Florencia Anggoro
College of the Holy Cross, MA·Education Research
Comparing two things side by side and noticing how they are alike and how they differ is one of the most powerful ways people learn science. This is called analogical or relational reasoning.
- Fields
Education Research
Psychology
- Topics
analogical reasoning
relational reasoning
analogy
- Grants
- 2 known grants, through Jul 2027
What they work on
- Test how changing the number and similarity of organism life-stage cards in LifeCycles (modified War) and CyClo (modified Uno) affects second- and fifth-graders' learning about biological variability, in lab studies with about 150 children.
- Determine whether giving caregivers support for guiding children's relational thinking improves comparisons and learning during card play, and study caregiver-child game play in museums, leading to a pilot museum exhibit prototype.
- Develop and test an analogy training program for undergraduates that teaches how to align examples, draw inferences and note key differences, builds insight into analogical thinking, and improves recognition of chances to compare.
- Test whether undergraduates who receive analogy training learn evolution and other topics from analogical comparisons better than a control group, measured with pre-post tests immediately and 6–7 weeks later, with a pilot adapted for eighth graders.
More about the research
Comparison is also mentally demanding, and teaching materials often give learners too little support. This research asks how to help learners make useful comparisons in biology, from young children learning about biodiversity to college students learning about evolution. The two projects share that goal but work with different ages and methods.
Why it matters
Better ways to support comparison could help elementary students build early understanding of biodiversity and variation within species, preparing them for later biology courses. Analogy training could help students who currently gain less from analogy-based teaching learn science topics such as evolution more effectively. The work could also give museums and teachers practical tools, including card games and an exhibit prototype.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Martha Alibali
University of Wisconsin-Madison, WI·Education Research
Test whether playing LifeCycles and CyClo, card games showing organisms' life stages, improves 2nd- and 5th-grade children's understanding of biological variability in lab studies.
Haley Vlach
University of Wisconsin-Madison, WI·Psychology
Examine when children first understand that effortful strategies causing "desirable difficulties," such as spaced learning and retrieval practice (self-testing), improve long-term learning.
Kayce Mastrup
California State University-Monterey Bay, CA·Education Research
Prototype a bounded large language model homework tool for grades 3–5 that uses structured prompting constraints to guide students' reasoning on science and math problems rather than giving direct answers.
The school
College of the Holy Cross: 1 labs on PI Pages.
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