Learning to Think, Learning to Learn: What The Science Of Thinking And Learning Has To Offer Adult Education

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Learning to Think,
Learning to Learn: What The Science Of Thinking And Learning Has To Offer Adult Education

Produced under a National Institute for Literacy
Literacy Leader Fellowship

Jennifer Cromley
Literacy Leader Fellow, 1998-99 1.
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© 2000 Jennifer Cromley

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Table of Contents
Introduction ...................................................................................................... iv
The "Cognitive Revolution" in the classroom
Teaching means teaching students to think
What is research? What does it have to offer teachers?
Is this book for me?
How to use this book

Fact Sheet 10: How Thinking Develops, Part 2:
Changes in Strategies................................................................... 97

Fact Sheet 11: How Thinking Develops, Part 3:
Experience Makes Some Difference for Adults ........................ 107

Introduction
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Introduction
What's new in learning— the "cognitive revolution" in the classroom
Thirty years ago, most theories about teaching and learning (for children and adults) were based
on drill. The idea was that if facts were repeated enough, then students would memorize them,
and this was learning. According to a 1954 teacher training textbook, "Learning is shown by a
change in behavior as a result of experience." 1 Notice that nothing is mentioned about what
students believe, what process they use to solve problems, or their own awareness of their
thinking. Although adult educators like Paolo Freire and Malcolm Knowles encouraged teachers
to use real-life examples that students were interested in, most adult reading workbooks looked
about the same as children's drill-based workbooks. This approach can be described as a
"behaviorist" approach to learning.

Since the 1970s, the field of cognitive psychology has taken a different approach— looking at
what people believe about what they are studying, how they go about solving problems, and how
aware they are of whether they understand what they are reading. This research has produced a
lot of useful knowledge about thinking and learning and has had a big impact on our
understanding of what can be most effective in the classroom. Most of this research has not
filtered down to teachers (except those trained as K-12 teachers in about the last five years). In
its simplest version, a cognitive approach to learning says that teaching is most effective when it
is based on certain research-based 2 facts about how the mind works:

Skills need to be taught in the context in which they will be used. For example, if students are learning to add fractions for a word problem test, they need to practice fraction word

problems, not just adding fractions.
Reading skills are subject-specific— understanding what you read in literature does not guarantee that you will read well in social studies.

Problem-solving skills in one subject (like reading) are different from those in other subjects (like math). Problem-solving skills need to be taught separately for each subject.
Since problem-solving skills do not automatically transfer from one subject to another, teachers need to show students how to transfer these skills and give them lots of practice.
Students need more and better mental models of the world in order to learn and master new information and skills.
Thinking skills such as inferring unstated facts need to be taught explicitly in the classroom, they do not develop on their own (except in a very few students). These strategies need to be
practiced over and over again.
Most adult learners have a very limited number of strategies for understanding new material or solving problems. Teaching them more strategies can help them learn much better.

Learning lasts when the student understands the material, not just memorizes it. Information needs to be presented in small chunks so that working memory can process it.
Students need immediate practice to move information from working memory to long-term memory.
It is impossible to remember without associating new information with what you already know. 7.
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Introduction
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Thinking changes from being good at familiar subjects to being able to work in unfamiliar subjects.
Background knowledge is vital— it affects memory, reading, thinking, and problem solving. People have informal beliefs about how the world works (e. g., about gravity), which interfere
with learning.
Good teachers need to know what topics tend to be hard for students in the specific subject they teach, and effective ways to help students get past those roadblocks. They need subject-specific

teaching knowledge in addition to general teaching knowledge and subject
knowledge.
This approach can be described as a "cognitive" or "constructivist" approach to learning, which
is the focus of this book.

Teaching means teaching students to think
This book is based on the idea that teaching means teaching students to think. It assumes that
teaching is not just about communicating facts or mechanical skills like math rules (of course,
you must have facts in order to learn), but is a process of coming to understand the world. As
Victoria Purcell-Gates says of teaching reading, "As teachers it is critical that we identify our
assumptions and beliefs . . . about what it is we are trying to help our students do." 3 My
assumption here is that students must think when they read in order to make sense out of what
they read.

Lauren Resnick argues that thinking skills have always been a focus of "elite" schools but not of
"mass schooling." 4 The idea that all students should learn how to think critically is a relatively
new one (certainly since the turn of the 20 th century) and one for which most schools are not well
prepared. For example, thinking skills may best be formed through discussions, yet most schools
have large classes with a teacher/ lecturer up front facing silent students sitting in rows.

There is an abundance of "thinking skills" programs available to K-12 teachers, most of which
assume that there are general problem-solving strategies that apply across all subjects. Cognitive
research shows that strategies actually are quite specific, so it is no surprise that these programs
do not work well. This report takes a different approach, namely that:

all real learning involves active thinking and teaching should be based on what we know about how the mind takes in and organizes

information.

What is research? What does it have to offer teachers?
Many adult education teachers never see any research on teaching, thinking, or learning. Who
has time to find, much less read, those academic reports? If you do read it and understand it,
what do the results mean in the classroom? The professors who do the research seem to many
adult educators to be shut up in their ivory towers, 5 not making any effort to share what they
know in an understandable way. Research studies often seem full of jargon and hard to relate to
everyday teaching. Researchers in turn sometimes feel frustrated because teachers to do not
seem to be using research results in their classrooms. The point of this report is to bridge this
gap between research and practice for adult educators. 8.
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Introduction
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Some teachers mistrust research because it is not done by practicing teachers. After all, most of
us notice patterns in our classrooms and try to solve problems by trying new approaches, which
is itself a kind of research. We make our own theories about why something is working or not
working, then test these theories by continuing or changing our teaching practices. For example,
if you teach a lesson on capitalization and students do not do well on a capitalization assignment,
you may form an idea about why it did not work. You then choose a different approach for the
lesson or choose different kinds of practice based on your diagnosis of why it went wrong.

What could researchers find out in the lab that we don't already know from the classroom?
Sometimes our experiments work, and sometimes they do not. Sometimes our instincts about
what is going on in the classroom show the full picture; sometimes they do not. I believe that
what researchers have to offer is an additional set of ideas and approaches for diagnosing and
solving problems in the classroom. For example, maybe your capitalization lesson did not work
because students memorized a rule but did not know how to apply it. Research on how to teach
strategies could help you teach this lesson in a way that works because it takes into account how
students think and learn. This gives you one more tool for improving your teaching.

You will find three types of research in this report:
Studies done in laboratories— most of the participants are young adult college students, but some are younger children

Studies done by researchers in classes— most of the participants are children Studies done by teacher/ researchers in their own classrooms— most of the participants are
children, but some are adults.
Some teachers may also be familiar with theories of adult education that are based on the
theorists' own teaching experiences, but not on controlled experiments. Such teachers may be
heartened to find that familiar principles of adult education such as using real-life materials,
surveying learners' interests, and using participatory teaching methods are well-supported by
cognitive science research. They may also be disappointed to find that some "unpopular"
teaching methods, such as individual classroom practice, repetition, and sometimes
memorization are also supported by the research. The research is important because it adds
another layer of confirmation to our own classroom experience.

Some researchers are actively trying to get research about thinking and learning to teachers. One
valuable source is the quarterly newsletter Focus on Basics, which is available free on the
Internet at http:// gseweb. harvard. edu/~ ncsall/ fob1. htm or by subscription for $8 for 4 issues from
World Education, Focus on Basics, ATTN: Kimberly French, 44 Farnsworth Street, Boston, MA
02210-1211. You may also want to explore the Theory Into Practice (TIP) Database at
http:// www. gwu. edu/~ tip/.

What research has been done so far?
Very little research has been done on how Adult Basic Education (ABE) or General Educational
Development (GED) students think and learn, and whether they think or learn differently from
children or from other adults. 6 Most educational psychology textbooks do not mention adults,
and when they do, it is often in the context of either college students or senior citizens. 7 9.
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Introduction
Produced with funds from the National vii © 2000 by Jennifer Cromley
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Traditional developmental psychology predicted that adult learners would not develop beyond
the thinking skills they had when they left school, 8 even though those of us who have taught
adults know that their thinking can develop significantly. Many developmental psychologists are
now taking a broader life-span perspective and looking at how thinking develops in adults. Most
core adult education textbooks do not mention educational psychology; rather, they are based on
the authors' classroom experience. Nonetheless, educational psychologists have spent a lot of
time thinking about the implications of cognitive psychology for teachers. 9

A few publications have come out since 1996 which address the psychology of learning as it
applies to adult literacy students:
Adult Learning and Development: Perspectives From Educational Psychology, M. C. Smith &
T. Pourchot, Eds. (Erlbaum, 1998).
Bridges to Practice: Guidebook 4— The Teaching/ Learning Process, National Adult Literacy
and Learning Disabilities Center (Academy for Educational Development, 1999).
Enhancing Learning in Training and Adult Education, R. R. Morgan, J. A. Ponticell & E. E.
Gordon (Praeger, 1998).
International Encyclopedia of Adult Education and Training, 2 nd Ed., A. C. Tuijnman, Ed.
(Pergamon, 1996).

Is this book for me?
This book is meant for three groups of adult educators who teach or tutor reading (including
science, literature, and social studies) teaching in GED-level classrooms:

Trainers of teachers who do initial training or continuing education sessions who are looking for additional training materials

Staff development professionals who are responsible for teacher training in state departments of adult education and are who are looking for effective approaches
Teachers or tutors (paid or volunteer) who want to get new ideas for teaching and who have perhaps 30 minutes each Friday afternoon to do a little reading
It may also be useful to ABE reading teachers, math and writing teachers in ABE/ GED, as well
as job training and English as a Second Language (ESL) teachers and trainers of adults (for
example, in computer training, workplace health and safety classes, or health education
workshops).

How to use this book
This book has 18 fact sheets on learning and thinking, each about 10 pages long. Each fact sheet
can be read by itself, although the summary fact sheets at the end of the book are based on the
earlier fact sheets.

The fact sheets themselves incorporate learning methods based on cognitive research:
1. Reflection questions to orient you to the topic and activate your prior knowledge
Questions for teacher reflection
Take 15 seconds to write down everything you can think of that is in a kitchen. 10.
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Introduction
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2. Quotes from teachers, learners, and researchers that show how the information is relevant to
your teaching

"Whenever you teach adults something you deprive him or her the opportunity of discovering it."

