Question 1

Which one of the following teachers is clearly keeping the notion of situated learning in mind as he or she helps students transfer what they are learning in school?

Accepted Answer

A)  Ms. Sporer asks her students to speculate about what might have happened if the Europeans had not "discovered" the New World until the 1800s. 
B)  Mr. Mendoza makes sure that each one of the students in his instrumental music class knows the difference between the treble and bass clefs. 
C)  Ms. Sabih gives each of her elementary art students a hunk of clay and then says, "I'd like you to mold your clay into a mythical creature of some kind-into an animal that no one has ever seen before." 
D)  Mr. Gerberg takes his middle school math students to the grocery store so that they can use their math skills to do some comparison shopping.

Question 2

Missy is given this problem: Mt. Washington is lower than Mt. Jefferson.
Mt) Washington is higher than Mt. Adams.
Which mountain is highest?
Missy reads the fourth word incorrectly-she thinks the word is higher rather than lower-and consequently answers the problem incorrectly. From an information processing perspective, Missy's difficulty is due to:

Accepted Answer

A)  Her limited working memory capacity 
B)  Functional fixedness 
C)  The way she encodes information 
D)  The fact that she is retrieving information that hasn't been stored meaningfully

Question 3

Which one of the following illustrates positive transfer?

Accepted Answer

A)  Robert is trying to learn the spelling of the word shepherd. He remembers that he learned to spell tomcat by putting two words together and so writes "sheepherd." 
B)  Vince notices that rules of grammar are not always the same in English and Japanese. 
C)  Zelda uses the formula for calculating the area of a circle when she wants to know how much bigger a 10-inch pizza is than a 7-inch pizza. 
D)  David is trying to learn to program a computer. He reads his programming manual but is confused by some of its instructions.

Question 4

Which one of the following examples best illustrates the notion of situated learning as it relates to transfer?

Accepted Answer

A)  When Rachel learns the concept inertia, she immediately recalls a variety of real-world phenomena that the concept can account for. 
B)  Lucinda doesn't enjoy her history class because her teacher expects students to memorize a lot of names, dates, and places. 
C)  Eleanor enjoys physical education class because she always feels more energized afterward. 
D)  It doesn't occur to Jennie that she can use algebra to solve a problem in her chemistry class.

Question 5

In English, the word llama is pronounced "LA-MA." In Spanish, llama is more typically pronounced as "YA-MA" or "JA-MA," depending on the dialect. Analyzing this situation in terms of the similarity of stimuli and responses, we can predict that a person who first learns to read the word in English and then learns to read it in Spanish will:

Accepted Answer

A)  Benefit from positive transfer 
B)  Suffer from negative transfer 
C)  Have little or no transfer from one language to the other 
D)  Benefit from positive transfer only if the two languages are learned close together in time

Question 6

Which one of the following is the best example of someone using a heuristic rather than an algorithm) in problem solving?

Accepted Answer

A)  Susan wants to know how long it will take her to drive from Phoenix to Los Angeles. She knows that the distance is 400 miles, and she figures she will average 50 miles an hour with stops, so she predicts the trip will take 8 hours. 
B)  Vinnie has a round hot tub that is six feet in diameter; he wants to build a top to cover it. He remembers the formula for calculating the area of a circle and works out how many feet of lumber he needs. 
C)  John wants to buy a computer. He compares prices at different computer stores and buys whichever model is least expensive. 
D)  Marion can't think of a plot for the short story she needs to write. She breaks her task into smaller pieces: First she'll decide who the main character will be, then she'll think of a conflict for that character to experience, and finally she'll identify a reasonable resolution of that conflict.

Question 7

Only one of the following students is definitely engaging in critical thinking. Which one?

Accepted Answer

A)  Louise has a puzzled look as she reads her textbook. "I don't understand what the author is trying to say," she thinks. 
B)  Sam reads over his responses to the essay questions on an astronomy test. "I think I've done my best," he tells himself. "I'm pretty sure I answered the first two questions correctly, but I'm not so sure how well I did on the last question." 
C)  As Morgan watches her lab partner experiment with a pendulum, she says, "You just changed the length of the string at the same time you added more weight. That won't tell us anything." 
D)  Raul jumps at the chance to learn how to use desktop publishing software. "I'm particularly interested in learning how to integrate text and graphics," he tell his teacher.

Question 8

Which one of the following examples most clearly illustrates the role of retrieval in problem solving?

Accepted Answer

A)  Arnie is trying to solve a physics problem on a classroom test. He is so anxious that he can't recall the problem-solving strategies he needs. 
B)  Bradley is looking for something to haul water but doesn't have a bucket. He fails to realize that his plastic wastebasket could easily carry water. 
C)  Charlie is doing a series of addition problems. He overlooks the subtraction sign on the last problem and so adds when he should subtract. 
D)  Doug is angry that another boy stole his bicycle. Rather than report the theft to the police, he steals a bicycle from someone else.

