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Metacognition: A Variable of Learning
Afroz Alam
Senior Research Fellow,
Dept. of Education &
Training,
Maulana Azad National Urdu
University,
Gachibowli, Hyderabad
Abstract
In the present research paper investigator made an attempt to
explore the concept of metacognition, its meaning, definition, nature and
scope in teaching-learning process. The concept of metacognition can
be described as a higher-order cognitive structure. More specifically,
metacognition as an appreciation of what one already knows, together
with a correct apprehension of the learning task and what knowledge
and skills it requires, combined with the ability to make correct inferences
about how to apply one‟s strategic knowledge to a particular situation,
and to do so efficiently and reliably. The present study also focus on the
components and constituents elements of metacognition. It is also
observed that why metacognition is important for learning and help in
learning strategies, techniques for enhancing metacognitive abilities in
the classroom and the value of increasing student metacognition. The
study is based on the secondary data. Secondary data had been
collected from the reviews of various books, journals and articles. The
study covers the thoughts and writings of various authors in the stream
of metacognition.It is revealed that the need metacognition in teachinglearning process is gradually increasing.
Keywords: Metacognition, Self-regulated learning, Declarative knowledge,
Procedural knowledge, Conditional knowledge.
Introduction
The main argument of this paper is that metacognition is an important
part of human abilities, which are, in turn, forms of developing expertise. To
the extent that our goal is to understand the bases of individual differences
in student academic performance, I need to understand metacognition as
representing part of the abilities that lead to student expertise, but only as
part.
Metacognition is defined most simply as “thinking about thinking”.
Metacognition consists of two components: knowledge and regulation.
Metacognitive knowledge includes knowledge about oneself as a learner
and the factors that might impact performance, knowledge about
strategies, and knowledge about when and why to use strategies.
Metacognitive regulation is the monitoring of one‟s cognition and includes
planning activities, awareness of comprehension and task performance,
and evaluation of the efficacy of monitoring processes and strategies.
Recent research suggests that young children are capable of rudimentary
forms of metacognitive thought, particularly after the age of three. Although
individual developmental models vary, most postulate massive
improvements in metacognition during the first six years of life.
Metacognition also improves with appropriate instruction, with empirical
evidence supporting the notion that students can be taught to reflect on
their own thinking. Assessment of metacognition is challenging for a
number of reasons: (a) metacognition is a complex construct; (b) it is not
directly observable; (c) it may be confounded with both verbal ability and
working memory capacity; and (d) existing measures tend to be narrow in
focus and decontextualized from in-school learning. Recommendations for
teaching and assessing metacognition are made.
Educational psychologists have long promoted the importance of
metacognition for regulating and supporting student learning. More
recently, the Partnership for 21st Century Skills has identified self-directed
learning as one of the life and career skills necessary to prepare students
for post-secondary education and the workforce. However, educators may
not be familiar with methods for teaching and assessing metacognition,
particularly among secondary school students.
Metacognition is essential to successful learning because it enables
individuals to better manage their cognitive skills and to determine
weaknesses that can be corrected by constructing new cognitive skills.
Almost anyone who can perform a skill is capable of metacognition – that
is, thinking about how they perform that skill. Promoting metacognition
begins with building an awareness among learners that metacognition
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exists, differs from cognition, and increases academic
success. The next step is to teach strategies, and
more importantly, to help students construct explicit
knowledge about when and where to use strategies.
A flexible strategy repertoire can be used next to
make careful regulatory decisions that enable
individuals to plan, monitor, and evaluate their
learning.
Early research tended to conclude that
metacognition is a late-developing skill. The
metacognitive capacity of preschool and elementary
aged children is limited by several factors, including
the development of executive functioning and verbal
ability. For example, maturation of the portions of the
brain responsible for executive functioning does not
occur until 3-6 years of age, which parallels the
emergence of skills such as inhibitory control.
Inhibitory control is believed to be a foundational skill
for theory of mind development. Theory of mind,
which predicts subsequent metamemory, may in turn
be dependent on the development of verbal reasoning
skills. More recent research suggests that young
children are capable of rudimentary forms of
metacognitive thought, particularly after the age of
three. Preschool-aged children will demonstrate
metacognitive behaviours, such as articulation of
cognitive knowledge, regulation of thought, and
regulation of emotional and affective states.
Recent research indicates that metacognitively
aware learners are more strategic and perform better
than unaware learners, allowing individuals to plan,
sequence, and monitor their learning in a way that
directly improves performance.
