The role and impact of Knowledge Organisers in the classroom: how can history teachers best make use of Knowledge Organisers at GCSE to facilitate meaningful retrieval practice?

Thesis

This project explored the usage and impact of Knowledge Organisers (KOs) in the history classroom, to support the retrieval of substantive knowledge for GCSE. The secondary history department in question had concerns that knowledge retrieved in classroom quizzes was not being effectively utilised in an applied exam setting. The study aimed to make retrieval practice using KOs more meaningful for students, in order to support them to use substantive knowledge in an exam setting and to ensure their motivation for the subject was not negatively impacted by the continued focus on substantive knowledge. Participants in the study were a mixed ability Year 10 cohort studying GCSE history, working remotely using a virtual learning platform due to school closures in March 2020. The study used a combination of online survey, task choice and teacher assessment to draw conclusions about student attitudes and preferences towards retrieval and KOs, as well as performance in exam style questions. Results showed that students found the more varied KO retrieval activities engaging and more useful for answering exam-style questions. Overall, this suggests that students would benefit from engaging in retrieval practice, using knowledge organisers, that is more varied than short-answer quizzes. Therefore, the department should instead include retrieval activities that rely not merely on the recalling of factual information, but also provide students with an opportunity to use substantive factual knowledge alongside other historical knowledge, for example to reach judgements about causation or to consider context and period.

Authors: Wilkins, L

• Type of award: MSc taught course
• Level of award: Masters
• Awarding institution: University of Oxford
• Language: English
• Keywords: MLT; MLT 2020
• Subjects: Education