KiandMarton (2003) foundthatbyinvitingnonnativelearnerstolearnsetsofCantonesewordsthathavethesamesoundbutdifferenttonecomponents,' ,-upstudy,KiandMarton (2005) demonstratedthatbyfirstseparatingvariationintoneandmeaningandkeepingsoundinvariant,thenseparatingvariationinsoundandmeaningandkeepingtoneinvariant,andfinallylettingallthreedimensionsvarysimultaneously,learnerscanmakegreatprogresstowardhandlingthecomplexitiesofeverydayuseofCantonese.
Learningtospellthetj (C) soundinSwedish.
Anotherstudyshowedthatwhatdistinctionsthelearnerscanmake—andhavetomake—,workingwitharesearcher,designedalessonthattheythoughtwouldcontributetoimprovingstudents' spellingofwordswithatjsound (Holmqvist,Gustavsson ＆ Wernberg,2005;inpress).Therearedifferentwaystospellthissoundthatconformtoarules—,,,andtheywerekepttogetherforonelessononly,,againafter4weeks,,.
Thetwogroupsthatsucceededlesswellinthelongrunhadbeengivenaworksheetinwhichallofthetjsoundswereremovedinatext,,inthiscase,,however,thestudentshadtodifferentiatebetweenwhatsignalsatjsound (shouldbeunderlined) andwhatsignalsasj (S) sound—,thestudentshadtodifferentiatebetweendifferentspellingsofthesamesoundanddifferentspellingsofanothersound.
Toexplainwhyonegroupimprovedmorethanthetwoothergroupsafterthelearningoccasion,theresearchersconjecturedthatthestudentsinthemoresuccessfulgrouplearnedtopayattentiontothedifferencesbetweenthetjsoundandthesjsound (andothersounds),,inthesenseusedbyBransfordandSchwartz (1999).
Providingforindividualdifferences.
ThelaststudydescribedintheprevioussectionwasablendofJapanese “lessonstudy” anddesign-basedresearch (Holmqvistetal.,inpress).Insuchablendedapproach,calledlearningstudy,' ' (orsequenceoflessons) ,,.
(Lo,Pong ＆ Chik,2005).Seventeenlessonsweredesigned,withanumberbeingrevisedonceortwice,,variationwasusedinsystematicways.In25ofthe27cases,,thisimprovementwassignificantlyhigheramonginitiallylow-achievingstudentsthanamonghigh-achievingstudents,,,researchersobservedthathigh-achievingstudentsdevelopedinsightsthatwentwellbeyondtheobjectoflearningandhencewerenotmeasuredbytheassessmenttools.
