A Systematic Review of (Classroom) Retrieval Practice

Does retrieval practice improve student learning in school and classroom settings?

There is an abundance of evidence to suggest that retrieval practice has a large effect size on improving learning for a variety of education settings. However, what impact does it have in the classroom…

Over the last decade, there has been an explosion of interest from teachers to learn more about retrieval practice!

In a new paper published by Agarwal et al, 2021, the term “classroom research” is used to conduct a narrow literature review on published retrieval practice research. Over 2,000 abstracts and 50 coded experiments were screened “to establish a clear picture of the benefits of retrieval practice in real-world educational settings.”

Where classroom relevant materials used by students during class, under the supervision of a teacher or researcher, only 37 studies met the full screening criteria.

This new paper looks exclusively at retrieval practice conducted in classroom settings. This is a welcomed addition to this field, as much of the past research most teachers have cited, myself included, has often been conducted in laboratory settings.

As a doctoral student, the introductory section of the paper offers a comprehensive picture of how academics identify their research (page 10), including how to use research databases to screen past published research. This may not be relevant for teachers in terms of practical application, but very useful for teachers who are interested in how research is gathered.

Definitions

“Retrieval practice in the classroom takes many forms that differ from the typical notion of a test… These low-stakes or no-stakes classroom learning activities were seldom referred to as ‘tests’ by the authors of the studies.” Teachers are more likely to use ‘quizzes’ or teaching terms such as ‘Do now’ activities to identify where retrieval practice activities are consciously used. Software such as Kahoot, Quizlet and many others are often used to support this…

“The process of practising retrieval that shapes learning, not tests” is referred to in this paper. Retrieval is also defined as “every class, once a week, once a month” with K12, content, delay and feedback also identified in the aims.

Results

From the 50 experiments coded in this review, the total sample size was n = 5,374 with education levels from 6 years of to college age. Only three (6 per cent) of studies included research conducted outside of WEIRD (Western, educated, industrialized, rich and democratic) countries. Those three countries were Taiwan, Turkey and Pakistan.

Sample sizes range from fewer than 20 to nearly 400 students with delays between retrieval practice and the final test from one day to the end of term. Quite a wide-ranging sample…

From my limited understanding of retrieval practice, most tend to focus on secondary and college students and maths and science subjects (35/50). As ever, I’m always curious to learn how retrieval practice works in primary school settings and in other subjects. Digging into the database results (page 14), only five (from 50) studies were conducted in primary schools. Fifteen in secondary classrooms and 30 in college environments.

The majority of past published results revealed medium to large effect sizes; something I will help explain in a future blog post. Whilst we know retrieval practice is a great strategy to strengthen memory, there is not much-published research to highlight how retrieval practice works in classroom environments…

Credit: Agarwal et al, 2021.

Clearly, there are many roads to Mecca! Perhaps it’s time to say goodbye to Powerpoint templates in schools?

Frequency and Feedback

Retrieval practice was typically used “at least once per week., with few experiments providing retrieval “multiple times.” The most common delay between the last retrieval practice and the final test was 1-3 days, what’s the most common format being multiple choice (27) and short answer 917) formats.

Note, free recall, cued recall and fill-in-the-blanks were only used 6 times respectively in retrieval exercises, with multiple choice (31) being the most popular format for final testing.

On feedback, or that boogie word ‘marking’, 10 experiments did not include any feedback and only 4 included delayed feedback. Researchers acknowledge that they were unable “to establish an optimal timing of feedback in school classroom settings.”

Recommendations

The researchers offer eight recommendations. We need more retrieval practice research investigating:

1. Varying delays between retrieval practice and the test
2. The provision and timing of feedback
3. Common classroom practices
4. Class sizes
5. Non-science content areas
6. The role of the teacher-researcher as a modulating factor (Hawthorne effect)
7. How and when collaborative and online quizzes increase learning
8. More diverse student populations.

For teachers seriously interested in retrieval practice, this research should have you thinking harder about how we can improve the evidence base for retrieval in classroom settings. The researchers conclude, “that educators should implement retrieval practice, with less concern about the precise format or timing of retrieval interventions.”

We need more research on retrieval practice from school settings, particularly in primary classrooms and from other subject areas.

You can read a summary from Pooja Agarwal who co-published the paper.