Comparing Static Fading with Adaptive Fading to Independent Problem Solving: The Impact on the Achievement and Attitudes of High School Students Learning Electrical Circuit Analysis

Abstract

This study compared conventional static fading, where the problem solving responsibility of the learner increases at a fixed sequence, with a novel adaptive fading design in which the learner assumes more problem solving responsibility only if her or his previous solution attempt is successful. This study was conducted in the engineering knowledge domain of introductory electrical circuit analysis with high school students. A 2 (static or adaptive fading) ϫ 2 (lower or higher academic ability) Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) yielded a significant main effect on retention and transfer performance: with adaptive fading the participants scored significantly higher on retention and transfer than with static fading, while not requiring more learning time or learning material.

Animated engineering tutors: Middle school students' preferences and rationales on multiple dimensions

“…Additional future research directions are to employ these agents in computer-based engineering instructional modules [1][2][3]32] and study their effectiveness in specific pedagogical functions, such as signaling [17], prompting [33], and practice guidance [34].…”

Learner Achievement and Attitudes under Different Paces of Transitioning to Independent Problem Solving

“…As a first step towards examining the impact of the pace of transitioning to independent problem solving, the study [14] considered an adaptive fading design, where the number of worked solution steps was reduced by one if the learner's preceding solution attempt was successful, otherwise the number of worked solution steps was not reduced. A learner who solved all steps correctly experienced essentially conventional backward fading with one less worked solution step with each new problem, whereas the pace of transitioning was effectively slowed down for learner who had difficulty in solving the problem steps.…”

Transitional feedback schedules during computer-based problem-solving practice

“…Fading strategies that gradually reduce the number of worked problem steps and increase the number of problem steps attempted by the learner have been demonstrated to benefit novice learners in skill acquisition (Atkinson, Renkl, & Merrill, 2003;Reisslein, Seeling, & Reisslein, 2006;Renkl, Atkinson, Maier, & Staley, 2002). Existing fading studies have considered static feedback for each problem solving step.…”