3. A summary of the ideas and evidence
What we know
What is a Mental Model?
Just like your "mental maps" of what is in a kitchen or theater, everyone has many complex
models of common things and events in the world. These mental models affect how we . . .

Information that is specific to adult learners is in a special box
ADULTS
Students who feel they "can't learn" as adults may be comparing their experience of learning as
adults with this feeling of learning rapidly as a child.

4. What this means for teachers
What it means for teachers
Using Adult Advantages
Have discussions that relate the reading to students' experiences. To return to the "Tell-Tale
Heart" example, ask students if they have ever done something wrong and felt guilty about it.

5. A set of short lesson ideas (not full lesson plans) based on the findings.
Lesson Ideas
Use any lesson idea from any of the fact sheets in this book that push your students to use a
strategy that they have but do not use fluently yet.

You will also find at the end of the book:
Appendices on two frequently asked questions: Are there learning styles? and What about the brain?

Short articles summarizing many of the fact sheets, which may be reproduced in teacher newsletters (Please see the copyright information on the inside front cover.)
A selected bibliography A glossary of technical terms used in the book
An index
I hope that you will find this information both thought-provoking and useful to you in your
classes.
Jennifer Cromley, January, 2000 11.
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Introduction
Produced with funds from the National ix © 2000 by Jennifer Cromley
Institute for Literacy under a 1998-99 Literacy Leader Fellow Project #X257I980003

Acknowledgements
Thanks to:
The staff at the National Institute For Literacy, especially: Julie Gedden, Fellowship Program
Officer; Alice Johnson, Senior Policy Analyst; Andrew Hartman, Director; and Wil Hawk,
Program Analyst, LINCS.

My fellow Fellows, Rita Collins, Esther Leonelli, Tom Macdonald, and Robin Schwartz.
For teaching me about teaching and learning: All of my students; my parents; St. Ann's School
in Brooklyn, NY; Les Leopold; Phil Moses; Marian Urquilla; Academy of Hope and all of its
volunteer teachers; my music teachers, Mary Beth Lewandowski and Linda Kay Smith; and John
Guthrie.

All of the participants in my trainings and the training organizers, especially Silja Kallenbach of
the New England Literacy Resource Center; Kate Randall at Academy of Hope in Washington,
DC; Elaine Randall at the DC Public Library; K. Brisbane at the SEA for Adult Education for the
District of Columbia; Carolyn Harding at Fairfax County, VA ESL; and Jane Swing at SE VAEL
in Radford, VA; Bob Mason, state adult education director for Rhode Island; Diane Inverso at
the Mayor's Commission on Literacy in Philadelphia, PA; Susan Dowd at Northeast SABES in
Lawrence, MA; Steve Reuys at ALRI in Boston; Sue Miller at Central SABES in Worcester,
MA; Diane McMullen and Madeleine Costa at Southeast SABES in Fall River, MA; Evelyn
Beaulieu at CALL in Orono, ME; and Wendy Ross, Executive Director, Vermont Adult
Education Board in Montpelier, VT.

Everyone who hosted me during my East Coast tour: Jane Swing at SE VAEL in Radford, VA;
Ben and Elizabeth White in Providence, RI; Laura Poltronieri and Stanley Tang in Swarthmore,
PA; Janet Corpus and John Hoffmeyer in Philadelphia; Fran and Howard Collins in Salem, NY;
Betsy Cromley in York, ME and Boston; William Leach and Elizabeth Blackmar in Carmel, NY;
and Diane Sarotte and Michael Lichalot in Montpelier, VT.

Professor M. Cecil Smith of Northern Illinois University, De Kalb, IL, who reviewed the entire
manuscript.

My proofreader, Sherri Alms of Washington, DC.
Family members who read and commented on this book and engaged in endless conversations
about learning and teaching: Betsy Cromley and Catherine White. 12.
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NOTES
1 Cronbach, L. J. (1954). Educational psychology. New York: Harcourt Brace, p. 47.
2 Research is not reported here unless results are significant at the p<. 05 level or F 5.00. The term "average"

always refers to the mean. 3
Purcell-Gates, V. (1997). There's reading . . . and then there's reading: Process models and instruction. Focus on
Basics, 1 (D), 6-10. Retrieved from the World Wide Web on October 12, 1998 from http:// hugse1. harvard.
edu/~ ncsall/ vpg. htm. (The address as of February 3, 2000, was http:// gseweb. harvard. edu/~ ncsall/ vpg. htm.) 4
Resnick, L. B. (1987). Constructing knowledge in school. In L. S. Liben (Ed.), Development and learning:
Conflict or congruence? Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. 5
Haywood, H. C., & Brooks, P. (1990). Theory and curriculum development in cognitive education. In M.
Schwebel, C. A. Maher, & N. S. Fagley (Eds.), Promoting cognitive growth over the life span. Hillsdale, NJ:
Erlbaum. 6
Roger Diaz de Cossio, a presenter at the first International Conference on How Adults Learn, held in Washington,
DC, in April, 1998, wrote in a postscript to his paper, "I learned many things from the Conference, especially the
fact that we are all in the same boat: (a) we do not really know how adults learn." de Cossio, R. D. (1999). Adult
education, migration, and immigrant education. In U. S. Department of Education. (1999). How Adults Learn.
Washington, DC: Author, p. 47. 7
Smith, M. C., & Pourchot, T. (1998). What does educational psychology know about adult learning and
development. In M. C. Smith & T. Pourchot, (Eds.), Adult learning and development: Perspectives from
educational psychology. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum. 8
Torff, B., & Sternberg, R. J. (1998). Changing mind, changing world: Practical intelligence and tacit knowledge in
adult learning. In M. C. Smith & T. Pourchot, (Eds.), Adult learning and development: Perspectives from
educational psychology. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum. 9
Byrnes, J. P. (1996). Cognitive development and learning in instructional contexts. Boston: Allyn and Bacon;
Gagne, E. D., Yekovich, C. W. , & Yekovich, F. R. (1993). The cognitive psychology of school learning (2 nd ed.).
New York: HarperCollins; Anderson, J. R. (1995). Cognitive psychology and its implications (4th ed.). New York:
Freeman. 13.
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1: Literature is not Science
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Fact Sheet 1: Literature is not Science
Principle: Literature Strategies are Different from Science Strategies
"I knew from my teacher training that students' skills would be uneven, that they
might be good at reading and weak in math. What surprised me was that they
could be such good readers in science and such bad readers in literature."— GED
teacher

Questions for teacher reflection
Do you think you are better at literature or math, or do you do equally well at both? Why?
Do you think that what you learned in social studies class as a child helped you in science?
Explain.
Have you ever done logic puzzles (such as brain teasers)? Do you think they have helped you
solve real-life problems in your personal life or at work? Why or why not?
Have you ever taken a "thinking skills" class. Do you believe it helped you think better?
How?
All of these questions got you thinking about whether thinking skills are general or specific to
certain subjects.

What we know
Are There General Thinking Skills?
Do you think that people are either generally smart or generally not? Are good chess players also smart in science or languages? Do good writers also do well in math? The debate between
those who say that thinking skills are general and those who say they are specific is an old one,
and has been particularly fierce for the last 40 years. 1 On one side, people argue that all thinking
skills are general; some of them say that schools should therefore teach logic, critical thinking, or
problem solving in separate classes. 2 On the other side, some argue that all thinking skills are
specific to fields; therefore, some of them say that thinking should only be taught as part of
school subjects. 3 The question is complicated because some thinking skills may be general, but
have to be taught in specific subjects to be effective.

Research from many fields shows that being "smart" in one area (like literature) does not usually make a person "smart" in other areas. 4 Of course, reading quickly probably helps people
in all areas that require reading, and people think much better in familiar topic areas than
unfamiliar ones. 5 But many researchers feel that there are very few general thinking or problem-solving
skills, and that these cannot be taught directly. 6 The evidence from thinking and
problem-solving programs, experts and beginners, child development, anthropology, and brain
biology is found below. 14.
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1: Literature is not Science
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Most thinking skills and problem-solving skills seem to be specific in different subjects. 7 Math thinking skills are useful for math, but not for science. Social studies thinking skills are
useful for social studies, but not for literature. Some of these skills may appear to be common
but are not. For example, "cause and effect" in social studies is not the same as "cause and
effect" in science. Likewise, "survival of the fittest" in biology is not the same as "survival of
the fittest" in human society. Although we can put the same label (" cause and effect") on both
things, they are not the same. Also, general problem-solving principles recommended by the
GED Testing Service like "breaking down a large problem into smaller ones" are very different
when applied to science than when applied to math. Students need to be taught how to apply
them separately in every subject area. This probably explains why stand-alone general thinking
programs (like CoRT, IDEAL, Odyssey, or Instrumental Enrichment) do not significantly
improve students' standardized test scores overall. 8

Because most teachers have had 16 or more years of formal education and have developed general problem-solving strategies, it may be hard to appreciate how different the thinking skills
are in each of the subject areas. But consider the table below: 9

Subject Sample subject-specific
information
Sample subject-specific
problem-solving
strategies

Sample problem

Economics Supply and demand.
Relationship between
taxes and employment.
Relationship between
inflation and production .

Effect of government
policies on businesses.
Calculating profitability.

Which of the
following would be an
effect of raising the
minimum wage?

American
history
Basic names, dates, and
facts about events.
Trends in American
history (urbanization,
industrialization, etc.).
Geography.

Historical cause-and-
effect.
Multiple points of view
and interpretation in
history.
Interpreting historical
actions in terms of
interests and motives.

Which of the
following arguments
explains the
settlement pattern for
the western states
shown on the map?

Chemistry The elements.
Chemical bonds.
Chemical reactions

Naming compounds.
Balancing chemical
equations.
Calculating concentrations.

What will be the
product of CH4 + O2?

Literature Structure of a story.
Forms (poems, plays,
novels, etc.).
Names, works, and
significance of prominent
authors.

Understanding figurative
language.
Inferring motives of
characters.
Interpreting the author's
purpose.

Why does the
character tell the joke
about the salesman?

