Earlier this month, we attended Zpannend Zernike, a family-oriented science festival held across the city of Groningen. As educational researchers and designers, this was a wonderful opportunity to see our work in the hands of young learners – And an opportunity for them to learn more about their internal learning and memory processes.
The personalised nature of adaptive learning gives children a sense of ownership over their learning – it’s all about them – and in the context of a science festival, this translates to real curiosity and interest. PhD-level cognitive science might sound intimidating, but the kids couldn’t wait to see how their memories stacked up – especially if it meant proving they’re smarter than their siblings… or, better yet, their parents!
We set up some laptops and tablets for the children, with a challenge: A four minute memory task – Try to learn and remember the names of footballers, or famous buildings, or the homes of some (adorable) cartoon animals. Afterwards, we would prepare a report on their memory and they could see their answer accuracy, reaction times, and the key variable behind our technology: their Speed of Forgetting.
This number represents how quickly forgotten a specific fact is for a specific learner. In short, we use Speed of Forgetting to estimate how long they will remember this fact, then use that information to calculate the moment (right before the fact is forgotten) when rehearsing the fact has the highest learning benefit. In doing so, we make learning considerably more efficient, as time is not wasted practising material that is too hard or too easy – Only that which is just right for that learner in that moment.
Naturally, different learners have different Speeds of Forgetting – when averaged over all facts, you arrive at a general measure for how quickly a learner forgets material. It is these individual differences that adaptive learning adapts to – Thereby ensuring that learners learn at their pace, and maximising learning outcomes. In Figure 1, you can see the data gathered from the children who took our learning challenge. With only a handful of data points, there are no trends worth noting – but look how much their Speeds of Forgetting vary! A low Speed of Forgetting means memories are longer-lasting and more easily accessed. Some children below 5 can practise at a similar pace to some adults! It really shows the importance of tailoring learning to the capabilities of the individual.
To put this plot into perspective, Figure 2 shows the data from a much higher-power study on Speed of Forgetting across age. There, we see a starker difference between 5-year-olds and young adults than we did at Zpannend Zernike. Indeed, the kids we met at Zpannend Zernike show remarkably low Speeds of Forgetting. They were delighted to hear this.
Alongside this challenge, children could also use Tafeltrainer, our times table memorisation game – and the much younger children coloured in drawings of our Tafeltrainer mascot, Wiske Wasbeer. It was so fulfilling to see kids leaning in, focused and happily engaging with the learning tools that we have put so much work into. In our online learning environment, achieving a Mastery Crown sends fireworks shooting across the screen. It was a small detail, but our UX designer, Jori, had a grin on his face when he saw one of the children fist-pumping in response to his fireworks. At Zpannend Zernike, we really felt our work pay off.
Since COVID, more and more schools across the country have been adopting adaptive learning technologies in their classrooms, and the parents we spoke to were cautious about these new methods. Events like this one help demystify the science that we are surrounded with in our daily lives, and show it to be approachable, practical and kid-friendly. With this opportunity to talk to researchers and see science happen – generating the above results – we demonstrated the importance of leveraging individual differences to learners’ benefit. Without this technology, diverse learning capabilities are often seen as challenges that need to be managed. But with it, children’s unique strengths become opportunities for growth – allowing them to practise at their own pace and truly let their potential shine.
