Teach & case
Help a near-peer reason through the idea — when you explain it, you understand it best — then read the real decision it comes from.
Help Thatcher study
In a minute you'll be the teacher. Get ready to teach Thatcher: retrieval practice.
Retrieval practice — recalling from memory — beats re-reading. Feeling familiar with a page isn't the same as being able to recall it.
What you've shown you can teach
A case · you decide
Thatcher's two study nights
Thatcher — a student with one big test and two nights left to study
Thatcher has a biology test in two days and feels behind. His instinct: re-read the chapter and highlighter-glow every page until it "feels familiar." His friend swears by closing the book and quizzing herself instead — which feels harder and worse.
Re-reading feels great: everything looks familiar, so Thatcher feels ready. Familiarity is the trap — recognizing words on a page isn't the same as being able to produce the answer with the book shut.
Self-quizzing feels awful: he blanks, he's unsure, it's slow. That struggle is the point — every effortful recall strengthens the memory more than another smooth read-through.
Night one. Thatcher has three hours. Re-read the chapter three times, or read once then quiz himself twice from memory?
He keeps blanking on a self-quiz and it feels like failing. Give up on quizzing?
Thatcher closes the book and quizzes. It feels worse and works better — that's the deal with retrieval practice: the struggle to recall is exactly what makes it stick.
A case · you decide
Tove mixes the practice
Tove — sixteen, preparing for a maths test on three kinds of problems
Tove's test has area, percentage and ratio questions. Her usual plan is 20 area problems, then 20 percentage, then 20 ratio.
In blocked practice, you always know the method before you start, because every problem in the set is the same kind.
On the test, the problems are mixed, and nothing tells you which kind each one is.
How should Tove practise?
Practise the choice as well as the method, because the test will ask for both.
A case · you decide
Thatcher and Marlowe spread the hours
Marlowe & Thatcher — sixteen, with three hours to study for a history test a week away
Marlowe plans to reread his notes for three hours the night before. Thatcher suggests something else.
Thatcher's move is retrieval: close the notes and try to recall, then check.
Marlowe's move is spacing: the same practice split across days sticks better than one long block.
What plan will help Marlowe remember most on test day?
Pulling something back from memory, again and again over days, is what makes it stay.
A case · you decide
Tove and Anwen check the choice, not just the answer
Anwen & Tove — sixteen, studying with Tove two days before the maths test
Anwen has been checking her answers against the back of the book. She gets most right, but only when she practises one chapter at a time.
Anwen's move is self-testing: find out what you actually know before the test does.
Tove's move is interleaving: mix the problem types so the test is realistic.
What should Anwen's self-test look like?
Test yourself the way the test will test you.