Rochel Gelman even feels that "the languages of science and mathematics are better thought of
as different languages than the one we use in everyday talk." 10 15.
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1: Literature is not Science
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It is possible to help students transfer what they have learned in one class to another class or to the world outside of school. This is covered in Fact Sheet 2, Making Connections, which
includes analogies.
Evidence From Thinking And Problem-Solving Programs

Hundreds of studies of thinking and problem-solving programs show that people only improve on the type of problems they learn in the programs. 11 In programs that use logic
problems to teach thinking, people become better at solving logic problems. But they do not
become better at math or become better thinkers overall. In fact, in most of the studies, students'
standardized test scores did not go up overall.

According to researchers: "The available evidence does not establish that such [general thinking] courses can
produce broad transfer of learning." 12
"Are there general problem-solving methods that transfer broadly across content domains and can be taught? A long line of research (starting with the work of Thorndike and

James) casts a gloomy pall on the prospect of general transfer." 13
"Significant gains . . . show up only on tests that are highly similar to the curricula in content and structure." 14

"Generalized thinking ability, that is, processing ability not tied to a particular intellectual skill, must be inductively derived [figured out] by students as incidental learning [by trial
and error] over years of practice." 15
"There is no strong evidence that students in any of the . . . thinking-skills programs improved in tasks that were dissimilar to those already explicitly practiced." 16

"Previous attempts to teach students to become better thinkers have not always turned out to be well-documented successes." 17
"[ Identifying] the teachable aspects of problem solving . . . has a long and somewhat disappointing history." 18

So what do the studies show? There are several consistent findings: 1) Teaching thinking skills is most effective in the context of real problem-solving in a
particular field. To learn to think, you have to have something to thing about! To teach
comparing and contrasting in social studies have students learn about two wars and then
compare and contrast them. 19
2) Teachers need to demonstrate or model for students the process of solving a problem in
that field. To teach cause and effect in science, talk out loud as you solve a physics
problem, such as what happens when one object hits another object. 20
3) Effective teachers create real discussions among students and between students and the
teacher. Students learn to think by actively thinking and engaging with the subject in a
social setting. To teach students to look at both sides of an argument in history, have a
debate 21 or ask student to write from another person's point of view. 16.
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1: Literature is not Science
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4) Effective programs identify the kinds of problems students must be able to solve, and
teach students how to solve those problems. To teach students how to infer meaning
from context in poetry, have them read poems and discuss them. 22

General problem-solving strategies are too general for most students to apply. For example, a study strategy called MURDER (Mood, Understand, Recall, Detect, Elaborate, and Review) asks
students to detect "omissions, errors, and ways of organizing the information." 23 The type of
omissions or errors will be different in a math problem, an economics question, a literature
analysis, and so on. So a student needs to already understand, for example, what a good
argument is in economics, in order to use this strategy to study economics. While the strategy
can help a student in any subject, it does not automatically work for a given subject until the
student gets to know the field. So the results of trying to teach thinking skills show that skills
should be taught explicitly as part of science, social studies, math, and other subject areas. Skills
that are learned in one area do not automatically transfer to another area, and students need a lot
of specific knowledge in order to be good thinkers in a subject. 24

Evidence From Experts And Beginners

Expert chess players are no better at science, math, or other subjects than the average adult. Expert chemists are no better at solving political science problems than college students are. 25
People who are expert at memorizing numbers are no better than average at remembering letters.
Being an expert generally means being an expert in one subject. Of course, many people
develop other skills while becoming an expert. For example, doctors learn how to memorize
medical terms in medical school, so they probably know how they memorize effectively.

Being an expert includes knowing a lot of facts in a subject (like knowing the parts of speech), knowing many rules (such as grammar rules), knowing when to use those rules (for
example, knowing that capitalization rules only apply to the beginning of a sentence or a proper
noun). In other words, experts are not people who are good at problem solving who just happen
to apply it to whatever field they are in. Experts have more subject knowledge and, along with
many problem-solving techniques, they know when to use those techniques. 26 "General
strategies per se are not the deciding factor in . . . an expert's superior performance; rather, it is
the application of a general strategy to a well-organized knowledge domain." 27 Experts have
also solved problems in their field so often that the process is faster for them 28 (see Fact Sheet
13: What Does Good Thinking Look Like? for more information).

Evidence About Specialized Areas Of The Mind
From Child Development 29

How Things Move— Even very young infants (6-10 months old) seem to understand the difference between animals that can move on their own and non-living objects that cannot. We
know this because they stare for much longer at objects that move on their own (but should not),
than at animals. This ability seems to be inborn. It is different from understanding which things
are breakable, what makes a noise, and other knowledge that children learn as they play. 30 17.
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Common sense ideas about how things move are not the same as the laws of physics. For
example, in physics, objects in motion tend to remain in motion. But in real life, everything that
moves eventually stops moving (physicists explain that this is because of friction). But even
college students with years of physics classes fall back on this child-like "naïve physics" when
they are not in physics classes. Inborn ideas about how things move are separate from ideas
about biology or how people behave. 31

Language--All children seem to have from birth the ability to learn a language. They are not programmed to learn any specific language, but they have a language capacity that helps them
learn the language that is spoken (or signed) around them. This language capacity is not the
same as a reading capacity, writing capacity, or other abilities. It is a separate "module" in the
mind that does not have to be learned, we are born with it. 32

Math--Very young infants (even as young as 5 months old) seem to understand the difference between one object and more than one object. Again, we know this because they stare for much
longer when there is an unexpected number of objects than when there is the expected number. 33
Again, this ability seems to be inborn, and it is different from counting, which children must
learn. 34

From Anthropology

Every culture that anthropologists have studied has a similar way of organizing the animals in that culture. Mayan Indians in Central America and students in Michigan organize familiar
animals in the same way (about 75% agreement). For example, both groups separate mammals
from non-mammals and people from all other animals. 35 Other parts of the two cultures are not
similar. So there seems to be a part of the mind that is "hard wired" to classify animals, and that
is different from other kinds of classifying.

From Brain Biology

Parts of the mind are specialized for different skills, like vision, language, speech, hearing, seeing faces, and touch. For example, information that comes through your eyes is processed by
one part of your mind. Sounds are processed by another part. Information from your eyes
cannot be processed by the language area of the mind. Evidence from patients with brain
damage suggests there may also be areas specialized for music, number, and social interactions. 36

ADULTS
Adults' skills tend to be more uneven than children's. While we do not expect a second-grade
child's reading and math scores to be very far apart, this is common in adults. One reason may
be that adults have had more time to improve the skills they are good at, while the skills they are
not good at have stagnated. For example, people who read a lot continue to improve their
vocabulary and knowledge of the world even after school; those who do not read do not improve
those skills. 37 18.
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There are a few general skills, but they are always used within a subject area. 38 Skills learned at school will be specific to different subjects, unless teachers make the connections between
different subjects for students. This is the subject of Fact Sheet 2, Making Connections.

Summary
1. Chess masters are not any "smarter" in other subjects (like literature, science, or math)
than anyone else. Experts tend to be very good in only one subject.
2. Each subject has unique bodies of knowledge, types of problems, and problem-solving
techniques.
3. We have twenty years of failed "general problem solving" programs.
4. General strategies need to be practiced in each subject area.
5. Why?— Converging evidence from four areas: Expert/ novice.
6. Child development— inborn language, number, and motion concepts.
7. Anthropology— common ways of categorizing animals.
8. Brain— Visual information cannot be processed in language areas.
9. Teachers need make the connections between different subjects for students.

What it means for teachers:
Student Abilities
Do not assume that a student who is good in one subject will be good at another or that a
student who is poor in one subject will be poor in others.

Do not assume that a student who learns a skill in your class (like finding the main idea in
history) will be able to apply the same skill in another subject (like finding the main idea in
science).

Setting Learning Objectives
Set very specific teaching objectives including the types of problems you want students to be
able to solve. Then teach them how to solve those problems. 39

Teaching Content
Teach more facts! Students cannot think if they do not have anything to think with and
connect new information to.

Teach your students to use the terminology, symbols, and diagrams that are used in your
subject. 40 19.
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Teaching Thinking Strategies
Teach problem-solving strategies (like the ones on page 2) and how to use them in the context
of particular subject matter. (See Fact Sheet 4 for a detailed description of how to teach
strategies.)

Balance facts and problem-solving strategies in your subject. Be clear about how the strategy
is applied in your subject.

Give worked-out problems that show how thinking and problem solving work in your
subject. 41

Mix up problems of different types (such as main point and author opinion questions) rather
than lumping all of one type of problem together.

If you want students to be able to solve real-life problems, such as consumer math, then teach
those problems in addition to the type of problems students are more likely to see on tests. 42

Do not use activation of prior knowledge or analogies with students who do not have
background knowledge in that topic.

Lesson Ideas
Intelligence
Ask students to write about what they think about intelligence. Do they think people are born "smart" or "dumb"? Do they think people who are good at science are always good at math? Do
they think people who are "book smart" are also "street smart"?
Subject Areas

Over a school term, expose your students to the core ways of thinking and ways of making an argument in your subject. For example, in history, be sure to cover acceptable types of evidence
(speeches, newspapers, novels, maps, laws, letters, hearsay), cause and effect in history (it is not
the same as in science!), types of patterns (population, employment, voting), and so on. Group
projects are an interesting and engaging way to do this.

Over a school term, expose your students to the core problem-solving strategies and tools in your subject. For example, in GED economics, be sure to cover patterns and correlation (when
wages go up, employment goes down); using graphs, tables, and charts; measuring employment,
wages, tax rates, and so on. Again, group projects are an interesting and engaging way to do this.

Ask students to solve a simple problem in a subject they know a lot about. Then ask them to solve a problem that uses the same skills but in a subject they do not know about.
(Unscrambling a word they know and one they do not know is probably the simplest example.) 20.
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Show students that a lot of "smarts" is not just raw brain power but knowing something about the
subject!

To build students' vocabulary in your subject, choose the most important terms (for chemistry, terms like atom, molecule, electron, proton, and so on) and have students use them in
many different types of exercises. Make matching column exercises; fill-in-the-blanks; play
word games like hangman, unscramble letters, and so on. Students need to use the terms in a
context.

