for each

25

technique in terms of its relative utility—low, moderate, or high. Students and teachers who are not already doing so should consider using techniques designated as high utility, because the effects of these techniques are robust and generalize widely. Techniques could have been designated as low utility or moderate utility for any number of reasons. For instance, a technique could have been designated as low utility because its effects are limited to a small subset of materials that students need to learn; the technique may be useful in some cases and adopted in appropriate contexts, but, relative to the other techniques, it would be considered low in utility because of its limited generalizability.

A technique could also receive a low- or moderate-utility rating if it showed promise, yet insufficient evidence was available to support confidence in assigning a higher utility assessment. In such cases, psychologists encourage researchers to further explore these techniques within educational settings, but students and teachers may want to use caution before adopting them widely. Most important, given that each utility assessment could have been assigned for a variety of reasons, psychologists discuss the rationale for a given assessment at the end of each review. Finally, our intent was to conduct exhaustive reviews of the literature on each learning technique. For techniques that have been reviewed extensively (e.g., distributed practice), however, psychologists relied on previous reviews and supplemented them with any research that appeared after they had been published. For many of the learning techniques, too many articles have been published to cite them all; therefore, in our discussion of most of the techniques, psychologists cite a subset of relevant articles.

Pressley and colleagues (Pressley, 1986; Pressley, Goodchild, et al., 1989) developed a good-strategy-user model, according to which being a sophisticated strategy user involves

26

“knowing the techniques that accomplish important life goals (i.e., strategies), knowing when and how to use those methods . . . and using those methods in combination with a rich network of nonstrategic knowledge that one possesses about the world” (p. 302). However, Pressley, Goodchild, et al. (1989) also noted that “many students are committed to ineffective strategies . . . moreover, there is not enough professional evaluation of techniques that are recommended in the literature, with many strategies oversold by proponents” (p. 301). Psychologists agree and hope that the current reviews will have a positive impact with respect to fostering further scientific evaluation of the techniques. Concerning students’ commitment to ineffective strategies, recent surveys have indicated that students most often endorse the use of rereading and highlighting, two strategies that psychologists found to have relatively low utility.

Nevertheless, some students do report using practice testing, and these students appear to benefit from its use. For instance, Gurung (2005) had college students describe the strategies they used in preparing for classroom examinations in an introductory psychology course.

The frequency of students’ reported use of practice testing was significantly correlated with their performance on a final exam (see also Hartwig & Dunlosky, 2012). Given that practice testing is relatively easy to use, students who do not currently use this technique should be able to incorporate it into their study routine. Why don’t many students consistently use effective techniques? One possibility is that students are not instructed about which techniques are effective or how to use them effectively during formal schooling. Part of the problem may be that teachers themselves are not told about the efficacy of various learning techniques. Given that teachers would most likely learn about these techniques in classes on educational psychology, it is revealing

that most

of the techniques do not receive sufficient coverage in

educational-psychology textbooks. Psychologists surveyed six textbooks (cited in the

27

Introduction), and, except for mnemonics based on imagery (e.g., the keyword mnemonic), none of the techniques was covered by all of the books. Moreover, in the subset of textbooks that did describe one or more of these techniques, the coverage in most cases was relatively minimal, with a brief description of a given technique and relatively little guidance on its use, effectiveness, and limitations.

Thus, many teachers are unlikely to get a sufficient introduction to which techniques work best and how to train students to use them. A second problem may be that a premium is placed on teaching students content and critical-thinking skills, whereas less time is spent teaching students to develop effective techniques and strategies to guide learning. As noted by McNamara (2010), “there is an overwhelming assumption in our educational system that the most important thing to deliver to students is content” (p. 341, italics in original). One concern here is that students who do well in earlier grades, in which learning is largely supervised, may struggle later, when they are expected to regulate much of their own learning, such as in high school or college. Teaching students to use these techniques would not take much time away from teaching content and would likely be most beneficial if the use of the techniques was consistently taught across multiple content areas, so that students could broadly experience their effects on learning and class grades.

Even here, however, recommendations on how to train students to use the most effective techniques would benefit from further research. One key issue concerns the earliest age at which a given technique could (or should) be taught. Teachers can expect that upper elementary students should be capable of using many of the techniques, yet even these students may need some guidance on how to most effectively implement them. Certainly, identifying the age at which students have the self-regulatory capabilities to effectively use a technique (and how much

28

training they would need to do so) is an important objective for future research. Another issue is how often students will need to be retrained or reminded to use the techniques to ensure that students will continue to use them when they are not instructed to do so.