Question 9

Nathan has been playing golf with his parents for many years. When he goes out for the school baseball team, he has trouble hitting the ball because he keeps confusing the swing of the bat with how he swings a golf club. Nathan's difficulty is the result of:

Accepted Answer

A)  Vertical transfer 
B)  Mental set in problem solving 
C)  Rote learning 
D)  Negative transfer

Question 10

Mary's parents want her to study advanced mathematics as a way of helping her remember her lines in theater productions. Considering research on transfer, are Mary's parents correct? Will studying advanced mathematics help Mary learn her lines more readily?

Accepted Answer

A)  Probably 
B)  Only if Mary studies mathematics for an extended period of time 
C)  Only if Mary studies abstract concepts 
D)  Probably not

Question 11

Which one of the following problems is most likely to be solved with a heuristic rather than an algorithm?

Accepted Answer

A)  Calculating the volume of a cylinder 
B)  Resolving an argument 
C)  Solving a difficult algebra problem 
D)  Using an old recipe to cook chili

Question 12

According to Thorndike's theory of identical elements, in which one of the following situations are we most likely to find positive transfer?

Accepted Answer

A)  Alice learns how to plant corn and then learns how to prune a hedge. 
B)  Brianne learns how to add 2-digit numbers and then learns how to add 3-digit numbers. 
C)  Cathy learns early British history and then learns early Japanese history. 
D)  Devlin learns how to play softball and then learns how to play poker.

Question 13

Which one of the following pieces of advice is most consistent with current beliefs about transfer?

Accepted Answer

A)  "Take calculus to help you develop your critical thinking skills." 
B)  "Study German so that you'll have an easier time learning Japanese next year." 
C)  "Taking an advanced history class will help you think more abstractly about the various subjects you will study in college." 
D)  "Use your knowledge of algebra to simplify this chemistry equation."

Question 14

Which of the following students is most clearly engaging in adaptive expertise?

Accepted Answer

A)  Alex loves to ride his bike to school and gets many other children to join him. 
B)  Julie is very good at chemistry. She often receives the highest grade in her class and has started tutoring other students in chemistry. 
C)  Marisa struggles with math, however she is very good at English. 
D)  Paul always excelled at math in school. He now works as a construction worker and used arithmetic everyday to calculate measurements.

Question 15

Which one of the following statements best describes theorists' rationale for advocating the use of authentic activities?

Accepted Answer

A)  Authentic activities are the most efficient way of teaching basic skills to a level of automaticity. 
B)  Authentic activities have built-in scaffolding that assures students' success. 
C)  Authentic activities help students transfer classroom subject matter to real-world contexts. 
D)  Authentic activities usually promote a mental set, which facilitates students' knowledge construction.

Question 16

Three of the following should help students learn mathematical problem-solving procedures. Given the textbook's discussion of problem solving, which one is least likely to be effective?

Accepted Answer

A)  Accompany word problems with illustrative pictures. 
B)  Provide worked-out examples that illustrate a particular procedure. 
C)  Have students apply the procedures to real-world problems in the classroom. 
D)  Encourage students to do problems entirely in their heads whenever possible.

Question 17

Leo has recently studied the principle of reinforcement in his psychology class. He is now trying to teach his daughter good table manners. From an information processing perspective of transfer, is Leo likely to use the principle of reinforcement in helping his daughter learn manners?

Accepted Answer

A)  Definitely yes 
B)  Definitely no 
C)  Only if he retrieves the principle of reinforcement at the time he is teaching his daughter 
D)  Only if he has previously learned the principle of reinforcement to a level of automaticity

Question 18

Transfer what you have learned about transfer and problem solving to a professional situation in which you might find yourself. More specifically:
a. Using either an educational or therapeutic context, describe a specific idea or principle you might want students or clients to apply outside the educational or therapeutic setting. In particular, describe what information you would want them to learn within the educational or therapeutic context, and how you hope they would transfer it in dealing with the outside world.
b. Explain how your students' or clients' success in transferring this information and/or using it to solve problems might be more or less successful depending on:
i. How they encode/store the original information, and the extent to which they elaborate on it
ii. How they encode/store the transfer/problem-solving situation, and the extent to which they elaborate on that situation

Accepted Answer

The answer of Transfer what you have learned about transfer...

Question 19

Which one of the following is the best example of negative transfer?

Accepted Answer

A)  Nell thinks that 5.75 is bigger than 5.9, because the former has more digits. 
B)  Fred knows he can get Bs in his classes without having to study at all. 
C)  José can't remember when the American Civil War started, so he recalls all he can about American history and concludes that the war must have taken place in the 1860s. 
D)  Edie wants to tie a string securely to her pencil so that she can hang it from her notebook, but she has forgotten how to tie a square knot.

Question 20

Ms. Webster tells students, "The author of our history textbook knows what he's talking about. He's a well-respected scholar whose specialty is the period we're reading about this month: colonial America." Although such a statement might certainly be beneficial in some respects, it has which one of the following drawbacks?

Accepted Answer

A)  It will promote negative rather than positive transfer of the subject matter. 
B)  It will increase the probability that students have functional fixedness. 
C)  It is unlikely to foster an inclination to critically evaluate textbook content. 
D)  It will predispose students to use algorithms rather than heuristics while studying.

Exam 13: Transfer, Problem Solving, and Critical Thinking Exam 13 Transfer, Problem Solving, and Critical Thinking Multiple Choice Questions