Ask students to write in their social studies, science, and literature classes using a type of argument or strategy that is used in that field. For example, ask biology students to write about
the differences between plants and animals. The best way to master a subject is to have to
explain it to someone else. Focus your comments on the arguments and evidence used. If you
comment on grammar, do it separately.

NOTES
1 Brown, A. L., Bransford, J. D., Ferrara, R. A., & Campione, J. C. (1983). Learning, remembering, and
understanding. In J. H. Flavell & E. M. Markman (Eds.), Handbook of child psychology: Vol. III. Cognitive
development, pp. 126-129, 141. New York: John Wiley & Sons. 2
Among many researchers taking this position are Simon, H. A. (1976). Identifying basic abilities underlying
intelligent performance of complex tasks. In L. B. Resnick (Ed.), The nature of intelligence. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
Others include Plato, Piaget, and Halpern, D. (1993). Assessing the effectiveness of critical-thinking instruction.
JGE: The Journal of General Education, 42 (2), 239-254. 3
Singley and Anderson call this the "radical specificity" position— there are no general thinking skills (Singley,
M. K., & Anderson, J. R. (1989). The transfer of cognitive skill. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, p. 235).
Singley and Anderson mention D'Andrade (1982), Griggs & Cox (1982), and Thorndike (1913) as proponents of
this position. Supporters of a modular model of the mind, who may or may not argue for thinking skills classes,
include Flavell and Gelman, R. (1991). Epigenetic foundations of knowledge structures: Initial and transcendent
constructions. In S. Carey & R. Gelman (Eds.), The epigenesis of mind: Essays on biology and cognition.
Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. In the middle of the road (there may be general skills, but they need to be taught in the
context of subject matter), interestingly, are both E. D. Hirsch (a conservative) and Howard Gardner (a liberal).
Others include Perkins & Salomon, and M. J. Adams. 4
Perkins, D. N. & Salomon, G. (1988). Teaching for transfer. Educational Leadership, 46 (1), 22-32. This is true
even though people who score high on one part of an IQ test are likely to also score high on other parts of the same
IQ test. 5
Brown, A. L. (1990). Domain-specific principles affect learning and transfer in children. Cognitive Science, 14,
107-133. 6
Bransford, J. D., Arbitman-Smith, R., Stein B. S., & Vye, N. J. (1985). Improving thinking and learning skills: An
analysis of three approaches. In J. W. Segal, S. F. Chipman, & R. Glaser (Eds.), Thinking and learning skills: Vol. 1.
Relating instruction to research. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum, and Gelman, R., & Baillargeon, R. (1983). A review of
some Piagetian concepts. In J. H. Flavell & E. M. Markman (Eds.), Handbook of child psychology: Vol. III.
Cognitive development, New York: John Wiley & Sons, p. 210. 7
Chipman, S. F., & Segal, J. W. (1985). Higher cognitive goals for education: An introduction. In Segal et al.
(Eds.), Thinking and learning skills and Goldman, S. R., Petrosino, A. J., & the Cognition and Technology Group at
Vanderbilt. (1999). Design principles for instruction in content domains: Lessons from research on expertise and
learning. In F. T. Durso, R. S. Nickerson, R. W. Schvaneveldt, S. T. Dumais, D. S. Lindsay & M. T. H. Chi (Eds.),
Handbook of applied cognition, New York: John Wiley & Sons. 8
Perkins, D. N., & Salomon, G. (1989). Are cognitive skills context-bound? Educational Researcher, 18 (1), 16-25. 21.
21 Page 22 23
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9 Some examples are from Resnick, L. (1987). Education and learning to think. Washington, DC: National
Academy Press, p. 18 and Leinhardt, G. (1992). What research about learning tells us about teaching. Educational
Leadership, 49 (4), 20-25. 10
Gelman, Epigenetic foundations of knowledge, p. 320. 11
Chance, P. (1986). Thinking in the classroom: A survey of programs. New York: Teachers College Press. 12
Resnick, Education and learning to think, p. 35. 13
Singley & Anderson, The transfer of cognitive skill, p. 230. 14
Adams, M. J. (1989). Thinking skills curricula: Their promise and progress. Educational Psychologist, 24 (1),
25-77. 15
Derry, S. J., & Murphy, D. A. (1986). Designing systems that train learning ability: From theory to practice.
Review of Educational Research, 56 (1), 1-39. 16
Bransford, et al., Improving thinking and learning skills, p. 202. 17
Mayer, R. E. (1988). Teaching for thinking: Research on the teachability of thinking skills. In The G. Stanley
Hall Lecture Series, 9, 139-164. 18
Mayer, R. E. (1992). Thinking, problem solving, cognition (2 nd ed.). New York: W. H. Freeman, p. 363. 19
Byrnes, J. (1996). Cognitive development and learning in instructional contexts. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1996,
p. 69-74 and Resnick, Education and learning to think. A growing field called "situated cognition" studies how
thinking is based in particular situations. For example, some people can use math very well in grocery stores and
not very well in paper and pencil exercises. Their math skills are situated in the grocery store context. In the same
way, a lot of school learning is situated in classrooms so it does not transfer well outside of the classroom. See
Brown, J. S., Collins, A., & Duguid, P. (1989). Situated cognition and the culture of learning. Educational
Researcher, 18 (1), 32-42 and Rogoff, B., & Lave, J. (Eds.). (1984). Everyday cognition: Its development in social
context. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. 20
Mayer, Teaching for Thinking. Richard Prawat disagrees with explicitly teaching thinking strategies. He argues
for an immersion approach where students practice real thinking tasks, but teachers do not explicitly instruct in how
to think, even in the domain (Prawat, R. (1991). The value of ideas: The immersion approach to the development
of thinking. Educational Researcher, 20 (2), 3-10, 30). 21
Brown et al., Situated cognition and the culture of learning. 22
Mayer, R. E. (1987). Educational psychology: A cognitive approach. Boston: Little, Brown, p. 214. 23
Slavin, R. (1997). Educational psychology: Theory and practice (5 th ed.). Boston: Allyn and Bacon, p. 208. 24
Alexander, P. A., & Judy, J. E. (1988 ). The interaction of domain-specific and strategic knowledge in academic
performance. Review of Educational Research, 58 (4), 375-404 and Keil, F. C. (1991). The emergence of
theoretical beliefs as constraints on concepts. In S. Carey & R. Gelman (Eds.), The epigenesis of mind: Essays on
biology and cognition, Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. 25
Glaser, R., & Chi, M. T. H. Overview. (1988). In M. T. H. Chi, R. Glaser & M. Farr (Eds.), The nature of expertise.
Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. 26
Derry & Murphy, Designing systems that train learning ability. 27
Modeling Expertise. Chapter 4 in Druckman, D., & Bjork, R. A. (Eds.). (1991). In the mind's eye: Enhancing
human performance. Washington, DC: National Academy Press. 28
Glaser & Chi, Overview. 29
Gelman & Baillargeon, A review of some Piagetian concepts. 30
Carey, S., & Spelke, E. (1994). Domain-specific knowledge and conceptual change. In L. A. Hirschfeld & S. A.
Gelman (Eds.), Mapping the mind: Domain specificity in cognition and culture, Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press. 31
Perkins & Salomon, in Teaching for transfer, make the important point that domains in the mind do not
correspond closely to school subjects. Causality in history and causality in "current events" are fundamentally the
same even if they are discussed in different classes in schools. 32
Noam Chomsky's domain-specific language theory is explained in Hirschfeld, L. A., & Gelman, S. A. (1994).
Toward a topography of mind: An introduction to domain specificity. In Hirschfeld & Gelman, Mapping the mind 33
Wynn, K. (1992). Addition and subtraction by human infants. Nature, 358, 749-750. 34
Gelman, Epigenetic foundations of knowledge. 35
Atran, S. (1995). Classifying nature across cultures. In E. E. Smith & D. N. Osherson (Eds.), An invitation to
cognitive science: Vol. 3. Thinking (2 nd ed.). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. 36
Leslie, A. M. (1991). ToMM, ToBy, and agency: Core architecture and domain specificity. In Hirschfeld &
Gelman, Mapping the mind. 22.
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37 Stanovich, K. E., West, R. F., & Harrison, M. R. (1995). Knowledge growth and maintenance across the life-span:
The role of print exposure. Developmental Psychology, 31 (5), 811-826 and Smith, M. C. (1990). The relationship
of adults' reading attitude to actual reading behavior. Reading Improvement, 27 (2), 116-121. 38
Perkins & Salomon, Are cognitive skills context-bound? 39
Brainin, S. S. (1985). Mediated learning: Pedagogic issues in the improvement of cognitive functioning. In E. W.
Gordon (Ed.), Review of Research in Education, 12, 121-155. 40
Nickerson, R. S. (1994). The teaching of thinking and problem solving. In R. J. Sternberg (Ed.), Thinking and
problem solving, San Diego, Academic Press. 41
Mayer, Thinking, problem solving, cognition, pp. 439-452. 42
Resnick, L. B. (1987). Learning in school and out. Educational Researcher, 16, 13-20. 23.
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Fact Sheet 2: Making Connections
Principle: Show Students How to Use Old Skills in New Areas
A student is in charge of sales at the School Store at her GED program one
evening.
Teacher: Delores, you know how to do decimals. You just added up the bill and
figured out the change.
Student: But that's money, that's not math class!

Questions for teacher reflection
When have you ever used what you learned in one part of a class to solve a problem later in
the same class? (for example, using what you know about fraction word problems to solve
decimal word problems)
When have you ever used what you learned in one subject to solve a problem later in another
subject? (for example, using deduction in science to solve a deduction problem in social studies)
When have you ever used what you learned in school to solve a problem outside of school?
(for example, using the writing skills you learned in school to write a letter to your grandmother)
When have you seen students not be able to solve a problem outside of school that they could
solve in class?
When have you seen students be able to solve a problem outside of school that they could not
solve in class?
These questions got you to think about transfer— using what you know in one area to solve a
problem in another area.

