The effects of cognitive strategy instruction on math problem solving of middle-school students of varying ability.

Abstract

The effects of a mathematical problem-solving intervention on students' problem-solving performance and math achievement were measured in a randomized control trial with 1,059 7th-grade students. The intervention. Solve It!, is a research-based cognitive strategy instructional intervention that was shown to improve the problem-solving performance of 8th-grade students with and without leaming disabilities (LD). The purpose of the present study was to determine whether the effectiveness of the intervention could be replicated with younger students. Forty middle schools in a large urban school district were included in the study, with one 7th-grade math teacher participating at each school (after attrition, n = 34). Solve It! was implemented by the teachers in their inclusive math classrooms. Problem-solving performance was assessed using curriculumbased math problem-solving measures, which were administered as a pretest and then monthly over the course of the 8-month intervention. Students who received the intervention (n = 644) embedded in the district curriculum showed a significantly greater rate of growth on the curriculum-based measures than students in the comparison group (n = 415) who received the district curriculum only. Results of the Bayesian analyses indicated that the intervention effect was somewhat stronger for low-achieving students than for averageachieving students. Overall, findings from the present study as well as the previous study with 8th-grade students indicate that the intervention was effective across ability groups and is an appropriate program to use in inclusive classrooms with students of varying math ability.

Working Memory and Strategy Instruction in Children with Learning Disabilities

“…Strategy instruction guides the participant toward representing various stages of information gathering (e.g., identifying what information is important) and processing (e.g., visual representation) (e.g., see Montague, Krawec, Enders, & Dietz, 2014 ).…”

Subskill mastery among elementary and middle school students at risk in mathematics

“…In many cases, the empirical support for existing math interventions is connected to a specific instructional target (e.g., math fact fluency); however, the underlying components of those interventions might be adapted to other subskills (Codding & Martin, ). For example, although the empirical support for interventions such as cover, copy, and compare (CCC; Skinner, Turco, Beatty, & Rasavage, ), concrete, representational, abstract instruction (CRA; Mercer & Miller, ), and cognitive strategy instruction (CSI; Montague, Krawec, Enders, & Dietz, ) is often tied to specific instructional targets, the underlying characteristics of those interventions (e.g., modeling, immediate feedback, high opportunities to respond) are generally considered to be evidence‐based principles that could be applied to a wider range of content (Codding & Martin, ). Relatedly, there is some evidence for supplemental interventions that target multiple, related skills that are involved when working with whole and rational numbers.…”

Interventions in Learning Disabilities

“…Strategy instruction guides the participant toward representing various stages of information gathering (e.g., identifying what information is important) and processing (e.g., visual representation) (e.g., see Montague, Krawec, Enders, & Dietz, 2014 ). Strategy instruction guides the participant toward representing various stages of information gathering (e.g., identifying what information is important) and processing (e.g., visual representation) (e.g., see Montague, Krawec, Enders, & Dietz, 2014 ).…”