Metacognition is
separate from other cognitive constraints on learning
such as aptitude and domain knowledge. There is
strong support for the two-component model of
metacognition
which
includes
knowledgeand
regulation of cognition.
Reflective Aspect of Learning
Knowledge about cognition corresponds to what
students know about themselves, strategies, and
conditions under which strategies are most useful.
Declarative, procedural, and conditional knowledge
can be thought of as the building blocks of conceptual
knowledge.
Control Aspect of Learning
Regulation
of
cognition
corresponds
to
knowledge about the way students plan, implement
strategies, monitor, correct comprehension errors,
and evaluate their learning.
A strong correlation between these factors
suggests that knowledge and regulation may work in
unison to help students become self-regulated
learners.Ifstudentsaretaught metacognitive awareness
concerning the purpose and usefulness of a strategy
as they are taught the strategy, they are more likely to
generalize the strategy to new situations. Given the
importance of high-stakes accountability and the use
of standards, it is imperative to teach metacognitive
skills in the classroom.
We engage in metacognitive activities everyday
being aware of and monitoring our learning. Although
related, cognition and metacognition differ: Cognitive
skills are those needed to perform a task whereas
metacognitive skills are necessary to understand how
it was performed. Successful adult learners employ a
range of metacognitive skills, and effective teachers of
adults attend to the development of these skills.
Objective of the Study
The purpose of the study was
1. To explore the nature of metacognition through
review of cited research
2. To explore the ways in which metacognition has
been defined by researchers
3. To investigate how metacognition develops in
adolescent students
4. To learn how teachers can encourage
development of metacognitive abilities in their
students; and
5. To review best practices in assessing
metacognition in the teaching-learning process
What is Metacognition
A student with metacognitive awareness will have
knowledge about how he or she thinks and be able to
control his or her learning. The knowledge about how
he or she thinks would include knowledge about
learning preferences, strengths, weaknesses, what
knowledge needs to be gained, and the best way to
acquire that knowledge. In order to control one‟s
learning a student should be able to plan, monitor,
and evaluate her learning. Using knowledge about his
or her learning the student should be able to plan a
strategy or strategies for acquiring knowledge that
work well with her preferred learning techniques.
Monitoring learning requires that the student be
reflective about how well the learning strategy is
working. Does the student need to acquire additional
knowledge? Where is the student weak and where is
the student excelling? What factors played into her
successful learning? Finally, a student needs to be
able to evaluate how well the plan worked. Did the
strategies that the student engaged produce the
expected results?
Cognition would be the skill required to complete
a task but in case of Metacognition is understanding
when and whyto apply a particular skill. Therefore,
teachingmetacognitive skills should help students
transitiontheir
scientific
skills
from
classroomassignments to daily practice.Most teachers
are making everyeffort to teach students when and
why they should use the skills being taught. But we
need to expand what we are teaching.
Given the relatively recent introduction of the
concept of metacognition into the fields of learning
theory and educational psychology, these concepts
and skills still are not being taught in a widespread
manner throughout most of the educational systems
in the India. This means that most of our students
havenever been taught to think about how they learn
or how to regulate their own learning. If the key parts
to metacognition are knowledge and control then we
need to be transparent about teaching metacognitive
abilities so that students understand the process and
the goals. Metacognitive skills are highly transferable
from subject to subject so these skills, taught in the
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of attack on problems in general” (Hennessey,
1999, p. 3).
4. Taylor (1999) defines Metacognition as “an
appreciation of what one already knows, together
with a correct apprehension of the learning task
and what knowledge and skills it requires,
combined with the ability to make correct
inferences about how to apply one‟s strategic
knowledge to a particular situation, and to do so
efficiently and reliably”.
5. “Metacognition involves the ability to think about
own cognitions, and to know how to analyse, to
draw conclusions, to learn from, and to put into
practice what has been taught” (King, 1999).
6. “Awareness and management of one‟s own
thought” (Kuhn & Dean, 2004, p. 270)
7. As Kuhn and Dean (2004) explain, metacognition
is what enables a student who has been taught a
particular strategy in a particular problem context
to retrieve and deploy that strategy in a similar
but new context. The authors note that in
cognitive psychology, metacognition is often
defined as a form of executive control involving
monitoring and self-regulation, a point echoed by
other researchers (McLeod, 1997; Schneider &
Lockl, 2002).
8. “The monitoring and control of thought”
(Martinez, 2006, p. 696).
Metacognition and Three Types of Knowledge
To increase their Metacognitive abilities, students
need to possess and be aware of three kinds of
content knowledge: declarative, procedural, and
conditional.
