Retrieval practice: the ups & downs of my experience

For years I've toiled with quiz questions in my biology courses (AKA core questions). I've used quiz questions as starter quizzes, to summarise key points of an explanation, as homework, and for cover work. I warned about potential problems of quiz questions in a post back in 2020, linked to Prof. Rob Coe's doubts about quiz questions in the classroom. But I made real efforts to make it work and spent considerable time meditating on the best design for quiz questions (see my book).

Recently, data I had collected indicated such an interesting pattern I dug out some previous data to help me reflect on the use and effects of short-answer quiz questions. In this post, I'll share the data and some of what I've learnt over this time.

🚨 Update: I've moved to a new home! You can read the newest, updated version of this article on my new website here: https://christianmooreanderson.com/retrieval-practice-the-ups-downs-of-my-experience/