Learning from Productive Failure

Author(s):  
Manu Kapur ◽  
Leslie Toh
Keyword(s):  
2012 ◽  
Vol 40 (4) ◽  
pp. 645-650 ◽  
Author(s):  
Manu Kapur ◽  
Nikol Rummel

2021 ◽  
pp. 003465432110191
Author(s):  
Tanmay Sinha ◽  
Manu Kapur

When learning a new concept, should students engage in problem solving followed by instruction (PS-I) or instruction followed by problem solving (I-PS)? Noting that there is a passionate debate about the design of initial learning, we report evidence from a meta-analysis of 53 studies with 166 comparisons that compared PS-I with I-PS design. Our results showed a significant, moderate effect in favor of PS-I (Hedge’s g 0.36 [95% confidence interval 0.20; 0.51]). The effects were even stronger (Hedge’s g ranging between 0.37 and 0.58) when PS-I was implemented with high fidelity to the principles of Productive Failure (PF), a subset variant of PS-I design. Students’ grade level, intervention time span, and its (quasi-)experimental nature contributed to the efficacy of PS-I over I-PS designs. Contrasting trends were, however, observed for younger age learners (second to fifth graders) and for the learning of domain-general skills, for which effect sizes favored I-PS. Overall, an estimation of true effect sizes after accounting for publication bias suggested a strong effect size favoring PS-I (Hedge’s g 0.87).


Author(s):  
Brandon Dickson ◽  
Jessica Weber ◽  
Donna Kotsopoulos ◽  
Taylor Boyd ◽  
Sagar Jiwani ◽  
...  

Author(s):  
Manu Kapur ◽  
Charles K. Kinzer
Keyword(s):  

2015 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-65 ◽  
Author(s):  
Manu Kapur
Keyword(s):  

2020 ◽  
Vol 48 (6) ◽  
pp. 651-697
Author(s):  
Valentina Nachtigall ◽  
Katja Serova ◽  
Nikol Rummel

AbstractThe current work builds on research demonstrating the effectiveness of Productive Failure (PF) for learning. While the effectiveness of PF has been demonstrated for STEM learning, it has not yet been investigated whether PF is also beneficial for learning in non-STEM domains. Given this need to test PF for learning in domains other than mathematics or science, and the assumption that features embodied in a PF design are domain-independent, we investigated the effect of PF on learning social science research methods. We conducted two quasi-experimental studies with 212 and 152 10th graders. Following the paradigm of typical PF studies, we implemented two conditions: PF, in which students try to solve a complex problem prior to instruction, and Direct Instruction (DI), in which students first receive instruction followed by problem solving. In PF, students usually learn from their failure. Failing to solve a complex problem is assumed to prepare students for deeper learning from subsequent instruction. In DI, students usually learn through practice. Practicing and applying a given problem-solving procedure is assumed to help students to learn from previous instruction. In contrast to several studies demonstrating beneficial effects of PF on learning mathematics and science, in the present two studies, PF students did not outperform DI students on learning social science research methods. Thus, the findings did not replicate the PF effect on learning in a non-STEM domain. The results are discussed in light of mechanisms assumed to underlie the benefits of PF.


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