Given the promise of some of the learning techniques, research on professional development that involves training teachers to help students use the techniques would be valuable. Beyond training students to use these techniques, teachers could also incorporate some of them into their lesson plans. For instance, when beginning a new section of a unit, a teacher could begin with a practice test (with feedback) on the most important ideas from the previous section. When students are practicing problems from a unit on mathematics, recently studied problems could be interleaved with related problems from previous units. Teachers could also harness distributed practice by re-presenting the most important concepts and activities over the course of several classes.

When introducing key concepts or facts in class, teachers could engage students in explanatory questioning by prompting them to consider how the information is new to them, how it relates to what they already know, or why it might be true. Even homework assignments could be designed to take advantage of many of these techniques. In these examples (and in others provided in the Issues for Implementation subsections), teachers could implement a technique to help students learn, regardless of whether students are themselves aware that a particular technique is being used. Psychologists realize that many factors are responsible whenever any one student fails to achieve in school (Hattie, 2009) and hence that a change to any single factor may have a relatively limited effect on student learning and achievement.

The learning techniques described in this monograph will not be a panacea for improving achievement for all students, and perhaps obviously, they will benefit only students who are

29

motivated and capable of using them. Nevertheless, when used properly, psychologists suspect that they will produce meaningful gains in performance in the classroom, on achievement tests, and on many tasks encountered across the life span. It is obvious that many students are not using effective learning techniques but could use the more effective techniques without much effort, so teachers should be encouraged to more consistently (and explicitly) train students to use learning techniques as they are engaged in pursuing various instructional and learning goals.

30

RESEARCH DESIGN The study is a Quanti-Qualitative approach to research. The Quanti-Qualitative approach will determine the effectiveness of the preferred learning techniques, specifically, for the students.

Moreover, the Quanti-Qualitative

approach will utilize a case study of

Quanti-Qualitative research.

DATA GATHERING PROCEDURE Once the questionnaires are ready, the chosen students would undergo a survey and would be done in time. The researchers will take note on what type of learning technique they would go for. The researchers will be tallying as soon as all of the questionnaires are answered.

RESPONDENTS OF THE STUDY The subjects of this research are the students of Asian College of Technology, in grade 9 specifically. The researchers will be choosing 15-20 of each section randomly and will be given questionnaires.

31

RESEARCH ENVIRONMENT

The researchers will be conducting the study on 710 Bulacao, Talisay, Cebu City, Cebu, since it would be easier and comfortable for the researchers to hand out the questionnaires to the respondents, specifically the grade 9 students.

32

RESEARCH INSTRUMENT This research will use a survey tool or questionnaires to gather data such as : 1.) Questionnaires - The researchers will be handing out these questionnaires to the chosen students to answer their preferred learning technique in terms of coping with mathematical difficulties. The questionnaire will consist of questions that would benefit the researchers in the 4th chapter so that the researchers will know which learning technique is the most preferred in coping with mathematical difficulties.

33

In this chapter, the researchers will be talking about the information that has been gathered by the use of the researchers questionnaire. The questionnaire has been answered by 24 respondents from the Grade 9 level of Asian College of Technology, Bulacao. The respondents were randomly chosen and given the chance to choose which learning technique they prefer to use in coping with mathematics..

The following are the gathered data and results needed in the survey questions:

LEARNING TECHNIQUES

Self Explanation

Practice Testing

Highlighting

Elaborative Interrogation

5-3

2-1

(preferred)

(not preferred)

13

11

(54.17%)

(45.83%)

14

10

(58.33%)

(41.67%)

16

8

(66.67%)

(33.33%)

15

9

(62.5%)

(37.5%)

34

Imagery Use

13

11

(54.17%)

(45.83%)

The results from the survey are now accomplished and majority of the respondents’ has most likely gone for Highlighting, followed by Elaborative Interrogation, averaging from 62.5%, Practice testing averaging from 58.33% and finally both Imagery use and Self explanation averaging from 54.17% . Majority of the respondents’ preferred Highlighting as a learning technique to cope with mathematics because the respondents would pick out the important information that is stated and then they would give an effective way to review that information later. Highlighting can be used in various ways, you can either use it to Highlight important words or Highlight problems that you are having a hard time with. The respondents stated that Highlighting has also helped them in a way to focus more on the mistakes they are making. A respondent has said that: “Mathematics is a hard subject and by highlighting important details we can at least know what to do next after each step of the equation that is given.”

In short, the respondents would be in frame of mind to know what will be happening to those numbers when they do finally look at them. Although Highlighting is not necessary for every student, it could still be useful to some students that are having a hard time coping with Mathematical problems.