What we know
The Need For Transfer
The ability to apply information or skills learned in one situation to another situation is a very important one.
Schools expect students to transfer what they learn in the classroom to their lives at home, work, and as citizens and community members. According to one researcher, "The question
of transfer is perhaps the fundamental educational question." 1
Employers expect their employees to transfer what they have learned at school and at previous jobs to the workplace. 2 As technology and work organizations change, employers

expect people to use what they know from past experience to perform in a new setting. 3
Transfer is also vitally important for the GED. The authors of the GED specifically test students on their ability to "use information and ideas in a concrete situation . . . . in a context

different from the one in which they were initially presented." 4 In addition, because the GED
tests "critical thinking skills," 5 students also have to be able to apply skills such as reading 24.
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comprehension to a wide range of reading materials (social studies, science, literature, math,
written passages on the grammar test, test directions, and the questions themselves).

As teachers, I believe we expect students to transfer skills from one class to another. For example, if they have learned to become good critical readers in science, we expect them to

show that critical reading in their social studies classes too.
However, transfer is a very difficult skill that has rarely been found in psychology
research. 6 (See Fact Sheet 1: Literature is Not Science for some reasons why transfer is hard to
find.)

In a classic study on people's difficulty with transfer, college students read a problem (with the solution) about a doctor who needed to destroy a tumor in a sensitive area. The doctor
beamed many low-intensity rays at the tumor from many directions. Then the students read a
problem about an army trying to attack a fortress surrounded by many small roads with land
mines on them. The solution to the problem was to split up the army into small groups that
would not trip the land mines and attack the fortress from many directions at once. About 80%
of the students could not transfer the solution of the first problem to the second one without a
hint. 7

Adults who could do "grocery store math" with 98% accuracy only got 59% of the same kind of questions right on a paper-and-pencil test. 8 They could not transfer their math
knowledge from the grocery store to the test because they did not see that the two tasks were the
same.

The most difficult part of transfer is "seeing" when a problem that you know how to solve can help you solve the new problem you are facing. 9 In the grocery example above, adults failed
to see that the grocery store math they knew how to do could help them solve the paper-and-pencil
problems they were not sure how to do. 10

Clearly it is easier to transfer knowledge when the subject matter is very similar. 11 A student who learns to capitalize cities will have an easier time capitalizing states than capitalizing
personifications. Transfer is also easier when students do not have a competing mental model. 12
For example, students will have trouble applying school learning about evolution when they are
at the zoo if they have a competing creationist model. Finally, transfer is easier for more general
knowledge. 13 Ideas that are associated with only one field (like democracy in social studies) will
be harder to transfer than ideas that apply very generally (like large organisms or groups being
more powerful than small ones). 14

How Does Transfer Happen?

Despite the pessimistic research, good learners do transfer more than poor learners (learning disabled students tend to have even more difficulty with transfer). 15 James Byrnes suggests six
things that can help students transfer knowledge:
1. Using the skill in several contexts (adding in class and adding at the "school store")
2. Knowing when to apply the skill (capitalization rules always apply at the beginning of a
sentence and in the middle of a sentence they only apply to proper nouns) 25.
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3. Learning new facts through patterns (enough and rough are spelled like tough)
4. Learning for understanding (knowing why the American colonists went to war against
Britain)
5. Trying to solve the problem by applying your understanding (if cats are mammals, then dogs
must be mammals too)
6. Having realistic ideas about learning (knowing that mistakes are part of learning) 16
This can be described as a "teaching for transfer" approach. 17 Ironically, "teaching for transfer"
may lead to students performing worse at first, but later performing much better. 18

Teach Skills In Multiple Contexts

One approach to transfer is to teach skills in several different contexts. For example, if students are learning proofreading, they can proofread a class flyer, a newsletter, a business
memo or resume cover letter, and so on. Another approach is to identify all of the situations
where students could use the skill and teach them specifically how to use it in that context. For
example, construction apprentices could learn to add fractions for measuring boards in inches,
(and other one-dimensional measurements), plywood in square feet (and other two-dimensional
measurements), and cement in cubic yards (and other three-dimensional measurements). 19

Sometimes the same skills are applied differently in school situations and outside of school. 20 For example, math word problems use language that is not found outside of school (" Bill has
four more marbles than Jane.") 21 Teaching the same problems in "real world" language can help
students bridge the gap from real life to school questions. It also helps students do better on
standard math word problems. 22

Teach When To Use The Skill, Not Just How To Do It

Students who know when to use a skill, as well as how to do it, will also be better able to apply it in a new setting. 23 For example, a student who knows that gravity acts on all objects on
the earth will know that gravity acts on amusement park rides, not just on falling objects in
physics class. When skills are taught in school, teachers rarely tell students when to use the skill
and when it does not apply.

One of the biggest problems students face is not recognizing that they can apply a strategy that they already have. Teaching skills in multiple contexts may help this problem. 24 A student
who learns how to use a dictionary to look up unknown words in science and literature and social
studies is likely to think that a dictionary may also be helpful for an unknown word in a writing
class.

Experts know when to use skills more than beginners do, and they use strategies more automatically. For example, a 12 th grader may add fractions more quickly than a 6 th grader
because the 12 th grader can simply multiply the denominators faster, not because the 12 th grader
has more advanced math knowledge. 25 26.
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Teach Through Patterns
Students who learn new facts through patterns or principles (all even numbers end in 0, 2, 4, 6, or 8), rather than by rote, are better able to transfer that knowledge. For example, a student
who has to learn about each even number one at a time (18 is even and 62 is even and 26 is even,
and so on) may never be able to conclude that 34 is also even. Another example is learning to
read words through patterns. A student could learn hat, mat, and cat by sounding out each one,
or could sound out "hat" and then learn that "cat" and "mat" are just like "hat." In one study,
students who learned what went on inside a computer's memory were able to transfer their
learning from one computer program to another much better than students who had not learned
what went on inside. 26

Teach For Understanding

Having a deeper understanding of a topic helps students transfer. 27 For example, adults who learned how to use a word processing program and understood why they needed to take certain
steps could transfer that learning to another word processing program. 28 In another study,
changing surface rules for a game of bridge did not change how well experienced bridge players
could play, but changing fundamental rules did make them play worse. 29

Students often learn facts in a disconnected way and do not learn for understanding. 30 In one study of social studies knowledge, 51% of 5 th graders knew something about the Declaration of
Independence, but only 26% knew that it was England that the U. S. declared itself independent
from. 31 Part of the problem, of course, is that many teachers do not teach for understanding.
Teaching for understanding takes longer than teaching by rote. 32 Experts, on the other hand, tend
to have very well-connected knowledge (not just more knowledge). 33

In order to transfer learning, students have to have a very good understanding of the subject they are transferring from. For example, before asking students to use World War I to
understand World War II, make sure they understand World War I. It is not, however, necessary
to master all aspects of the fundamentals in a subject area before you can do any transfer. For
example, as soon as students can understand a passage, you can have a discussion about what it
means. They do not have to become expert decoders before you can ever work on
comprehension. Active learning, lots of practice, learning for understanding, feedback, and well-organized
texts can help students build a solid foundation. 34

Students who spend time organizing what they know— by writing outlines, bubble diagrams, summarizing, or other methods— have a deeper understanding of what they have learned.
Students who also relate what they are learning to what they already know have a deeper
understanding. Students who both organize the information they are learning and integrate it
with what they already know understand much better than students who do not. 35 27.
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School learning tends to use explanations and rules,
rather than examples. When
a new problem is like an old
problem, students who learn
from examples can transfer
well. The more unlike the
example is, the less well the
students do. When students
learned from rules alone and
never had examples, the
percentages were miserable,
all less than 20%. With
examples and rules, the
students did better, even on
unlike problems. 36

Students Need To Apply Their Understanding When Solving Problems
Applying a principled understanding is another important part of transfer. 37 For example, a student who tries to answer a question about a poem by understanding the poem will do better
than one who tries to remember, "Now, what was the answer to this question the last time I saw
it?"

Students Need Realistic Ideas About What Learning Is

Students are more likely to transfer if they know that learning is about understanding, not just memorizing facts. For example, a student who actively tries to understand what she reads will
remember more than one who reads to "say the words right." The one who reads for
understanding can apply her background knowledge (for example, knowledge about gravity) in
new areas (such as plant roots growing down).

Teaching With Analogies 38

In order to apply information in a new setting, students need to see the relationship between the two situations. For example, if a student is going to use what he knows about the World War
II to understand the Gulf War, he needs to make the connections between:
World War II Gulf War Role
Germany Iraq Aggressor nation
Hitler Saddam Dictator
Czechoslovakia Kuwait Innocent country invaded by aggressor. 39

0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90

Very
similar
problems

Somewhat
similar
Somewhat
dissimilar
Dissimilar
problems

Is It Better To Learn From Rules,
Examples, or Both?

Learn from rules
only

Learn from
examples only

Learn from
examples and
rules 28.
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One way to teach for transfer is to use analogies like this and explain to students what makes the two situations the same. Different analogies can explain different aspects of a problem. For
example, to explain electricity, some teachers use the analogy of water in pipes and some use the
analogy of cars moving in a road. Less water moves through a small pipe, just like less current
moves through a small wire. Fewer cars can get through a narrow road. The smallness of the
pipe causes the reduction in flow. The narrowness of the road causes the drop in the number of
cars getting through. 40 Students who learned the water analogy did better on electricity questions
about batteries (and worse on questions about resistors). Students who learned the cars analogy
did better on electricity questions about resistors (and worse on questions about batteries). 41

Electricity Water Driving
Electrons Water Cars
Resistor Narrowed pipe Narrowed road
Resistance Pipe narrowness Road narrowness
Current Water flow Cars getting through 42

Students seem to learn better when they see many analogies, especially if the analogies are
different from each other, such as the water and car analogies above. 43 Students start to see
which parts of the situation are important and which ones are just surface differences.

ADULTS
Adults have some more experiences to make analogies from than children do. For example, they
may know about car engines, electricity, work, city politics, and so on. Keep in mind, though,
that many adult literacy students have a very narrow range of experiences. For example, they
may ride the bus, but not the subway.

