Order from us for quality, customized work in due time of your choice.
Data Analysis and Discussion
The present section is organized into two parts: the analysis of the quantitative and qualitative data. The analysis of the quantitative data seeks to answer whether color coding was of any use for enhancing memory retention in students. The first part of the results section interprets the data and visualizes the findings in a comprehensive and understandable way. The second part of the results section deals with the materials drawn from six interviews with students from the intervention group. The analysis of the quantitative data provides insights into the emotional perception of the method by students as well as their preferences in color-coding.
Quantitative Data Analysis. What is the effect of color-coding on memory retention in students learning English as a second language?
The quantitative data collected for the research entails the test results of two groups of students control and intervention with the latter being subjected to the color-coding method. The control group consisted of 31 participants whereas the sample for intervention turned out to be somewhat larger at 51 participants. The evaluation was conducted three times before the lesson, right after it, and with a one-month delay.
The data collection resulted in six sets of data three data sets per group that later were subject to comparison through a variety of statistical methods. The first step toward data interpretation was analyzing the results with the purpose of determining the inner consistency and reliability. One of the methods used was computing Cronbachs alpha a commonly known statistical measure demonstrating how consistent the results are and whether they describe the same object of scientific inquiry. As seen from Table 1, Cronbachs alpha is at 0.627 (N=10), the value is positive and close to 1, which denotes a decent inner consistency.
The metric is even better when Cronbachs alpha based on standardized items is used (0.801, N=10), which might be a more appropriate measure for the present study given the changing response option of the scale used. Image 1 provides the inter-item correlation matrix with the majority of values fitting into the interval [0.25, 0.5], which once again confirms the inner consistency of the test and test results.
Table 1. Cronbachs Alpha.
The next step was to explore the data for normality, computing its mean values and standard deviation (Table 2). The label color denotes the intervention group whereas no-color the control group. To gauge the effect size, the minimum, maximum, and range values were also calculated for both groups (Table 3).
Table 2. Test results, their mean values and standard deviation.
Table 3. Test results, minimum, maximum, and range values.
As seen from Table 1, both control and intervention groups had comparably similar mean values and standard deviation. This shows the researchers that random assignment at two groups to minimize bias was successful, as groups proved to be more or less homogenous (Graph 1). In Graph 1, the two histograms overlap, showing that the initial results before the second group was subjected to the intervention were similar. Had it been the other way around, one would have had the right to speculate that group constitution was skewed from the start, as in one group might have had stronger or more knowledgeable learners. If the latter were the case, the intervention effect would have been mitigated and, hence, fairly dubious.
Graph 1 and Graph 2 demonstrate the results in the form of a histogram with the probability density function overlayed to show how the histogram fits the bell curve. Neither the control group nor the intervention group fits the graph of the probability density function (the bell curve). If the pre-test results had been normally distributed, the majority of the students would have scored around 12. It is true that the outliers (extremely low and extremely high scores) fit the probability density function in both cases, which is seen as standard. Yet, in both groups, the majority of students scored higher than average (13-15). It is hard to say exactly what accounts for this curious phenomenon. One possible explanation is that students in both groups already had decent background knowledge allowing them to show outstanding performance.
The next step was to measure the effect size of the intervention by putting together three Gaussian distribution graphs next to each other on the same plot (Graph 3 and Graph 4). By the shape of the histograms plotted on Graph 3, one may conclude that the intervention had a tangible positive effect. The distributions for pre-test and post-test results (in blue and orange respectively) barely overlap as the mean test score increased significantly after the color coding was introduced. Moreover, after the intervention, the color group showed a smaller standard deviation in results than they did before.
This change means that weaker students were able to make progress and decrease the difference between their scores and those of the stronger students. The green histogram represents the Gaussian distribution of the delayed post-test results. Expectedly, the intervention group experienced a setback in test scores (the histogram located to the left of that denoting the test results right after the intervention). Yet, as seen from Graph 3, the setback is not serious as it still barely overlaps with the graph representing the initial results. However, the graph denoting the delayed results is less steep than the one denoting the immediate results. This difference means that after a delay, the student group showed more diverse performance, allowing for worse scores than right after the intervention.
Graph 4 is similar to Graph 3 and represents the results drawn from the control group. As seen from Graph 4, the control group has shown some improvement after being taught the new topic traditionally (the mean range is a positive value). The progress is evident since the graph representing the immediate results (in orange) is farther from the left than the one representing the initial results (blue) (Vogt, 2007).
Moreover, the histogram in orange is steeper than the one in blue, demonstrating fewer outliers and more concentrated around the mean axis. This tendency means that after being taught the new topic, the students in the control group showed stably higher-than-average results. After a one-month delay, the control group experienced a certain setback, with the green graph (delayed results) almost overlapping with the blue one (initial results). Moreover, after one month, the students showed more diverse performance, allowing for both lower and higher scores.
