The Challenge of Challenges: Examining the Impact of Difficulty Dynamics on Mastery Learning in Math

Adaptive learning systems promote mastery learning by allowing students to hone and harness the foundational skills through a number of problem-solving opportunities. To properly scaffold this learning process, it is instrumental that the problems are structured and sequenced in ways that are not too difficult to be discouraging but also not too easy for students to unchallenging. While considerable work focused on improving the cognitive models to inform the design of adaptive scaffolding and other interventions, it remains unclear how the differences in problem-level difficulty, whether they are negligible or dramatic, shape students' learning and their engagement within the adaptive learning systems. In this work, we aim to explore the effect of the problem sequence on students' learning processes and outcomes. We concluded with a discussion on the opportunities and challenges of our work to inform the design and development of adaptive learning systems in ways that are more responsive to individual problem-solving experience.