Targeting fraction misconceptions and reducing high confidence errors in an online tutor

Abstract

Background: Providing students with worked out problem solutions is a beneficial instructional technique in STEM disciplines, and studying examples that have been worked out incorrectly may be especially helpful for reducing misconceptions in students with low prior content knowledge. However, past results are inconclusive and the effects of incorrect worked examples alone or in combination with correct examples remains unclear. Objectives: We aim to address whether studying incorrect examples alone or in combination with correct examples can support the reduction of students' fraction misconceptions, operationalized as errors made with high confidence. Methods: After incorrectly solving a sampling problem, 130 students in 4th through 11th grade in the U.S. were randomly assigned to a condition in an online problem set focused on fraction equivalence. Students studied either single-type worked examples (i.e., correct or incorrect; n = 49) or combination-type worked examples (correct and incorrect; n = 41) or engaged in a problem-solving control (n = 50). Results: Studying a combination of correct and incorrect worked examples was as effective as the problem-solving control with feedback at improving fraction equivalence knowledge and reducing the rate of high-confidence errors. Students in both the combination condition and the problem-solving with feedback condition outperformed those who studied either correct or incorrect worked examples alone. Conclusions: Results support the inclusion of a combination of correct and incorrect worked examples when teaching students with low prior content knowledge. Studying a combination of example types within an online tutor helps to reduce misconceptions about fractions, a topic students commonly struggle with. A problem-solving task with corrective feedback worked equally well.