Improving Children’s Competence in Decision Making

• In Event: Poster Session 8
  In Poster Session: Goals, Beliefs, Attitudes, and Metacognitive States

Abstract

This research examined children’s decision-making as manifested in their essays on a moral and practical dilemma. 764 fifth-graders from 36 classrooms in two low-income districts completed a 6-week unit on wolf management. They completed the unit using either Direct Instruction (DI), Collaborative Group work (CG), or were waited-listed Controls. Analysis of independently-written essays on a topic unrelated to wolves revealed that CG, but not DI students, acquired decision-making strategies and transferred them to a novel task.

Keywords: Decision-making, decision-making schema, collaborative learning, direct instruction, argumentation

Authors

• Xin Zhang, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

• Richard C. Anderson, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign