Learning by explaining orally or in written form? Text complexity matters

In this experiment, we examined whether linguistic text complexity affects effects of explaining modality on students’ learning. Students (N = 115) read a high-complex and a low-complex text. Additionally, they generated a written or an oral explanation to a fictious peer. A control group of students retrieved the content. For the low-complex text, we found no significant differences between conditions. For the high-complex text, oral explaining...