35

CONCLUSION As said, the Highlighting technique would benefit students in coping with their Mathematical problems, with the use of this technique the student would highlight a part that they have difficulty on and focus on understanding and solving their problems. The result of this study and the questionnaire proves how Highlighting could help students in coping Mathematical difficulties. Highlighting could help students in not just coping with Mathematics but also with other subjects, basically the learning technique, Highlighting, is an all in one learning technique which essentially means this type of learning technique can be used in any subject, and any matter. Although the researchers are not saying the other learning techniques such as Elaborative Interrogation, Self Explanation, Imagery Use, and

36

Practice testing are not a “all in one” learning technique, all five of them are basically the same, but the thing is, Highlighting is more of a effective “all in one” learning technique than the other learning techniques according to the researchers instrument, the questionnaire.

The other four however, are still a benefit to the students coping with Mathematical difficulties, because not all students in the whole province, country or world would go for the learning technique that is most popular or used. Every student has a different taste or liking of a learning technique that they should go for is important. Choosing a learning technique that they are comfortable with is important because with this it would make learning much easier and more efficient especially to a subject such as Mathematics in which memorization is required to get an even better score. Learning techniques are not created to just pick one to go for, students can go for 2 or more learning techniques. It was not stated that students can only choose 1 learning technique to go for, students can choose anything, 2 or more, as long as it is helping you cope with subjects that you are in trouble with, you can even combine one learning technique to another to make your learning experience even better, that is why picking a learning technique that you can benefit and be comfortable with is important is so that it wouldn’t be a hassle for students to have a hard time coping with subjects they are having trouble with. Therefore, no matter how mostly used or popular this learning technique is, always pick whichever is the best for you to cope with.

37

RECOMMENDATIONS The researchers would like to recommend students to discover their own preferred learning technique. Finding the certain technique that fits their comfort zone improves their studying and learning skills. If a student picks a technique that suits his or her taste then it would benefit the students because it would enable their brain to work and it could refrain from boredom when one studies a certain topic that they may have difficulty in. Researchers recommend students to try out the highlighting technique because it’s simple and quite interesting to do. Highlighting/Underlining is used to help students organize what they have read by selecting what is important. This strategy teaches students to highlight/underline only the key words, phrases, vocabulary, and ideas that are central to understanding the reading.

The stress will be diminished if the student knows how to use his or her learning technique.

The researchers recommend the students to try out the different techniques which are self-explanation, practice testing, highlighting, elaborative interrogation, and visual spatial. If students try these out the students would be able to determine which their preferred learning technique is. The researchers recommend that students try the trial and error way so that the students can specifically determine the technique that the students prefer.

Once the students will be able to discover the technique that suits them, then the students will be able to study in a very easy and fun way. The advantages of choosing a technique that the student is comfortable with is because once the student will feel comfortable with that technique he or she won’t feel too stressed about topics he or she finds difficulty in. He or she will also feel relaxed because she would know how to use this

38

technique. He or she would be sure that the technique he or she is using is effective and won’t have to stress over topics that are difficult to understand.

39

The attached letter is proof that Asian College Of Technology International Education Foundation has given us permission to conduct our study Asian College of Technology, Bulacao campus on December 12, 2019 around 3:30 – 3:40 pm. Although the researchers had lost the original copy of the Transmittal letter with the actual signature of the JHS Principal, Nina Teresa C. Alilin, JHS Coordinator, Floramae S. Arain, and JHS Research Adviser, Roxan Mae T. Jao. The researchers had still made a copy of the original Transmittal letter to show what the researchers had written on the given letter.

40

Name (optional) : ___________ Age : _________

Section : _____________

1 . Which learning technique would you prefer more when coping in mathematics? Please rank the following from 1-5

- Self explanation (Is a learning technique in which students explain to themselves pieces of a learning material for the purpose of improving their understanding) - Practice testing (Practice testing refers to any form of testing for learning which a student is able to do on their own. Examples of this technique include practicing recall through flash cards, or completing practice problems or tests.)

- Highlighting (Highlighting involves students marking what they consider to be important parts of material being learned while reading, typically by underlining or using a colored marker.)

- Elaborative Interrogation (“Elaborative interrogation” is a strategy within this broad idea, and it involves asking “how” and “why” questions and finding those answers) - Imagery use (Imagery means to use figurative language to represent objects, actions and ideas in such a way that it appeals to our physical senses. Usually it is thought that imagery makes use of particular words that create visual representation of ideas in our minds.)

2. Was this learning technique you chose effective? (Please answer with full honesty since the researchers can benefit from your answer) _____________________________________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________.

41

3. Why did you choose this learning technique? (It would help us researchers to have your answer with full honesty) _____________________________________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________.

If you have any feedback, write it down. (Optional) _____________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________.