Teaching From Examples
Another way to teach for transfer is to use many worked-out example problems and help students see what they have in common. Sample problems work particularly well for students
who are beginners on a particular skill. 44 As mentioned earlier, school learning tends to use
explanations and rules, but when children learn from their parents, they tend to learn from
examples, which clearly is an effective way to learn and teach. 45

In one study, students learned better from, for example, seeing 4 worked-out problems and doing 4 practice problems, than from seeing one worked-out problem and doing 8 practice
problems. 46 Surprisingly, students can get a better understanding of math problems by using
many worked-out problems than from being lectured to. Teaching from examples is not just rote
learning— theories are easier to understand in the context of a real problem than in the abstract.
Xinming Zhu and Herbert Simon have designed an algebra and geometry curriculum that can be
taught in only 2 years (instead of 3) to average Chinese middle school students by teaching from
examples. 47 Worked-out examples can help low-scoring students do as well as high-scoring
students on math problems. 48 29.
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Summary
1. Teach skills in multiple contexts.
2. Teach when to use the skill, not just how to do it.
3. Teach through patterns.
4. Teach for understanding.
5. Students need to apply their understanding when solving problems.
6. Students need realistic ideas about what learning is.

What it means for teachers
Transfer
Always give problems that have a context. 49 For example, make all grammar problems
proofreading problems, so that students can see where they need to use the skills they are
learning.

Imagine the transfer you want students to make and teach in a way that helps students make
those connections. 50 To do this, you will have to look closely at what skills and knowledge are
needed for the initial learning and for the later transfer. 51

Mixing up types of practice problems (like mixing up comprehension and analysis questions)
improves transfer later. 52 Students do not get into a habit of blindly using one strategy, but have
to choose strategies based on understanding the problem. 53

Start with the skills that students do have to teach new skills. 54 For example, reasoning about
what to say to a landlord (tactfully and indirectly) may help students understand an indirect
conversation in a literature passage.

When you introduce new information, explain how it could apply in students' lives (now or in
future careers) or ask students how they think it can be useful. 55

Modeling
To help students transfer from one area to another (for example, to transfer writing skills from
school to home), demonstrate how you would make that transfer. Then ask students to transfer
the knowledge themselves. 56

Simply telling students to transfer is not effective until they have some examples. 57
Point out what two different situations have in common, for example, the treatment of Blacks
before the Civil War and in South Africa in the 1980s. Most teaching tends to cover the features
that make each situation stand out, not what they have in common. 58 30.
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Analogies
Be sure that your students know the topic you are making an analogy from. For example,
using "Fore!" in golf as an analogy to teach "Timber!" in forestry would be a bad example
(unless your GED students play golf).

When you make an analogy, explain in detail how the parts of each example relate to each
other. 59 In other words, say "The earth circles around the sun. An electron circles around the
nucleus," rather than, "An electron is like the earth."

You may need to explain that analogies are about how the parts of each situation relate to
each other, not how the situations relate. When we say "Cat is to kitten as horse is to foal," we
do not mean that horses are like cats! 60

Begin your explanation with the familiar example. In other words, say "The earth circles
around the sun. In an atom, the electrons circle around the nucleus," rather than, "An electron
circles around the nucleus just like the earth circles around the sun."

Also point out the differences between the two situations. In the sun example, the sun is
yellow, hot, and huge. The earth has life on it. These aspects of the sun and earth are not
relevant to the nucleus and electrons. 61 It is better to start from a rich example that many sample
problems can be compared to. 62

Newspapers often use language that depends on analogies, such as "sour grapes" (which
refers to a story from Aesop— the newspaper story is an analogy to the Aesop story). Explain
these cultural references so that students can understand the point being made by the writer. 63

Students may make an analogy to life experiences that do not match the problem you are
working on. For example, they may think about drinking laws as an analogy to voting laws. For
drinking laws, "If you're over 21, you can drink or not drink, it doesn't matter." But for voting
laws, "If you're over 18, you can vote or not vote, it doesn't matter" is a different kind of
statement. 64

Examples
Choose examples that are enough alike that students can see the common elements, but
different enough that they are not solved in exactly the same way. 65

Put example problems in order from easier (more fundamental) to harder. 66
Explain why you use the strategies you do on example problems. 67 For example, if you give
sample sentences where a colon is used, explain that the colon is there because a list follows. 68

Always give examples whenever you teach an abstract idea (like democracy, fractions, verbs,
etc.). 69 31.
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In beginning algebra, use letters that stand for some real quantity, like s for speed or t for
time. 70

The risk of learning from examples is that students will simply duplicate the steps from a
sample problem without thinking about what it means. You need to explain why you take each
step in a sample problem. 71

Practice
Allow students to practice some without immediate feedback so that they become more
independent learners. This will help them transfer later. 72

Learning For Understanding
Ask "Why?" Why do you think the North and the South went to war? Why do you think
other countries send diplomats to the United States? I agree that that's the right answer, tell me
why you chose it. Why do you think fractions must have the same denominator before you can
add them? Why do you think the rich are rich and the poor are poor?

Ask students to predict what will happen in an experiment, run the experiment, and ask them
to account for what happened. This can help them transfer their learning to other areas. 73

Students need to first learn concretely, so they can really understand, and then generalize
what they have learned.

Lesson Ideas
Teaching For Understanding
Always ask students to write about what they read, it will help them understand it better.
Before reading a story, ask students to role play an analogous story from a familiar setting. For example, before you read Romeo and Juliet, ask students to take the roles of 1) a young man
and 2) a young woman from rival gangs who fall in love, 3) the man's father, 4) his friends, and
5) the man's mother. Afterwards, discuss what happened and relate it to the story you will read.

Ask, "How is a candle like a light bulb?" and other questions that get students to look at fundamental relationships.

Transfer Across School Topics
Collaborate with other teachers at your school to teach a unit across several subjects. Math problems can apply to social studies/ economics. Physics and math go well together. 32.
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Real-life Applications
For writing lessons, write real-life letters to: employers (a cover letter for a job),
landlords, stores, or
politicians.
Do class projects to go with existing word problems. Use fabric, wood, or recipes (for fractions) or
play money or metric rulers (for decimals). Design, buy, and make curtains, a skirt, cookies, a bookshelf, or make change to show students
that these classroom skills can be useful in a real-life context.

Set up a "school store" and have students figure out per item costs, set prices, and calculate profits. This can also be turned into a graphing exercise. Students can also write their own word
problems that the whole class will solve.

Teach students how to punctuate a letter, then have them write addresses on an envelope and a postcard to show them that the punctuation is the same.