After seeing the dynamics within the two groups separately, it is reasonable to ask how these results compare to each other. So far it was possible to observe pretty similar dynamics: a lesson in articles would prompt students to make some progress, no matter the teaching method. After some time, however, regardless of the assigned group, students would experience a setback. To better understand how the two group dynamics compare and contrast, the results were visualized separately. As seen from Graph 5, the intervention group showed far better results than the control group. Moreover, the students in the intervention group showed steadily high performance with the scores concentrated mainly around the mean of the distribution. The same goes for Graph 6: after a one-month delay, the students in the intervention group were more capable of retaining the information and scoring higher than their counterparts in the control group.
Lastly, to confirm what has been said, the data were analyzed using Students t-test. For the pre-test results, the method showed similarity between the two independent samples (t = 0.556, df = 81), which is consistent with Graph 4. In the same manner, the post-test results proved to be dissimilar (t = 8.021, df = 81), which may also be seen from Graph 5. Lastly, Students t-test showed a significant discrepancy when it comes to the delayed post-test results (t = 7.5, df = 80).
Summary
The pre-test results have shown somewhat peculiar results distribution with the majority of data points concentrated past the mean axis. One may assume that the students both in the intervention and control groups had already been showing pretty good results before being tested on a new topic. The color-coding intervention seems to have yielded positive results with the intervention group showing much more progress than their counterparts in the control group. Besides, the group that was exposed to the color-coding method managed to retain more information and score higher after a one-month delay.
Qualitative Data Analysis. What is the participants perception of the color-coding method? Is using color more preferable than black-and-white schemes?
The purpose of the qualitative part of the research was to gain deeper insights into the participants perception of the color-coding method. It is true that quantitative data may be more objective when gauging the efficiency of a strategy. However, figures and numbers often fail to embark on the psychological aspect of the learning process, which cannot and should not be dismissed. Moreover, pre-, post, and delayed test results did not provide the researchers with straightforward practical implications aside from the overall promising prospects of the method. The unstructured interview (response rate = 9%) sought to confirm that students understood why and how the method was used. Among other goals were gaining an understanding of their subjective perception and whether they attributed the color-coding to their improved performance.
Coding: colored vs. Black and White
After the analysis of the qualitative data, it has become possible to fill in one of the main knowledge gaps outlined in the literature review. The question was as to whether color-coding using real, chromatic colors presented any benefits as opposed to using only black and white. Having interviewed six students from the intervention group, one may conclude that they were overwhelmingly in support of the color incorporation (100%). According to the statistical data provided by NVivo, references to the choice between the colored and black and white presentation of materials have amounted to a total of 8% of the coverage. Interestingly enough, when explaining exactly why they liked the use of color, participants made clear associations with other themes singled out in qualitative data.
For instance, Participant 1 tied his preferences to his personal impressions and helpfulness of the new method: Of course I like it to be more colorful like I said before, it helps me to remember the important stuff and focus on them and make studying easier for me and more effective, it was really useful. As seen from the citation, Participant 1 specified exactly why the method was helpful, focusing on the ease of learning and enhanced memory retention. These observations are in line with what other participants reported regarding their remembering faculties: The colors helped me focus more on the main idea. And helped me in recalling them and going back at the slides in my mind.
Participant 2 was also in favor of the color-coding method, appraising it for its ability to help to concentrate: It helps me focus on the information more than when black ink is used and it stands out more. Further, they added that the color-coding helped to maintain the consistency and flow of the learning materials, which was another common theme encoded via NVivo: When color coding is used in both lectures and tests, it helps you think of them together.
Another participant pointed out how logically the new learning materials were organized. They argued that the color-coding might have as well been done wrong if too many colors had been used at once. In this case, students would have to understand the color-coding system in detail before embarking on a task. The use of color for this research proved to be sufficient and not distracting as stated by the said participant: If you can just make it all black, red, green, theyll get interested in it but they dont understand it cause theyre trying to find the word like where it cause if you put like highlighted colors it would like theyll know it better cause they can see it.
Interestingly enough, the color-coding helped not only with keeping the lesson consistent but preparing the students for what is coming next: I think using colors are more effective because it helped me know whats going on and even before you teach the lessons sometimes and it helps you understand it more. Lastly, one of the interviewees drew parallels between color-coding and other methods aimed at drawing students attention: Yeah I think its more helpful in memory and in drawing the attention and You can also underline, Bold, Italics they are kinda like color coding. In summation, according to the interview materials, colors are perceived better than achromatic schemes (black and white).
Helpfulness
Probably the overarching concept discovered when encoding the interviews is that of helpfulness (10% of the total coverage according to NVivo). This result may be seen as positive as the concept of helpfulness may point one to the references regarding memory retention, which is the central question of the present research. Helpfulness is a broad concept that entails several sub-themes defined as follows (see Image 1).
