Questions Related to the Readings

Topic: Mastery Learning

Read the following:

• Reading #29, two pages: 265-266 (you need not read the rest of the

reading)

• Reading #30, four pages: 7-8, 14-15

1. Name the two most influential approaches to mastery learning and their originators.

2. Identify who controls the pace (rate) of instruction under each approach.

3. Describe what happens when students fail quizzes under each approach.

4. According to Bloom (1968) what is the relationship between instruction and learning (the "end result of instruction") in a conventional model of school learning? What is the relationship under a mastery model?

5. Describe Bloom’s predictions (1968) regarding the gains that could be expected by employing mastery learning procedures.

6. Describe Bloom’s ideas (1976) regarding the amount of time students must spend on school tasks.

1. Describe what the authors mean when they say that the self-study units of the TAX-PAC curriculum were prerequisites to the central school curriculum.

2. Why did the training staff at Andersen decide that they needed better control over the way in which participants in the curriculum went about studying the self-study units?

3. Mastery learning has been defined as "an instructional approach that allows learners to spend the time they need to master one set of skills before requiring them to learn another [superordinate] set of skills." In light of this definition describe how the CMI strategy Arthur Andersen employed was an example of a mastery learning approach.

4. What were the benefits and costs of employing this mastery learning approach?