Declarative knowledge refers to “knowing what”.
Declarative Knowledge is the factual information that
one knows; it can be declared- spoken or written. An
example is knowing the formula for calculating
momentum in a physics class (momentum = mass
times velocity).
Procedural knowledge refers to “knowing how”.
Procedural knowledge is knowledge of how to do
something, of how to perform the steps in a process;
for example, knowing the mass of an object and its
rate of speed and how to do the calculation.
Conditional knowledge refers to “knowing why
and when”. Conditional knowledge is knowledge
about why and when to use a procedure, skill, or a
strategy and when not to use it; why a procedure
works and under what conditions; and why one
procedure is better than another. For example,
students need to recognize that an exam word
problem requires the calculation of momentum as part
of its solution.
This notion of three kinds of knowledge applies to
learning strategies as well as course content. When
they study, students need the declarative knowledge
that:
1. All reading assignments are not alike; for
example that a history textbook chapter with
factual information differs from a primary
historical document, which is different from an
article interpreting or analysing that document.
They need to know that stories and novels differ
context of scientific skill, should have a positive
impact on other skills as well.
Prior to reading the educational theory and
learning the terminology and concepts, teacher should
talk to students in class about the importance of
“thinking about how you are thinking about particular
topic or thing.” It is a clumsy phrase but my instinct
was that most students had not thought about how
they were approaching particular topic or thing.
Teachers have tried to teach studentsabout assessing
resources and reading strategies.But many students
do not seem to be learning theseskills in a way that
they are transferring to their lifein practice.I believe
that most of our students have thewill to learn
(another concept important to metacognition).
Teaching these students abouthow to become
“expert” and “self-regulated”learners may give them
the tools they need totranslate the skills they learn in
school to newand varied situations in practice.
Meaning and Definition of Metacognition
The word metacognition has a Greek origin. The
Greek word „meta‟ means moving something or some
idea from one place to another. So there is
„metacognition‟, when we feel and think about our
behaviour; there is „meta-knowledge‟, when we know,
plan, remember and do in executing a repetitive or
familiar task; there is „meta-positioning‟ when we
reflect on our various roles. „Meta‟ signifies going
beyond or transcending. Therefore, metacognition is
cognition that goes beyond ordinary thinking and it
also refers to second order knowledge or function
(Biehler & Snowman, 1986).
J. H. Flavell originally coined the term
metacognition in the late 1970s to mean “cognition
about cognitive phenomena,” or more simply “thinking
about thinking” (Flavell, 1979, p. 906). The definition
of Flavell emphasizes active monitoring and
regulation of cognitive processes. He also suggested
a model of metacognition and cognitive monitoring in
describing: Metacognitive knowledge, Metacognitive
experience, goals or tasks and actions or strategies.
Subsequent development and use of the term have
remained relatively faithful to this original meaning.
For example, researchers working in the field of
cognitive psychology have offered the following
definitions:
1. “The knowledge and control children have over
their own thinking and learning activities” (Cross
& Paris, 1988, p. 131).
2. Schraw (1998) describes metacognition as “a
multidimensional set of general, rather than
domain-specific, skills. These skills are
empirically distinct from general intelligence, and
may even help to compensate for deficits in
general intelligence and/or prior knowledge on a
subject during problem solving”.
3. “Awareness of one‟s own thinking, awareness of
the content of one‟s conceptions, an active
monitoring of one‟s cognitive processes, an
attempt to regulate one‟s cognitive processes in
relationship to further learning, and an
application of a set of heuristics as an effective
device for helping people organize their methods
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from arguments. Furthermore they need to know
that there are different kinds of note taking
strategies useful for annotating these different
types of texts;
2. Students need to know how to actually write
different kinds of notes (procedural knowledge)
and
3. They need to know when to apply these kinds of
notes when they study (conditional knowledge).
Knowledge of study strategies is among the kinds
of Metacognitive knowledge, and it too requires
awareness of all three kinds of knowledge.
Components of Metacognition
Metacognitive components were classified into
three as follows:
1. Metacognitive knowledge is what individuals
know about themselves and others as cognitive
processors;
2. Metacognitive regulation is the regulation of
cognition and learning experiences through a
set of activities that help people control their
learning and
3. Metacognitive experiences are those experiences
that have something to do with the current,
ongoing cognitive endeavour.