NOTES
1 Singley, M. K., & Anderson, J. R. (1989). The transfer of cognitive skill. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press, p. 1. 2
Griffin, S., Case, R., & Capodilupo, A. (1995). Teaching for understanding: The importance of the central
conceptual structures in the elementary mathematics curriculum. In A. McKeough, J. Lupart, & A. Marini (Eds.),
Teaching for transfer: Fostering generalization in learning. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum, p. 123. 3
21st century skills for 21st century jobs. (1999). Published by the U. S. Department of Commerce, U. S.
Department of Education, U. S. Department of Labor, National Institute for Literacy, and Small Business
Administration, Washington, DC and Gott, S. P., Hall, E. P., Pokorny, R. A., Dibble, E., & Glaser, R. (1993). A
naturalistic study of transfer: Adaptive expertise in technical domains. In D. K. Detterman & R. J. Sternberg (Eds.),
Transfer on trial: Intelligence, cognition, and instruction, Norwood, NJ: Ablex. 4
The cognitive skills required to pass the GED are based on Bloom, B., et al. (1956). Taxonomy of educational
objectives. New York: Longmans Green, used by most high schools and textbook publishers to design curricula.
Bloom's opinion was that application (his term for transfer) was more difficult than rote knowledge and simple
comprehension (lower-order thinking), but prerequisite to evaluation or synthesis (higher-order thinking). 5
Swartz, R. (1988). Official teacher's guide to the GED. Washington, DC: ACE, p. 94. 6
For overviews of the failure to find transfer in the research, see The study of transfer, Chapter 1 in Singley, M. K.,
& Anderson, J. R. (1989). The transfer of cognitive skill. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. For
arguments against transfer, see Lave, J. (1988). Cognition in practice. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University
Press, and Detterman, D. K. (1993). The case for the prosecution: Transfer as an epiphenomenon. In Detterman &
Sternberg, Transfer on trial. For examples of successful transfer, see Detterman & Sternberg, Transfer on trial and
A. McKeough, J. Lupart, & A. Marini (Eds.). (1995). Teaching for transfer: Fostering generalization in learning.
Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum. 7
Gick, M. L., & Holyoak, K. J. (1983). Schema induction and analogical transfer. Cognitive Psychology, 15, 1-38. 33.
33 Page 34 35
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8 Lave, J., Murtaugh, M., & de la Rocha, O. (1984). The dialectic of arithmetic in grocery shopping. In B. Rogoff
& J. Lave (Eds.), Everyday cognition: Its development in social context. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press, p. 82. 9
Mayer, R. E., & Wittrock, M. C. (1996). Problem– solving transfer. In D. C. Berliner & R. C. Calfee (Eds.),
Handbook of educational psychology. New York: Macmillan, p. 48. 10
Bassok, M., & Holyoak, K. J. (1993). Pragmatic knowledge and conceptual structure: Determinants of transfer
between quantitative domains. In D. K. Detterman & R. J. Sternberg (Eds.), Transfer on trial: Intelligence,
cognition, and instruction, Norwood, NJ: Ablex, p. 48. 11
Perkins and Salomon argue that there is "low road" transfer, where new information automatically triggers
routines, and "high road" transfer, which requires, "Mindful abstraction . . . from one context for application in
another." Perkins, D. N., & Salomon, G. (1988). Teaching for transfer. Educational Leadership, 46 (1), 22-32, p.
25. Reed, S. K., Dempster, A., & Ettinger, M. (1985). Usefulness of analogous solutions for solving algebra word
problems. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 11 (1), 106-125. 12
Frederiksen, J. R., & White, B. Y. (1988). Intelligent testing within an intelligent tutoring system. Machine-Mediated
Learning, 2, 351-372, p. 366. 13
Schraw, G. (1998). On the development of adult metacognition. In M. C. Smith & T. Pourchot (Eds.), Adult
learning and development: Perspectives from educational psychology. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum, p. 96. 14
Robbie Case argues that there are knowledge structures he calls "central conceptual structures" (like the number
line) that cross domains. McKeough, A. (1995). Teaching narrative knowledge for transfer in the early school years.
In A. McKeough, J. Lupart & A. Marini (Eds.), Teaching for transfer: Fostering generalization in learning.
Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum. 15
Brown, A. L., Bransford, J. D., Ferrara, R. A., & Campione, J. C. (1983). Learning, remembering, and
understanding. In J. H. Flavell & E. M. Markman (Eds.), Handbook of child psychology: Vol. III. Cognitive
development (pp. 106-126). New York: John Wiley & Sons, p. 146. Learning disabled: Lupart, J. L. (1995).
Exceptional learners and teaching for transfer. In A. McKeough, J. Lupart, & A. Marini (Eds.), Teaching for
transfer: Fostering generalization in learning. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum. Some researchers feel that transfer never
happens, see Detterman, D. K. (1993). The case for the prosecution: Transfer as an epiphenomenon. In D. K.
Detterman & R. J. Sternberg (Eds.), Transfer on trial: Intelligence, cognition, and instruction, Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
Gott, et al. argue that students who can transfer have more elaborated mental models, in A naturalistic study of
transfer. 16
Byrnes, J. P. (1996). Cognitive development and learning in instructional contexts. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, p.
74-80. 17
McKeough, Lupart & Marini, Teaching for transfer and Butterfield, E. C., & Nelson, G. (1991). Promoting
positive transfer of different types. Cognition and Instruction, 8 (1), 69-102, p. 71. 18
Cormier, S. M., & Hagman, J. D. (1987). Introduction. In Cormier, S. M., & Hagman, J. D. (Eds.), Transfer of
learning: Contemporary research and applications. San Diego: Academic Press, p. 3. 19
Detterman, The case for the prosecution. 20
Mayer & Wittrock point out that school problems usually have "one right answer" (are well-defined), but real-life
problems often have many "right answers" (are ill-defined, such as a business letter, which could be written in
many different ways), Problem– solving transfer, p. 48. 21
Brown, J. S., Collins A., & Duguid, P. (1989). Situated cognition and the culture of learning. Educational
Researcher, 18 (1), 32-42. 22
Mayer, R. E. (1988). Teaching for thinking: Research on the teachability of thinking skills. The G. Stanley Hall
Lecture Series, 9, 139-164, p. 153. 23
Catrambone, R., & Holyoak, K. J. (1990). Learning subgoals and methods for solving probability problems.
Memory and Cognition, 18 (6), 593-603, p. 599. 24
Brown, Bransford, Ferrara & Campione, Learning, remembering, and understanding, p. 143-144. 25
Cooper, G., & Sweller, J. (1987). Effects of schema acquisition and rule automation on mathematical problem-solving
transfer. Journal of Educational Psychology, 79 (4), 347-362. 26
Mayer, R. E. Teaching for thinking, p. 159. 27
Gagné, E. D., Yekovich, C. W., & Yekovich, F. R. (1993). The cognitive psychology of school learning (2 nd ed.).
New York: Harper Collins, p. 237 and Mayer & Wittrock, Problem– solving transfer, p. 50. 28
Lateral Transfer. Chapter 3 in Singley & Anderson, The transfer of cognitive skill. 29
Sternberg, R. J., & Frensch, P. K. (1993). Mechanisms of Transfer. In D. K. Detterman & R. J. Sternberg (Eds.),
Transfer on trial: Intelligence, cognition, and instruction, Norwood, NJ: Ablex, p. 29. 34.
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30 Bereiter, C. (1995). A dispositional view of transfer. In A. McKeough, J. Lupart & A. Marini (Eds.), Teaching for
transfer: Fostering generalization in learning. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum, p. 27. 31
McKeown, M. G., & Beck, I. L. (1990). The assessment and characterization of young learners' knowledge of a
topic in history. American Educational Research Journal, 27, 688-726. 32
Bransford, J., Brown, A., & Cocking, R. R. (1999). How people learn: Brain, mind, experience, and school.
Washington, DC: National Academy Press. 33
One collection of studies from many areas is Chi, M. T. H., Glaser, R., & Farr, M. (Eds.). (1988). The nature of
expertise. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. 34
Druckman, D., & Bjork, R. A. (Eds.). (1991). In the mind's eye: Enhancing human performance. Washington,
DC: National Academy Press, p. 37. 35
Wittrock, M. C. (1990). Generative processes of comprehension. Educational Psychologist, 24, 345-376. 36
Reed, S. K. (1993). A schema-based theory of transfer. In D. K. Detterman & R. J. Sternberg (Eds.), Transfer on
trial: Intelligence, cognition, and instruction, Norwood, NJ: Ablex, p. 51. See Brown, A. L., & Kane, M. J. (1988).
Preschool children can learn to transfer: Learning to learn and learning from example. Cognitive Psychology, 20,
493-523, for startlingly similar results with 4-year-old children. 37
Reed, Dempster, & Ettinger, Usefulness of analogous solutions, p. 123. 38
Note that I am not referring to the kind of analogy used on some standardized tests, such as human: arm:: dog: paw. 39
Holyoak & Thagard use this as an example of an ambiguous analogy, since Kuwait is also a dictatorship, unlike
Czechoslovakia, and it is not clear which country that Germany invaded should be "mapped" onto Kuwait. Holyoak,
K., & Thagard, P. (1995). Mental leaps: Analogy in creative thought. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, p. 131. 40
Holyoak & Thagard, Mental leaps, p. 116. 41
Mayer, R. E. (1992). Thinking, problem solving, cognition (2 nd ed.). New York: W. H. Freeman, p. 432. 42
Frederiksen & White, in Intelligent testing, point out that the water model interferes with learning about electronic
troubleshooting. For example, if current can either go through a light bulb or through another circuit without a light
bulb, it will short-circuit the light bulb. Water, in the analogous case, would flow through both "circuits," p. 367. 43
Gick & Holyoak, Schema induction. 44
Ross, B. H. (1987). This is like that: The use of earlier problems and the separation of similarity effects. Journal
of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 13 (4), 629-639, p. 632. 45
Rogoff, B., & Gardner, W. (1984). Adult guidance of cognitive development. In B. Rogoff & J. Lave (Eds.),
Everyday cognition: Its development in social context. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, p. 102. 46
Cooper & Sweller, Effects of schema acquisition and rule automation. 47
Zhu, X., & Simon, H. A. (1987). Learning mathematics from examples and by doing. Cognition and Instruction, 4
(3), 137-166. Zhu and Simon feel that classes were successful because students had to take primary responsibility
for learning. Worked examples may free up working memory, since means-end problem solving strategies create a
very heavy working memory load. Sweller, J., van Merrienboer, J. J. G., & Paas, F. G. W. C. (1998). Cognitive
architecture and instructional design. Educational Psychology Review, 10 (3), 251-296, p. 273. 48
Cooper & Sweller, Effects of schema acquisition and rule automation, p. 352. 49
Brown, Collins & Duguid, Situated cognition and the culture of learning, p. 32. 50
Perkins & Salomon, Teaching for transfer, p. 30. 51
Singley, M. K. (1995). Promoting transfer through model tracing. In A. McKeough, J. Lupart & A. Marini (Eds.),
Teaching for transfer: Fostering generalization in learning. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum. 52
Druckman & Bjork, In the mind's eye, p. 40-43. 53
Gagné, Yekovich & Yekovich, The cognitive psychology of school learning, p. 238. 54
Schraw, On the development of adult metacognition, p. 120. Mothers do this all the time with children, see
Rogoff, B., & Gardner, W. (1984). Adult guidance of cognitive development. In B. Rogoff & J. Lave (Eds.),
Everyday cognition: Its development in social context. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, p. 101. 55
Sternberg & Frensch, Mechanisms of transfer, p. 35. 56
Sternberg & Frensch, Mechanisms of transfer, p. 35. 57
Butterfield & Nelson, Promoting positive transfer, p. 83. 58
Perkins & Salomon, Teaching for transfer, p. 28. 59
Perkins, D. N., & Salomon, G. (1989). Are cognitive skills context-bound? Educational Researcher, 18 (1), 16-
25. 60
Halford, G. (1993). Mental models. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum, p. 185. 61
Halford, Mental models, p. 187. 35.
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62 Reed, S. K. (1993). A schema-based theory of transfer. In D. K. Detterman & R. J. Sternberg (Eds.), Transfer on
trial: Intelligence, cognition, and instruction, Norwood, NJ: Ablex, p. 48. 63
Holyoak & Thagard, Mental leaps: Analogy in creative thought, p. 8. 64
Cheng, P. W., & Holyoak, K. J. (1985). Pragmatic reasoning schemas. Cognitive Psychology, 17, 391-416, p. 397. 65
Butterfield & Nelson, Promoting positive transfer, p. 94. 66
Zhu & Simon, Learning mathematics from examples. 67
Singley & Anderson, The transfer of cognitive skill, p. 236. 68
Reed, Dempster, & Ettinger, Usefulness of Analogous Solutions, p. 117 and Cooper & Sweller, Effects of Schema
Acquisition, p. 349. 69
Gagné, Yekovich & Yekovich, The cognitive psychology of school learning, p. 170-173. 70
Salvucci, D. D., & Anderson, J. R. (1998). Analogy. In J. R. Anderson & C. Labierre (Eds.), The atomic
components of thought. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum, p. 352. 71
Catrambone & Holyoak, Learning subgoals and methods, p. 595. 72
Druckman & Bjork, In the mind's eye, p. 45-47. 73
Two reviews of more than 107 transfer studies found 7 studies that did show transfer— 6 of the 7 asked students
think out loud about how well their strategies worked. 36.
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3: Mental Models
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Fact Sheet 3: Mental Models
Principle: More and Better Models Help Learning
"When I introduce a unit on 'magical realism, ' I ask students if they have ever
had something inexplicable happen to them. After students relate ghost stories
and strange sightings, I tell them my ghost story and explain how these stories
relate to the idea of magical realism."— Art teacher M. Peach Robidoux 1

Questions for teacher reflection
Take 15 seconds to write down everything you can think of that is in a kitchen.
Take 15 seconds to write down everything you can think of that is on a golf course.
These are your mental models for 'kitchen' and 'golf course. '
Which list was longer? Why? How much experience do you have with kitchens? With golf
courses?
Which list do you think your students would have the most difficulty with?
If your students were reading a passage related to kitchens, do you think they would have
more or less trouble than if they were reading a passage related to golf? Why?

