Technological Design and Durable Independent Learning ACCEPTABLE
Access to technology can improve performance during practice without producing competence that persists when assistance is removed. This article examines a more specific hypothesis than the general superiority of technology: instructional designs that preserve independent attempts while supporting feedback, retrieval and subsequent application may increase durable independent learning within a fixed study period. A critical narrative synthesis of thirteen research publications, supplemented by two contextual sources on El Salvador, brings together research on learning, computer tutoring, generative artificial intelligence and chess. Findings include benefits, null effects and harms. They do not establish a universal technological advantage or isolate technology as the cause of historical improvements in chess. The proposed framework distinguishes the organization of practice from the cognitive operations learners are intended to acquire. It operationalizes an observable attempt, feedback and reapplication cycle without treating cycle frequency as evidence of learning by itself. A proposed four-arm randomized trial compares active print study, fixed digital practice, constrained adaptive digital practice and direct access to solutions, with common core blocks protecting scheduled syllabus coverage. The primary outcome is unaided performance on novel chess positions four weeks after training. Improved assisted performance without a delayed advantage would not establish durable learning. The contribution is a falsifiable research framework and a proposed protocol, rather than a new empirical finding or a registered study.
Working paper. Citable, but not yet screened for the AIRR collection.