How to combine generative learning and retrieval practice in fostering the acquisition of declarative concepts?

陈述性概念的学习，即学习关键术语和抽象概念的简短定义，是一个共同的学习目标--在几乎每个领域，陈述性概念都代表着学习者在扩展知识时所建立的基本知识的重要部分。鉴于这种共同的、中心的、跨领域的学习目标，能够促进陈述性概念习得的学习任务的设计在教育心理学研究中受到了极大的关注。本研究的一个主要结果是，两种类型的学习任务特别适合于这一目的：主要鼓励学习者建构知识的学习任务(即生成性学习任务)和主要鼓励学习者练习提取的学习任务。典型的生成性学习任务包括要求学习者在阅读一篇说明性课文后，用自己生成的例子(详述)来说明陈述性概念，并在概念之间建立联系(组织)。如果学习者在这个学习任务中仍然可以接触到学习材料(即他们仍然可以使用说明性文本)，那么他们主要专注于知识建构(详述和组织)，而很少练习从记忆中提取概念(提取练习)。另一方面，一个典型的提取练习任务是要求学习者根据记忆再现关键术语和概念的定义。如果学习者不再有机会接触到学习材料(即说明文不再可用)，他们主要忙于提取练习，由于学习任务的再生性，很难构建知识。两种类型的学习任务都能促进陈述性概念的习得。然而，到目前为止，关于如何将这两种类型的学习任务结合起来，以及如何共同开发知识建构和提取练习在获得陈述性概念方面的潜力的研究很少。从理论上讲，这两种学习任务都很有希望实现，因为它们应该在功能上相辅相成：生成性学习任务应该主要改善学习者的心理表征结构，而提取练习任务应该主要有助于巩固心理表征。在此背景下，该项目的目的是通过三个实验来研究如何将生成和提取练习任务结合起来促进陈述性概念的习得。

The learning of declarative concepts, i.e. the learning of key terms and short definitions of abstract concepts, is a common learning objective – in almost every domain declarative concepts represent a substantial part of the basic knowledge on which learners build as they expand their knowledge. In view of this common, central and cross-domain learning objective, the design of learning tasks that can foster the acquisition of declarative concepts has received much attention in educational psychological research. A main result of this research is that two types of learning tasks are particularly suitable for this purpose: learning tasks that predominantly encourage learners to construct knowledge (i.e., generative learning tasks) and learning tasks that predominantly encourage learners to practice retrieval. A prototypical generative learning task consists of asking learners, after reading an expository text in which to-be-learned declarative concepts have been presented, to illustrate the declarative concepts using self- generated examples (elaboration) and to establish connections between the concepts (organization). If the learners, as is often the case, still have access to the learning material during this learning task (i.e., the expository text is still available to them), they are predominantly occupied with knowledge construction (elaboration and organization) and hardly with practicing the retrieval of concepts from memory (retrieval practice). A prototypical retrieval practice task, on the other hand, is that learners are asked to reproduce the key terms and definitions of the concepts from memory. If the learners no longer have access to the learning material (i.e., the expository text is no longer available), they are mainly occupied with retrieval practice and, due to the reproductive character of the learning task, hardly with knowledge construction. Both types of learning task can promote the acquisition of declarative concepts. However, to date there has been little research on how the two types of learning task can be combined and how the potential of knowledge construction and retrieval practice in the acquisition of declarative concepts can thus be jointly exploited. From a theoretical perspective, it is highly promising to implement both types of learning tasks, as they should complement each other functionally: Generative learning tasks should predominantly improve the structure of the learners’ mental representations, while retrieval practice tasks should predominantly contribute to the consolidation of the mental representations. Against this background, the aim of the project is to investigate in three experiments how generative and retrieval practice tasks can be combined in fostering the acquisition of declarative concepts.