Metacognition refers to a level of thinking that
involves active control over the process of thinking
that is used in learning situations. Planning the way to
approach a learning task, monitoring comprehension,
and evaluating the progress towards the completion of
a task: these are skills that are Metacognitive in their
nature. Similarly, maintaining motivation to see a task
to completion is also a Metacognitive skill. The ability
to become aware of distracting stimuli- both internal
and external- and sustain effort over time also
involves Metacognitive or executive functions. The
theory that metacognition has a critical role to play in
successful learning means it is important that it be
demonstrated by both students and teachers.
Students who demonstrate a wide range of
Metacognitive skills perform better on exams and
complete work more efficiently. They are selfregulated learners who utilize the “right tool for the
job” and modify learning strategies and skills based
on their awareness of effectiveness. Individuals with a
high level of Metacognitive knowledge and skill
identify blocks to learning as early as possible and
change “tools” or strategies to ensure goal attainment.
The Metacognologist is aware of their own strengths
and weakness, the nature of the task at hand, and
available tools or skills. A broader repertoire of tools
also assists in goal attainment. When tools are
general, generic, and context independent, they are
more likely to be useful in different types of learning
situations.
Another distinction in metacognition is executive
management and strategic knowledge. Executive
management processes involve planning, monitoring,
evaluating and revising one‟s own thinking processes
and products. Strategic knowledge involves knowing
what (factual or declarative knowledge), knowing
when and why (conditional or contextual knowledge)
and knowing how (procedural or methodological
knowledge). Both executive management and
strategic knowledge metacognition are needed to selfregulate one‟s own thinking and learning (Hartman,
2001).
Finally, there is a distinction between domain
general and domain specific metacognition. Domain
general refers to metacognition which transcends
particular subject or content areas, such as setting
goals. Domain specific refers to metacognition which
is applied in particular subject or content areas, such
as editing an essay or verifying one‟s answer to a
mathematics problem.
Constituent Elements of Metacognition
Metacognition has two constituent parts:
knowledge about cognition and monitoring of
cognition (Cross & Paris, 1988; Flavell, 1979; Paris
&Winograd, 1990; Schraw &Moshman, 1995; Schraw
et al., 2006; Whitebread et al., 1990). Several
frameworks have been developed for categorizing
types of knowledge about cognition. For example,
Flavell (1979) defines cognitive knowledge as
knowledge about one‟s own cognitive strengths and
limitations, including the factors (both internal and
external) that may interact to affect cognition. He
classifies such knowledge into three types: (a)
“person” knowledge, which includes anything one
believes about the nature of human beings as
cognitive processors; (b) “task” knowledge, which
includes knowledge about the demands of different
tasks; and (c) “strategy” knowledge, which is
knowledge about the types of strategies likely to be
most useful. Flavell notes that these different types of
knowledge can interact, as in the belief that one
should use strategy A (versus strategy B) to solve
task X (rather than task Y).
Metacognition is a multidimensional set of skills
that involve “thinking about thinking.” Metacognition
entails two components: metacognitive knowledge
and
metacognitive
regulation.
Metacognitive
knowledge includes knowledge about oneself as a
learner and about the factors that might impact
performance
(declarative),
knowledge
about
strategies (procedural), and knowledge about when
and why to use strategies (conditional).
Metacognitive regulation is the monitoring of
one‟s cognition and includes planning activities,
monitoring or awareness of comprehension and task
performance, and evaluation of the efficacy of
monitoring processes and strategies. Insights
experienced while monitoring and regulating cognition
play a role in the development and refinement of
metacognitive knowledge. In
turn, cognitive
knowledge appears to facilitate the ability to regulate
cognition. The two are empirically related and may be
integrated in the form of metacognitive theories, which
are formal or informal frameworks for representing
and organizing beliefs about knowledge.
Metacognition is related to a number of other
constructs, including critical thinking and motivation.
Critical thinking may be a component of metacognition
or both concepts may be subsumed under the more
general framework of self-regulated learning. At the
very least, metacognition can be seen as a supporting
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condition for critical thinking to the extent that
monitoring the quality of one‟s thought makes it more
likely that one will engage in high-quality thinking.
Motivation is the set of beliefs and attitudes that
underlie the development and expression of
metacognition. Thus, self-regulation includes the
ability to manage and regulate affective states, and its
effect on academic success is mediated by
motivation. Children with better self-regulation of
emotion experience more positive social relationships
at school, which in turn increases their level of
engagement and academic motivation. This improved
motivation then enhances academic performance.
Empirical research supports this link, as effortful
control of affective states predicts future scholastic
achievement test (SAT) scores, as well as reading
and math abilities.
