Examining the Learning Benefits of Different Types of Prompted Self-explanation in a Decimal Learning Game

While self-explanation prompts have been shown to promote robust learning in several knowledge domains, there is less research on how different self-explanation formats benefit each skill set in a given domain. To address this gap, our work investigates 214 students’ problem-solving performance in a learning game for decimal numbers as they perform self-explanation in one of three formats: multiple-choice (N = 52), drag-and-drop (N = 72) and open-ended (N = 67). We found that self-explanation performance in all three formats was positively associated with problem-solving performance. At the same time, we observed better outcomes with the drag-and-drop format than the open-ended format for solving decimal addition problems that do not remind students about carrying, but worse outcomes than the multiple-choice and open-ended format for other problem types. These results point to the nuanced interactions between the problem type and self-explanation format that should be further investigated to identify when and how self-explanation is most helpful for learning.