Improving children's regulation of their reading PREP time☆

Abstract Factors influencing children's perceived readiness for examination performance (PREP) and their self-regulation of study time while reading were investigated. Prior to giving fourth-grade children trials on a reading passage, subjects were informed of the goal of achieving 100% mastery on a factual test over the passage. Children regulated the number of trials taken, providing an estimate of time spent learning. If a child did not reach 100% during these elected trials, he/she was given further trials to reach the criterion. Experiments 1 and 3 contained the same three conditions. In the Study condition, children read the passage as many times as they wished before taking the test. In the Test condition, children read the passage and then were tested without feedback. Children elected as many study-test trials as they wished. The Estimate condition was identical to the Test condition except that following each test children estimated how many items they got correct. In Experiment 1, which employed a multiple-choice test format for assessing mastery, children misperceived PREP and understudied in all three conditions. Experiment 2 indicated that the children's inflated PREP was due to their certainty about the correctness of their incorrect responses on the multiple-choice test. In Experiment 3, which employed a recall test for assessing mastery, the match between elected study trials and trials needed for mastery was quite close in the Test and Estimate condition but not in the Study condition, where subjects elected less than half the trials needed to reach criterion. PREP-level reports in the Study condition were also far higher than actual test performance. In contrast, reported PREP levels of Test and Estimate subjects following study were an accurate reflection of actual test performance and closely matched the designated criterion. Thus, children effectively regulated study time on a reading task when they assessed their current PREP level against the designated criterion on recall tests (but not multiple-choice tests) during study.

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