Consistency
One of the minor themes that were possible to outline via NVivo was that of consistency (1% of coverage). In the context of the learning process, consistency can be operationalized as the harmony and balance of all elements allowing for better comprehension. Participants were not asked directly as to whether they thought that color-coding made the lesson more consistent. Instead, they provided the insights independently, for example: The layout of the lecture was the same from start to finish. Another participant complimented the flow: It really made the presentation flow nicely. Lastly, one more interviewee reported on the wholeness of the experience thanks to the color-coding method: [color-coding helped me] concentrate more on the lecture as a whole.
Focus. Another significant topic within the helpfulness theme is the focus. Participants provided the following answers regarding the subtopic:
-
The colors helped me focus more on what the question was asking;
-
The contrast between the black and red print also helped me look at the question better;
-
It helps you look at it right away instead of searching for the important stuff;
-
Yes, I only focused on the highlighted words because they were in color;
-
It helps you look at it right away instead of searching for the other information in the slides.
One of the participants even went as far as describing the process of noticing, interpreting, and logging without using the proper terms: cause it was easy to get the sentence so I can read it fairly and then I can answer that question the highlighted words tell you what your supposed to look at its a kind of question like how to like its some or any you then highlight some words that you know that you know its either some or any.
Preparedness. As has already been mentioned, the color-coding seems to have had an unexpected effect on students, or at least something that was not directly mentioned in the interview questions. Several participants reported that the highlighted words provided meaningful pointers to what the topic of the lesson was: Since its the main idea like some and any, you know the lesson is about that instead of the other words. At first, this claim might not seem like that big of a deal. However, upon further investigation, it proves to be consistent with the input enhancement theory. In order to notice something, a student needs to activate their background knowledge, which was accomplished by highlighting the words and gently hinting at what a student had to recall;
Memory retention. The analysis of the interviews has shown that participants clearly associated the new method with improved memory retention. According to them, memorization of the new rules was possible through the prioritization of information. The literature review has touched on the topic of singling out useful details from the broad context within the framework of field-dependent and field-independent learners. It seems that memory-related findings might shed some light on the said concept by showing exactly how color-coding helps with discernment. It is a well-known fact that the human operating memory can only handle so much information (Anderson & Bower, 2014).
Therefore, in the learning process, the storage should be used thoughtfully to make sure that the students retain the most valuable pieces. The research has shown that when color coding is applied this might be the case: So I remembered the main idea but I didnt remember everything on the slides. Regarding prioritization and the hierarchy of the input, the researchers were able to gather the following feedback:
-
I thought they [highlighted words] were important;
-
The articles were in a red font which made it seem important;
-
I thought it would be important to remember.
Based on the cited reactions, it seems that even before/ or without an explanation regarding the purpose of the highlighter in the text, students were able to make the right conclusions. They came to think that the words in red bore more significance than the rest of the text, so they were able to concentrate on them from the start.
Fun & Novelty
Yet another significant concept discovered from the qualitative data is fun. The literature review has lightly touched on the importance of understanding the emotional perception of the new method. The interviews have clearly shown that five out of six participants referred to the method as fun ( It is fun ), with the references amounting to 4% of the total text data volume. For instance, participant 2 appraises color coding: Like visualization, its a really great strategy it uses a lot of pictures and videos and it was actually fun and creative.
They refer to the strategy as creative, and one may speculate that it hints at the novel nature of color coding, which was probably part of the reason why participation was an engaging experience. Participant 3 concurs and emphasizes the rarity of truly interesting methods in education: Not a lot of teachers use this kind of teaching because you need to be more creative and imaginative. Apparently, to some, the concept of fun was tied to the ease of the lesson due to the comprehensiveness of color coding: They were easy and fun answering the questions on the presentation.
As one may notice, two concepts that proved to be interlocked together when analyzing participants answers are fun and novelty. For example, participant 4 explained the association directly: The lecture was fun because it was something new to me.
Another participant repeated it almost word by word: The class was engaging and fun because it was new to me. Participant 5 was amazed at the efficiency of the method since they did not expect much from that: colors made me concentrate more. I didnt think this detail would attract my attention as much as it did. On the contrary, however, two participants (33%) saw novelty as something if not negative then pretty confusing: Because its kind of hard to understand and new. On the bright side, after some time, the confusion was resolved: At first I didnt understand it but after the lesson It was easy. As seen from Image 2, the novelty of the concept (color coding) proved to have ambiguous connotations: it contributed to fun and engagement but also gave rise to difficulties with understanding.
