Fifth graders study videos faster than illustrated texts: Studying rate, review strategies, and learning implications

Despite the prevalence of videos and illustrated texts in primary education, there is a limited understanding of how children study and review these materials, and how this impacts their learning performance. This study examined 97 tablet screen recordings, which captured the learning behaviors of fifth graders as they studied illustrated texts and videos in a within-subjects experiment. The screen recordings were coded frame-by-frame to assess the children’s studying rates and learning strategies. These factors, and their connection to prior learning performance data, were analyzed using mixed-effects models and stepwise regression. The results show that videos were studied significantly faster than content-equivalent illustrated texts. Furthermore, this faster studying was associated with better learning outcomes and lower cognitive load. As the children scarcely used the navigation options in the videos, the videos were mostly studied and reviewed linearly at their designed rate, which was especially beneficial for slower readers. In comparison, both the studying rate and the review strategies were more varied in the illustrated texts. In both conditions, children devoted more time on the slides that had more text content and were positioned early in the presentation. The type of pictures on the slide did not influence time spent. These results indicate that children tend to watch and review videos linearly at their designed rate and sequence, leading to faster studying rates, better learning outcomes, and lower cognitive load compared to illustrated texts. In particular, slow readers benefit from videos.