What we know
What Is A Mental Model?
Just like your "mental maps" of what is in a kitchen or golf course, everyone has many complex models of common things and events in the world. 2 We have thousands of mental
models--for places like offices or schools, for actions like buying things or walking down the
street, for objects like beans, for text, and even for learning. Mental models do not stay the
same; we change and deepen our mental models as we gain experience in the world. 3 Mental
models shape how we understand our experiences, and our experiences in turn shape our mental
models.

These mental models affect how we understand what we see and hear. 4 For example, people gave very different summaries of the exact same story when it had the title "Going Hunting" than
when it had the title "An Escaped Convict." 5 Their "hunting model" and "escaped convict
model" shaped how they understood the story. Likewise, people's mental models shape what
they pay attention to when they read. In another study, musicians remembered musical details
when they read a passage including, "Early in the evening Mike noticed Pat's hand and the many
diamonds. As the night progressed the tempo of play increased." Non-musicians remembered
details about the card game instead. 6

A mental model is a kind of shorthand for experience (or a stereotype of it). The model includes what is common to all kitchens or golf courses, or whatever. A mental model is made 38.
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Settlers
came

up of what we do not have to pay attention to because we take it for granted. 7 We do not have to
wonder, 'What is that big white box in the kitchen? ' and we do not need to open it up and feel
that it is cold inside because we know to expect a refrigerator.

In a mental model, all of the parts are interconnected. In a "kitchen model," "kitchen" is probably linked to refrigerator, cabinets, sink, food, etc. "Food" is probably linked to

refrigerator and cabinets. In another culture, the mental model might have an open fire instead of
a stove. I suspect many of my students would put "people" in their list of what is in a kitchen,
even though I did not.

An Ideal Mental Model for Parts of the American Revolution

Parts Of An Actual 6 th Grade Student's Mental Model
Adapted from M. G. McKeown & I. L. Beck. (1990). The assessment and characterization of young learners'
knowledge of a topic in history. American Educational Research Journal, 27, 688-726.

Columbus
discovered
America

July 4th

Became a
country
(U. S.)

Revolutionary
War

Independence
Americans vs.
Spanish

America
won

Declaration of
Independence

July 4th

Became a
country
(U. S.)

Revolutionary
War

Declare
independence

Colonies vs.
Britain 39.
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Terms in bold ovals were mentioned in the questions that children were asked.
Solid lines represent true relationships.
Dashed lines -- represent incorrect relationships.
Terms in shaded ovals are irrelevant information. 8

People have remarkably similar models for common things and events. For example, 73% of people in one study agreed on six events that would always happen when eating at a restaurant

(for example, looking at the menu, ordering food, etc.). 9 Mental models are also linked to each
other. The "refrigerator" in your kitchen model is also part of your "electrical appliance" model,
your "cold" model, and your "Sears" model.

How Do Mental Models Help Us Think?

Mental models help our thinking in five different ways: 10 1. They make learning and memory more efficient because the information is organized
(poodle, greyhound, and pit bull are stored with "dog," not stored separately as "poodle dog,"
"greyhound dog," etc.).
2. They set up expectations, including what to pay attention to (when you see a dog, you expect
it may bark or bite).
3. They help us remember things associated with specific objects (when you think of "dog" you
also think of fur, fleas, puppies, etc.).
4. They help us comprehend because they organize background knowledge (when we read
Lassie, we think of dog characteristics— loyal, guards, good for children, etc.).
5. They include problem-solving shortcuts. 11
Most stories that are interesting are actually about situations that do not fit our models. They are
interesting because they are not the norm. 12

Mental models can also interfere with thinking because they are stereotypes. When we remember something we read, our memories tend to capture the general sense of the reading, but
not the precise details. 13 As time passes, our memories of a particular passage tend to look more
like our stereotypes and less like the passage itself. 14

Background Knowledge And Mental Models

People with little background knowledge of a topic will have a poor mental model for that topic. They have a hard time learning new information about the topic because they have no
mental model to structure their thinking. 15 A mental model is a kind of summary of background
knowledge about a topic.

Mental models may mirror the way information is stored in the mind in networks of associated facts. You may have noticed that the mental models above look like the idea maps or
bubble diagrams used by many writing teachers. See Fact Sheet 8: Long-term Memory and
Learning for more information. 40.
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Institute for Literacy under a 1998-99 Literacy Leader Fellow Project #X257I980003

Students with learning disabilities may not use their background knowledge as much as other students. They may benefit more from pre-reading discussions or pre-reading questions which
activate what they already know about a topic before they read. 16
Mental Models Are Organized

Mental models are not just collections of related facts, they are organized. Experts in fields, especially, have more specific information grouped under more general ideas. Novices' mental
models tend to be jumbled, even when they have the same information as experts. 17 For
example, I was teaching a class at a university. On the first day of the class, I figured out how to
get from the apartment where I was staying to the classroom. I also figured out how to get from
the apartment to the dining hall. But I had to look at a map to figure out how to get from the
classroom to the dining hall. I had the information, but it was not well-organized.

Experts also have knowledge about when to use a mental model. For example, there is a difference between knowing how to add two fractions and knowing when to add two fractions.
Knowing when to use information makes the link between "school learning" and "real life."

Students also have mental models about learning itself. For example, they may think that they will learn what they need to simply by coming to class and listening.

Expectations
Mental models set up readers' expectations before they read. 18 For example, if you read a romance, you expect a lonely heroine, a love object, an obstacle to love, and a happy ending.
This mental model helps readers to understand because they do not have to pay attention to
details that just fit their expectations. 19 Most stories have a common structure: a hero who faces
some difficulty and then overcomes it. People who are asked to remember stories from other
cultures tend to leave out certain details and add other details that make the stories take on this
more familiar form. 20

Mental models also bring ideas to mind when we read. When we read the word "car," "we assume that it has an engine, headlights, and all of the standard characteristics of an
automobile." 21

Many students find stories easier than textbooks. One reason is that they have a "story model" that tells them what to expect but no "textbook models." 22 For example, very few stories
give a definition followed by supporting evidence, but many textbooks do. In fact, without a
mental model, a textbook can seem like so many disconnected sentences. 23

Comprehension

To understand what we read, we need to draw on all of our knowledge about the topic. Even a simple sentence such as "The truckdriver stirred the coffee in his cup." requires a "drinking 41.
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3: Mental Models
Produced with funds from the National 29 © 2000 by Jennifer Cromley
Institute for Literacy under a 1998-99 Literacy Leader Fellow Project #X257I980003

model" in order to understand that the man must have had a spoon. 24 Children younger than
fourth grade simply do not make these connections when they read 25 (that the man must have
had a spoon). Studies show that good readers sometimes "remember" information that was not in
a text because they added information from their own background knowledge. For example, a
reader may think that the "coffee" sentence specifically mentioned a spoon. Good readers
mistake their background knowledge for ideas in the text. 26

Poor readers tend to underestimate how much they already use background knowledge when they read and how much more they need to. 27 They may assume that the meaning comes entirely
from the text, and therefore fail to use what they know.

When students have trouble understanding, the mental models theory suggests four possible problems: 28
1. The reader does not have a (good enough) mental model for the topic.
2. The reader has a model, but the text does not give the right clues to bring that mental model
to mind.
3. The reader found a different meaning from the one the author intended (a different mental
model).
4. The reading challenges the reader's model, and he or she may need to expand the model. 29

Solving Problems

A lot of thinking involves solving problems, and problem solving uses mental models. Even reading includes problem-solving, such as inferring the meaning of a word the reader does not
know. Common mental models that help with everyday problem solving include, "Which way
am I allowed to drive on the street?" and "How should I talk to my supervisor?".

We may not have any trouble solving logic problems that take place in a familiar setting because we already have mental models for them. In one study, the problem "Which of these
people is legally allowed to drink alcohol?" was easy to solve. But when problems are in an
unfamiliar setting we do not have a mental problem-solving model for the situation. 30 In the
same study, very few people were able to answer a question with identical logic that asked,
"Which letter needs more Italian postage?" (although it was easier for Italians to answer than for
Americans!).

Good problem-solvers have more and better-developed mental models than poor problem-solvers. 31 For example, there are four common types of arithmetic word problems, which are
also reading comprehension problems. Good word problem-solvers can read a problem (often
just the first few words) 32 and know how to solve it because they match it to a type of problem.
A mental model for an addition problem might look like this,

"Person 1 has a certain amount of things. Person 2 gives Person 1 a certain
amount more. How many does Person 1 have now? Solution: Add the two
amounts together." 33 42.
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3: Mental Models
Produced with funds from the National 30 © 2000 by Jennifer Cromley
Institute for Literacy under a 1998-99 Literacy Leader Fellow Project #X257I980003

Problem-solvers with few, incomplete, or wrong mental models for "school-type" problems may not know how to solve the problem, or they may approach it in a way that does not work.
For example, inexperienced physics students in one study lumped all "pulley" word problems
together even though some problems had to be solved using equations for tension on the rope
and others using equations for gravity. 34 The mental models of experienced physics problem
solvers included a lot of physics equations, but also information about when to apply them. The
inexperienced students had a mental model for physics problems that did not work.

Mental models are also at work when students try to figure out what a poem means, or why a character in a play said what he did, etc. For example, in a poem most language is not direct. A
"poem model" or a "play model" can help students understand better because they know to
expect indirect language.

Summary
1. Mental models are complex networks of information about a topic (an office, buying
something, walking down the street) that change as we learn.
2. They affect how we understand what we read and hear.
3. People share similar models for common events.
4. Mental models help thinking: they are efficient and organized, create expectations,
provide memory cues, and include problem-solving models.
5. Mental models are closely tied to background knowledge.
6. Experts' models are highly organized.
7. Many students have a model for stories (narratives), but not textbook writing (expository
prose).
8. Mental models allow us to make inferences.
9. Good problem-solvers have mental models for many types of problems.

What it means for teachers
Choosing teaching materials