Study Guides
A study guide is a teaching aid designed to
help students develop reading skills
needed to enhance their comprehension of
the material is the textbook. Study
guides can be very helpful to students
who have low comprehension skills. A
study guide will ensure that the student
will focus their attention on what is
important for them to learn. The study
guide has to be relevant to the test that
will be given. Many teachers will
assign a specific reading for the class and
many of the students may not
adhere to the teacher's request. A study guide will
reinforce the reading
material. A study guide that is prepared without the
answers will force a
student to do the reading. A study investigated the use of
study guides as
instructional tools and compared the effectiveness of study
guides with and
without analogies. Seventy-four undergraduate students in three
upper
division education classes studied three passages about three
obscure
religions (Manichaeism, Jainism, and the Druze religion) with and
without the
aid of two types of studyguides. One study guide analogized the
religions to
Christianity, and one did not employ analogies. Both study
guides were written
in multiple-choice, short answer, and essay format.
Within each class, students
were randomly divided into three groups for
comparison, and each subject was
given all three passages to study in
different sequences, studying one passage
per treatment condition. Results
revealed a significant interaction between text
and treatment, but with a
small effect size. Results also revealed: (1) that the
Manichaeism text
produced scores significantly different from the combination of
Druze and
Jainism scores across all three treatments; (2) that the Manichaeism
study
guide treatments produced scores significantly different from those of
the
other two treatments; and (3) that the Druze analogical study guide
treatment
produced scores significantly different from those of the other
treatments, but
that the Jainism analogical study guide treatment was not
significantly
different from the other two treatments. A study explored
whether the use of a
study guide would improve students' comprehension of
content area material. Two
groups of students in an eighth grade social
studies class were involved:
students in the control group received the usual
instruction--the chapter was
read orally and discussed in class--while
students in the experimental sample
were given a study guide, skimmed the
material silently, and worked on the
exercises in groups of two or three. A
posttest on history revealed no
statistically significant differences between
the scores of the two groups. How
ever, since both time and the amount of
material were limited and since no
information is available regarding the
reliability of the method used, the
results of this study can be applied only
to these two samples. Reading in the
content areas from grades four through
twelve requires the integration of new
knowledge with what is already
known,that involves sophisticated skills. Content
area teachers must be aware
of, model, and teach those reading and study skills
that help students to
better comprehend their reading assignments. Some
strategies that have been
used successfully to train students to acquire
information on their own
include the use of prediction guides, advance
organizers, graphic organizers,
study guides, and glossing. In most of the
studies that I read, the use of a
study guide improved most of the test scores.
Study guides are a useful
tool that can be used in any content area to enhance a
students learning. The
idea behind study guides is that students can use them as
models of how to
plan their own scheme of work. They are meant to primarily to
be an
initiation to self-direction. A survey was administered to 10th-grade
regular
biology students to diagnose the cause for low achievement on chapter
tests.
Survey results verified teacher suspicion that students did not read
textbook
assignments when designated as homework and, as a consequence,
this
deficiency contributed to low achievement scores. A treatment included
requiring
additional homework in the form of a teacher-prepared Reading Study
Guide (RSG)
that accompanied each chapter and had to be completed while
students read the
assignments. To complete the individualized RSG, students
were unable to skim
the material but, instead, had to read the assignments
thoroughly. Upon
completion of the RSG, a pretest was administered and
learning activities
relative to the chapter objectives were presented,
followed by a posttest. Cloze
test results indicated improvement in student
ability levels. Posttest scores
increased significantly and the overall grade
average on the RSG surpassed
expectations. During treatment, cloze test
results disclosed that student
ability levels were not equivalent to reading
stanine levels. Overall results
provided evidence that Reading Study Guides
Was an excellent resource when used
with students who have the potential to
improve learning skills and increase
achievement levels. The RSG treatment
was successful as it highlighted course
objectives, outlined important
concepts and information, was used to study for
tests, and encouraged
students to read homework
assignments.