Background:

Research shows distributed practice enhances learning and skill development, but less is known about the effect on perceptions and attitudes toward the material being learned.

Objective:

This study examined whether distributed practice could improve performance and attitudes in statistics, a subject that students report finding unpleasant and anxiety-provoking.

Method:

This quasi-experiment compared statistics students who received distributed practice with Excel throughout the semester to a control group without distributed practice. At the end of the semester, all students completed a major data analysis project with Excel and a self-report measure of their perceptions and attitudes toward the class and statistics.

Results:

Significant results suggest students who received distributed practice: earned higher project grades; liked statistics more; and perceived the class to be more effective for knowledge and skill development, even though they found statistics to be more difficult than the control group.

Conclusion:

This study suggests distributed practice helps improve students’ performance and attitudes toward statistics, even though they think it is difficult.

Teaching Implications:

In addition to improving performance in challenging subjects, distributed practice may be used to help students appreciate and feel more favorably about classes they find difficult.

中文翻译：

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利用分布式实践来提高学生的统计学态度和绩效

背景：

研究表明，分散的练习可以提高学习和技能的发展，但是对认知和对所学材料的态度的影响知之甚少。

目的：

这项研究调查了分散练习是否可以改善统计学的表现和态度，学生报告发现该学科发现令人不快和引起焦虑。

方法：

这项准实验将在整个学期中使用Excel进行分布式练习的统计学学生与没有分布式练习的对照组进行了比较。学期末，所有学生都使用Excel完成了一项主要数据分析项目，并通过自我报告来衡量他们对班级和统计学的看法和态度。

结果：

重大结果表明接受分布式实践的学生：获得较高的项目等级；喜欢统计资料；即使他们发现统计数据比对照组困难，他们仍认为班级对知识和技能的开发更为有效。

结论：

这项研究表明，分布式练习可以帮助提高学生的成绩和对统计学的态度，即使他们认为这很困难。

教学意义：

除了提高在具有挑战性的科目上的表现外，分布式练习还可以用来帮助学生欣赏和感觉到他们发现困难的课程。