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Reasoning beyond history: examining students’ strategy use when completing a multiple text task addressing a controversial topic in education

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Abstract

Given prior work identifying sourcing, corroboration, and contextualization as key strategies needed to learn from multiple texts, this study examines students’ multiple text processing and written response composition under three different heuristic conditions. In particular, students were asked to engage in sourcing, corroboration, or contextualization while completing a multiple text task. Then, log data of text access, students’ notes, and written responses were analyzed across task conditions. Moreover, each sentence included in students’ written responses was linked to information in notes and in the library texts provided. Results indicate that students directed to engage in sourcing both accessed more document information and included more of such information in their notes. More generally, students’ response composition was found to be reductive in nature, with students filtering information from library texts into their notes and into the written responses that they composed; at the same time, cross-textual integration was found to be limited.

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  1. Department of Educational Psychology, Counseling, and Special Education, The Pennsylvania State University, 227 Cedar Building, State College, PA, 16827, USA

    Alexandra List & Hongcui Du

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  1. Alexandra List
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Appendices

Appendix 1: interest and attitudes

Interest Interest was assessed at the topic level. In particular, students were asked to rate their interest in each of seven topics related to gifted education (e.g., gifted and talented education, school policy, special education) using a seven point Likert scale, ranging from not at all interested to very interested. Cronbach’s alpha reliability for the seven item scale was .86. Students’ average interest ratings were 4.74 (SD = 1.07).

Attitudes Students were asked to report attitudes toward gifted education in three primary ways, capturing attitude content, stance, and certainty. Attitude content was captured by asking students to rate their agreement with 10 items reflecting statements in support of or in opposition to gifted and talented education. Statements read: Gifted education is an important priority for all schools and All students are gifted in different ways. It is wrong to prioritize some students over others. Scale reliability for the five items supporting the inclusion of gifted education in schools was .72, while reliability for the five items opposing gifted education was .70.

Students were additionally asked to adopt an attitude stance regarding the inclusion of gifted education in schools. In particular, students were asked to respond to the multiple choice item: do you think elementary schools should have gifted and talented programs and asked to select (a) yes, (b) no, or (c) I don’t know. While 56.94% (n = 41) of students supported the inclusion of gifted education in schools, 13.89% of students opposed this measure, and 29.17% indicated that they did not know whether or not they supported gifted education. Finally, students were asked to report attitude certainty. Specifically, after responding to the multiple choice item capturing attitude stance, students were asked to rate three Likert items assessing the strength of their chosen position (i.e., how sure are you? how certain are you? how strongly do you feel?). Reliability for the three item certainty scale was .92.

Across these various individual difference measures we were able to verify both that students had at least a moderate degree of interest in the topic of the task and held varied attitudes supporting and opposing gifted education. Additionally, neither interest (p = .79) nor any of the attitude-related measures (p > .07) were found to significantly differ across task conditions.

Appendix 2: sample coding of students’ notes

figure a

Appendix 3: sample response

  1. 1.

    I believe that my school should not have a gifted and talented program. (position)

  2. 2.

    Within the six resources I have just read, I came to the conclusion that three of the sources authors were against gifted education programs, and three were for them. (inter-text)

  3. 3.

    Susan Moore, a teacher with a mixed abilities classroom was the first I saw to be for these programs. (organization)

  4. 4.

    However, her arguments were completely biased and opinionated. (transform)

  5. 5.

    She stated that teaching her mixed ability class was very “challenging and disappointing.” (text-direct)

  6. 6.

    She further explains that this is because she cannot keep the attention of all of her students throughout the day. (intra-text)

  7. 7.

    Personally, I think she just does not sound like the best teacher. (transform)

  8. 8.

    If she were a good teacher, she would be able to differentiate instruction effectively so she can keep all of her students engaged and attentive. (transform)

  9. 9.

    Frederick M. Hess was the next author to be for gifted and talented programs. (organization)

  10. 10.

    He believes that “schools exist to provide resources and instruction that can nurture the gifts that students possess.” (text-direct)

    ···

  11. 13.

    Hess also states that is its “unreasonable to expect most teachers to differentiate instruction well.” (intra-text)

  12. 14

    Teachers are taught specifically how to differentiate instruction, so why would they not be held to that standard to do so. (transform)

  13. 15

    Going back to Moore’s above position, good teachers will be able to differentiate instruction. (inter-text)

    ···

  14. 20

    Halley J. Potter was an author who is against gifted and talented programs, and she made points that I have never thought of. (transform)

  15. 21

    She explains that programs like these increase socioeconomic and racial segregation. (text-direct)

  16. 22

    She gives evidence from 2011 by saying “roughly 70 percent of all New York City public school students were black or Latino, but more than 70 perfect of kindergartners in gifted and talented programs were white or Asian.” (text-direct)

  17. 23

    If this holds true, it really is segregating schools. (elaboration)

  18. 24

    I am not saying the schools are segregating students on purpose, however, it is still a trend from gifted and talented programs. (elaboration)

    ···

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List, A., Du, H. Reasoning beyond history: examining students’ strategy use when completing a multiple text task addressing a controversial topic in education. Read Writ 34, 1003–1048 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-020-10095-5

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