Integrating digital documents by means of concept maps: testing an intervention program with eye-movements modelling...

Area of Science:

• Educational Psychology
• Cognitive Science
• Learning Sciences

Background:

• Students struggle to integrate information from multiple online documents for learning.
• Concept mapping is an instructional method to aid multi-document integration, but can be challenging for learners.
• Previous research focused on older students, leaving a gap in understanding effectiveness for younger learners.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the effectiveness of eye-movement modeling examples (EMMEs) and self-explanation prompts in teaching concept map construction to 6th-grade students.
• To assess the impact of EMMEs on students' comprehension and ability to integrate information from multiple documents.
• To determine if EMMEs can be efficiently taught as a literacy strategy in a natural educational setting.

Main Methods:

• A quasi-experimental design with an intervention group (n=34) receiving EMMEs and self-explanation prompts, and an active control group (n=32) receiving similar instruction without EMMEs.
• Participants engaged in 1-hour sessions over four consecutive days in a natural educational setting.
• Data collection included questionnaires on concept mapping, open-ended reading comprehension questions, and a delayed summary task.

Main Results:

• The EMME group demonstrated significantly better learning of concept map construction phases compared to the control group, as evidenced by questionnaire results.
• No significant differences were found between the EMME group and the control group in reading comprehension or delayed summarization performance from pre-test to post-test.
• The study suggests EMMEs are effective for teaching the procedural aspects of concept mapping.

Conclusions:

• Eye-movement modeling examples (EMMEs) can effectively foster the learning of specific literacy strategies, such as the phases of concept map construction, in primary school students.
• While EMMEs improved procedural knowledge of concept mapping, they did not yield significant gains in deeper reading comprehension or information integration.
• Further research is needed to explore how to enhance the impact of EMMEs on comprehension and integration for younger learners.