Schema abstraction with productive failure and analogical comparison

The idea

A schema is useful when it travels. This paper tests learning designs that ask people to struggle with a problem first, then compare cases, so the abstraction they form is not tied to the examples they happened to see.

The approach

The designs pair productive failure with analogical comparison and look for transfer into a domain that does not resemble the training materials. The question is whether the comparison step is what lets the schema leave the original topic.

• Productive failure before the explanation
• Comparison across cases as the route to a schema
• A test of transfer that crosses domains
• Jacobson, Goldwater, Markauskaite, Lai, Kapur, Roberts, Hilton
• Learning and Instruction, 65, 101222