What is Retrieval Practice?

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Are you familiar with retrieval practice? It’s been discussed in educational circles for the last few years, with consideration of how to use it within learning to improve outcomes for pupils. It’s cited in the Ofsted inspection framework overview of research as being “important practice for effective retention of knowledge” and inspectors may look for evidence of it during an inspection. It’s been the subject of many staff meetings in schools. But what is it, and how can you use it to help your pupils remember key learning? 

By the way, did you know the capital of Mali is Bamako?  

What is retrieval practice? 

Retrieval practice is a teaching and learning strategy that involves actively recalling information from memory to improve learning. The key word in that definition is ‘actively’ – it highlights the importance of children consciously and deliberately recalling prior knowledge to support ongoing learning.  

Studies have shown that actively retrieving previously-learnt information helps to strengthen it in long-term memory and makes it less likely to be forgotten. This goes back to the work of Hermann Ebbinghaus in 1885, whose research into forgetting demonstrated how revisiting learning over time can reduce memory loss, as illustrated by the Ebbinghaus Forgetting Curve. Can you think of a time when you know you have taught a concept to a class and come back to it weeks or months later to find that many of them couldn’t remember it, then said that dreaded teacher phrase “But we’ve already done this!” (just me?). Had there been some recap work on that concept between initial teaching and returning to it, this would have meant more children remembering the concept at a deeper level – and would have been retrieval practice! 

You might actually have used retrieval practice yourself more than you think, without even realising. An EEF blog about the importance of retrieval practice highlights how episodes of many drama series often begin with a recap of what has happened previously – this is helping you to remember key events, characters and cliffhangers, ready for the episode to build on as the drama unfolds, because you may have forgotten them since the last episode. If you have learnt how to drive, you may have practised certain things over and over to help embed them into long-term memory so that they’re now second-nature – the act of initially learning how to parallel park, then trying it, then trying it again the week after, and again the week after that, will have been crucial for this. The more senior of you may have even had that ‘what did I come in here for?’ moment when looking for something around the house – muttering the thing you’re looking for under your breath might perturb your family but it’s helping retain the item in your short-term memory (usually glasses, in my dad’s case). 

Bamako is the capital city of Mali. 

How does retrieval practice link to the classroom? 

Within education, it is worth remembering that retrieval practice is not just about memorising facts to be regurgitated but considering what can be done with that information. Kate Jones, who has published a range of books about retrieval practice, defines retrieval practice as “the act of recalling learned information from memory, with little or no support, and every time that information is retrieved it makes that memory stronger”.  

In Year 4, for example, pupils are required to take the Multiplication Tables Check. One of the facts for this is to know that 4 x 7 is 28, which children will have learnt in Year 3 when learning the 4 times table. To help embed this one piece of knowledge into long-term memory further, you might ask a Year 4 child what seven lots of four are, or how many marbles they’d have if they had four bags that each contained seven marbles, or what is multiplied by seven to make twenty-eight, or what the product of four and seven is (all examples of schema development). Each of these is utilising that one fact in a different way and doing something different with that information, thereby strengthening that knowledge as it is being handled more flexibly than just ‘what is four times seven’ and making the long-term memory of that fact even stronger. 

What are the key principles of retrieval practice? 

Kate Jones’s work links back to that of Tom Sherrington, who came up with some principles of retrieval practice when used in the classroom: 

• All students must be involved and checking their knowledge, not just a few or one at a time through questioning (1:1 questioning between a classroom adult and a pupil has its place in all classrooms, when done effectively, but this is not retrieval practice for all) 

• Prompt children with what key information has been covered in a lesson so they know what must be self-checked (in history, for example, knowing that Anne Boleyn was Henry VIII’s second wife is almost definitely a more important fact than knowing that her great-grandfather was a hat-maker) 

• Vary the retrieval practice used so that pupils can explore knowledge in different ways and strengthen future recall (multiple-choice quizzes and use of whiteboards have become increasingly commonplace in classrooms and are incredibly valuable, but there are many other retrieval strategies!) 

• Ensure that pupils can check and correct answers, and that this is simple (all students should be able to find out what they got right and wrong, what they know well, what misconceptions they have and where their learning gaps are) 

• Encourage pupils to think more (this is a metacognition strategy – support children to think for themselves – struggling to recall key information will strengthen the fact when it is retrieved, and an unsuccessful recall still means the child has rootled around linked facts in their memory to strengthen those passive facts)  

• Make it time-efficient (retrieval practice should be quick and efficient, and not dominate a whole lesson; think about a starter activity in a lesson you did recently, as it may have had some aspects of retrieval within it) 

• Make it workload-efficient (there should be no addition to a teacher’s workload, as strategies ensure children retrieve information, receive feedback from either the teacher or another pupil, and then move on) 

Mali’s capital city is Bamako.  

A key aspect of the Ofsted definition of retrieval practice cites the need for it “to occur a reasonable time after the topic has been initially taught”. There are a lot of variables to what quantifies ‘a reasonable time’ and the amount of time may change depending on the topic being retrieved – the names of the continents in Key Stage 1 is essential substantive knowledge in geography and would be perfect for retrieval knowledge, but will be revisited less frequently in most KS1 classrooms than the phonics required for fluent reading. However, returning to the names of the continents days, weeks or months later (or a spaced combination of these, harking back to Ebbinghaus’ work – this could be retested the following week, then two weeks later, then a month later) through retrieval techniques will unquestionably help strengthen these facts. 

How can retrieval practice be used in the classroom? 

There are lots of exciting strategies you can carry out with your class as retrieval practice, which will be covered in an upcoming blog. One activity that a Year 6 class I taught really enjoyed is the Leitner system, which uses flashcards to embed key facts into long-term memory. This video explains it fantastically, alongside some jaunty music; I showed it to the class to help them understand it and we then applied it to spellings. They were able to have a much more active role in their individual spellings and five minutes of this a day really helped many of the pupils. Is this something you could try with your class this week – maybe times tables, high-frequency words or vocabulary?  

Finally, do you remember what the capital city of Mali is? It was a fact mentioned at the start of the blog then peppered throughout a few more times. This was an example of retrieval practice – by having the fact presented to you once, then reiterated in different ways spaced out across the blog, it will have helped embed that into your long-term memory. If it had been mentioned once then not again, you might be able to remember it after all the subsequent information but it is less likely. This can be how some pupils experience learning, but your interest into knowing more about retrieval practice is the first step to counteracting that.  

Hopefully you’re now raring to use retrieval practice to support your pupils – as you now understand the theory and rationale behind it, the following blog will give you more examples of it in practice within the primary classroom.