42

BIBLIOGRAPHY Alexander Fowler-Katharine Whitehurst-Yasser Al Omran-ShivanchanRajmohan-YagazieUdeaja-Kiron Koshy-BuketGundogan https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5673147/ Arra, Christopher T.; D'Antonio, Mark D.; D'Antonio, Mark, Jr. / Students’ Preferences for Cooperative Learning Instructional Approaches : Considerations for College Teachers / eric.ed.gov / September 2011 / Retrieved from https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ1098390 Bethany Rittle-Johnson ; Abby M. Loehr ; Kelly Durkin / Promoting Self-Explanation to improve mathematics learning : A meta-analysis and instructional design principles / link.springer.com / January 19, 2017 / Retrieved from https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11858-017-0834-z#citeas Central, Y. (2019). Study Tips / Study Techniques / Study Help / Youth Central. / November 13, 2019/ Retrieved from https://www.youthcentral.vic.gov.au/study-and-training/help-with-study/how-to-study-bet ter/top-10-study-tips Dunlosky, J., & Rawson, K. A. / Practice tests, spaced practice, and successive relearning: Tips for classroom use and for guiding students’ learning. Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Psychology, 1(1), 72–78. / psycnet.apa.org / 2015 / Retrieved from https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2015-13426-004 Dunlosky, J.; Rawson, K. A.; Marsh, E. J.; Nathan, M. J.; & Willingham, D. T. / Effective Learning Techniques from Cognitive and Educational Psychology / UNB.ca / 2013 / Retrieved from https://www.unb.ca/fredericton/cetl/tls/resources/teaching_tips/tt_instructional_methods/e ffective_learning_techniques.html Dunlosky, J., Rawson, K. A., Marsh, E. J., Nathan, M. J., & Willingham, D. T. / Improving Students’ Learning With Effective Learning Techniques: Promising Directions From Cognitive and Educational Psychology. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 14(1), 4–58. / doi.org /2013 / Retrieved from https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1529100612453266#articleCitationDownloadC ontainer Edward Kang / 5 research-backed studying techniques / Edutopia / April 4, 2019 /

43

https://www.edutopia.org/article/5-research-backed-studying-techniques Enriching young minds and hearts / Using highlighters as a math strategy / http://www.enrichingyoungmindsandhearts.com/math-strategies/using-highlighters-in-ma th-math-strategy-of-the-month/ Henry L. Roediger, III / Improving Students’ Learning With Effective Learning Techniques: Promising Directions From Cognitive and Educational Psychology / Psychological science / January 7, 2013 / Retrieved from https://www.psychologicalscience.org/publications/journals/pspi/learning-techniques.htm l James Rhay Johnston ; Helbert Rondon Berrios / Applying effective teaching and learning techniques to nephrology education / research gate.net / August 5, 2016 / Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/307548829_Applying_effective_teaching_and_ learning_techniques_to_nephrology_education Janice Friedman / Top 10 Learning Techniques: ranking from best to worst / Examined Existence / March 27, 2017 / Retrieved from https://examinedexistence.com/top-10-learning-techniques-ranking-from-best-to-worst/ Jeffrey S. Rosenthal / Active learning strategies in advanced mathematics classes / srhe.tandfonline.com / August 05, 2006 / Retrieved from https://srhe.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03075079512331381723#.XnDVgagzbDc Peter / 10 Learning techniques rated according to a scientific study – find out which is the best / gainweightjournal / December 21, 2018 / Retrieved from https://gainweightjournal.com/10-learning-techniques-rated-according-to-a-scientific-stu dy-find-out-which-is-the-best/ Robert A. Bjork ; Dunlosky John ; Nate Kornell / Self-Regulated Learning: Beliefs, Techniques, and Illusions / annual reviews. Org / September 27 , 2012 Retrieved from https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev-psych-113011-143823 Steven Engler ; Benjamin Berger / Reading in Colors : Highlighting for Active Reading in Religious Studies / onlinelibrary.wiley.com / January 19, 2004 / Retrieved from https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/1467-9647.00091 Tri / Examined Science / Top 10 Learning Techniques : Ranking From Best to Worst / May 29 2017 / Retrieved from https://examinedexistence.com/top-10-learning-techniques-ranking-from-best-to-worst/

44

Vicki S. Gier ; Daniel Herring ; Jason Hudnell ; Jodi Montoya ; David S. Kreiner / Active Reading Procedures for Moderating the Effects of Poor Highlighting / February 01, 2010 / Retrieved from https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02702710903397082 Whaowia Te Kete Matauraka / Effective Study Techniques / otago.ac.nz / October 26 / 2016 / Retrieved from https://www.otago.ac.nz/hedc/otago615340.pdf

45