Summary
The interviewees found the color-coding method useful with the main theme derived from the thematic analysis being helpfulness. Students from the intervention group associated the new method with enhanced focus, memory retention, learning material consistency, and ease of application. According to the interviewees, the method helped them to prioritize the important information and not to waste their energy on memorizing every little detail. Another overarching theme alongside helpfulness was fun the majority of the interviewees found the method creative, interesting, and engaging. However, the novelty of the method had ambiguous connotations as some students found it difficult to understand the system.
Discussion
Under this section, two main points will be discussed: the practical implications of the study and its novelty, importance, and validity in the context of the previous research. The first point deals with exactly how English language instruction could be transformed to accommodate the studys findings. The second part addresses the studys virtues and shortcomings as well as outlines the prospects for future research.
Overall, it seems that the present research has succeeded in coming up with conclusive results that answer the research questions. The effect size of the intervention was unambiguous and demonstrated the inarguable efficiency of the color-coding intervention in ESL students. The success of the intervention could be attributed to its impact on the memory retention faculties in participants, especially given that the effect persisted even after a one-month delay.
From the interviews, it has also become obvious that the new method yielded positive reception from the students. They were aware of the pragmatism of color-coding, i.e. its role in helping to prioritize information and discern the important from the unimportant. From an emotional perspective, the students were happy to engage in a lesson that employed a creative and novel method, even though some have found becoming familiar with the new system somewhat challenging. The question arises as to exactly how the new study fits with the existing body of evidence.
First, it seems that the studys findings are consistent with the much-debated concept of noticing. Despite being largely criticized, noticing made its way to education as part of input enhancement. The study has shown that noticing was not only an integral element of the learning process but also a conscientious activity. Every student that agreed to do an interview was able to recognize noticing as the first step in exploring the new topic.
The interviewees were straightforward about how noticing patterns helped them to look for important information and ignore insignificant details. Therefore, one may conclude that color-coding proved to be a valid input enhancement method and a method for facilitating noticing. Second, the students preference for the use of real colors as opposed to the traditional black-and-white presentation is consistent with Kohlers (2009) findings. Therefore, the present study contributed to the body of evidence advocating for adding color to the ESL learning materials.
Further, the present study confirms the results of the study by Hamavandy and Golshan (2015) who showed that input enhancement was a significant predictor of academic performance. Besides, the findings are more or less consistent with similar research conducted by Hosseini and Branch (2015). According to the researcher, color coding was found to be efficient when teaching indefinite articles. However, when it came to definite articles, students did not show much improvement. Akin to the study by Hosseini and Branch (2015), the present research focused on teaching articles using color-coding. The sole difference was that the improvement was noticeable across all domains, i.e. including all types of grammar constructions.
It is difficult to say what accounted for better results in the case of the present research. On the one hand, the present study might have succeeded in adapting the color-coding method for articles in a more appropriate manner. On the other hand, the differences might lie predominantly in the constitution and properties of the sample. As Hosseini and Branch (2015) theorized, the students in his sample might have had poor knowledge of English grammar to begin with, which prevented them from building on what they had already known. The sample for the present study, however, showed excellent performance even at the initial stage with the majority of scores being well-past the mean axis.
From what has been discussed so far, it is only reasonable to wonder whether color-coding fits stronger student groups better than those who struggle. So far, there is no consensus on this issue. Schneider and Kulmhofer (2016) argue that the multisensory approach helped students having difficulties learning the English language. The students in their study experienced higher levels of engagement due to the involvement of all five senses. The present study and the study by Schneider and Kulmhofer (2016) are not exactly comparable to make any meta-analytical conclusions. They were conducted in different countries, and the method was tested on dissimilar samples.
Pedagogical Implications
The question as to whether the color-coding method should be ubiquitously used in pedagogics comes down to the needs of each particular school. The present research capitalized on the so-called combination model in teaching languages that encompassed both cognitive and humanistic approach in education. The color-coding proved to be a valid strategy for enhancing memory retention, which makes part of the cognitive domain. In class, color-coding can be used for raising students awareness regarding their cognitive processes. Subconsciously, people tend to use their memory more efficiently by discarding unnecessary details and focusing on what needs their attention. color coding makes this discernment conscious: students do not have to separate concepts on their own and can follow the lead provided by the instructor.
What should be taken into account by teachers and educators though is that they should be thinking about creating a color-coding system. Richards and Reppen (2014) argue that learners can learn efficiently only if the number and intensity of stimuli are moderated, otherwise, they might become overwhelmed. Dwyer and Moore (1995) showed that field-dependent learners, i.e. learners that need extra help and feedback from the learning environment, might struggle with understanding a color-coding system and the same time with understanding a new topic. We believe that the present research managed to strike a balance between novelty and clarity.
The use of color was consistent, reasonable, and limited to situations where it was most needed. As much as students were confronted with a method that they had never tried before, they could navigate the lea
Order from us for quality, customized work in due time of your choice.