Are learning strategies recommended by teachers aligned with the science of learning?

Teachers may play a crucial role in translating findings from the science of learning into educational practices through the recommendations they make to students. Yet, little is known about how well their recommendations align with actual research-based findings. To investigate this issue, we surveyed 249 public-school K-12 teachers from the Brasília metropolitan area in Brazil regarding their teaching practices, beliefs, and the learning strategies they typically recommend to students. We found that most of their recommendations involved thinking of real-life examples, asking questions in class, rereading, highlighting, and summarizing. By contrast, learning strategies based on memory retrieval such as flashcards and active recall were recommended less often, even though their benefits for long-term retention are strongly supported by research. Interestingly, recommendations were similar across teachers with diverse demographic characteristics, although some suggestive variation was evident across subject areas. In addition, teachers often reported the belief that students have different learning styles, and often adapted their classes to accommodate such presumed learning-style differences. Taken together, these findings reveal a gap between research-supported learning principles and the study strategies teachers recommend to students. They highlight the need for improvements in the professional development of teachers, focusing on the promotion of evidence-based study strategies.