Do Multiple Homework Attempts Increase Student Learning? A Quantitative Study

Learning must inherently involve practice. It is true for athletes, for musicians, for almost any area of learning. However, this commonsense approach stops short when it comes to student homework where the debate about whether to allow multiple attempts continues. Proponents claim the value of practice and learning by reworking. Opponents cite grade inflation, student guessing behaviors, and superficial learning rather than true mastery. Meanwhile, the increased use of online homework management systems that easily allow for multiple graded attempts intensifies the need for a data-based answer to the question. It is further complicated by the increase in adult learners and online education. Would multiple homework attempts increase student learning? Would the effect be the same for adult learners in a fully online environment as found in previous studies of traditional students? This natural experiment divided a sample of 917 online students in an entry-level university economics course into two groups to look at the relationship between multiple graded homework attempts and exam scores. The results show mean exam scores increased from 60.34% to 70.77%, when multiple homework attempts were allowed. In addition, 76.89% of variance in exam scores was explained by variance in homework scores. This strong relationship suggests that multiple graded homework attempts increased student learning as measured by the increased exam scores. JEL Classifications: A22, C93, D01, 12