LEARNING FROM LECTURES - EFFECTS OF KNOWLEDGE MAPS AND COOPERATIVE REVIEW STRATEGIES

The effects of knowledge maps versus list-style lecture aids and cooperative versus individual review strategies were investigated. Eighty-five undergraduates viewed either knowledge maps or lists while hearing a lecture on descriptive statistics, then reviewed the information alone or with a partner, using either maps or lists as review aids. Dependent measures were free recall and scores on a multiple-choice test including factual versus application-level items. Other measures included self-reports of prior knowledge and confidence, and repeated-measures ratings of comprehension and predicted test performance. Recall performance was influenced significantly by the interaction of format with confidence; that is, less confident students were helped by having maps while more confident students did better with lists. An analysis of notetaking behaviours revealed that map-users annotated their handouts significantly less than list users. Also, the metacognitions of map-users with regard to their comprehension and predicted performance were less accurate than list-users, as shown by correlations between self-ratings and test scores. Map-users with low confidence had the least accurate metacognitions.