Why is Met acognition Important to Learning
“High achieving students have been found to
possess more met acognitive awareness and engage
in more self-regulatory behaviour than low achieving
students.” A student who is met acognitively aware
will be better able to assess what knowledge they
have not learned thoroughly. These students will be
able to develop a plan for relearning the material
using techniques that speak to their preferred
methods of learning. These students, by reflecting on
what they have learned and filling the gaps, will not
only be better students but will be able to contribute
more fully to the classroom experience. They may
better understand where their fellow students are
struggling and provide a model for other students.
Because met acognitively aware students can assess
their strengths and weaknesses and plan how to
correct weaknesses, they will be able to apply
knowledge and skills from school to new situations in
practice.
Metacognitive Learning Strategies
A teacher interested in facilitating her students‟
use of Metacognitive learning strategies would do well
to teach them strategies such as Self-Questioning,
KWL, PQ4R and IDEAL. Fascinatingly, cross-cultural
studies have shown that similar strategies are used in
different parts of the world: Japanese, Australian and
American students were taught to use very similar
Metacognitive problem-solving strategies.
Self-Questioning
To facilitate metacognition, teachers can present
divergent questions (or questions with a range of
possible answers) for students to answer, or they can
encourage the students to generate their own
i.
questions. We will focus on the latter strategy.
A teacher can assist students in their use of SelfQuestioning or self-interrogation (Ganz and Ganz,
1990). He suggested that Self-Questioning encourage
the students monitoring of their own cognition, along
with the assessment of their feelings about the
efficacy of their thinking. It also assists students in the
employment of self-correction and the development of
newer understanding (Ganz and Ganz, 1990).
In attempting to teach students the process of
Self-Questioning, a teacher would do well to use
many of the cognitive behavior modification
techniques. Specifically, the teacher should
demonstrate the procedure, then encourage students
to execute the strategy along with the teacher, and
finally, provide opportunities for students to enact the
strategy alone.
Wilen and Philips (1995) enumerate three steps
for helping learners:
Step one requires the teacher to
1. Identify the skills to be taught
2. Outline the steps necessary to complete the skill
and
3. Explain to students both the significance of the
skill and the circumstances of its use, often
through illustrative examples.
Step Two requires that the teacher to model the
cognitive processes necessary to use the skill. Step
Three directs the teacher to guide the students in the
exercise of the skill (Wilen and Phillips, 1995). Ideally,
teachers will become less involved in the exercise of
the skill over time, as the students have greater
opportunities to practice (Hyde and Bizar, 1989).
When applying this model to teaching SelfQuestioning skills, a teacher would first identify SelfQuestioning as the specific Metacognitive skill that
he/she wishes to teach and then describe to her
students the significance of that skill for effective
study. The teacher might then Self-Questioning,
prompts for the student.
In
general,
effective
teachers
facilitate
development of Metacognitive skills by teaching
students specific strategies and allowing them time to
practice the strategies (Feden, 1994).
KWL Strategy
KWL is a strategy enabling students to know
what they know, what they want to learn, and what
they did learn (Dixon-Krauss, 1996). This
Metacognitive strategy starts with student discussion
of what they know and a listing of the information.
Then, students are encouraged to make predictions
about what they want to learn. Having read the
content information, students are guided to recall the
information they learned.
PQ4R Strategy
The PQ4R is a popular Metacognitive strategy
with steps similar to KWL, albeit in greater detail.
PQ4R is an acronym for: Preview, Question, Read,
Reflect, Recite and Review. This PQ4R strategy
assists students to process a lot of information in
relatively short amount of time. It helps the student to
orient cognitively the task at hand prior to actual
reading.
IDEAL Strategy
Another approach to metacognition is to Identify,
Define, Explore, Act and Look. IDEAL is the acronym
for these strategies, which are important for effective
and efficient thinking and problem solving (cf. Byrnes,
1996). Each of these specific Metacognitive skills can
be taught to students by a teacher who is concerned
with facilitating effective thinking and problem solving.
Effective problem solving should begin with
identification or the careful anticipation of potential
difficulties. Novice learners rarely anticipate problems,
while expert learners do. However identifying the
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existence of problems is not enough. It is also
necessary to attempt to ascertain just what makes this
problem so difficult, to ask “What‟s wrong here?”
Thus, after identification, problem definition is a
significant step (Byrnes, 1996). Through this step, the
efficient learner examines goals and looks for
obstacles to those goals.
The third strategy in problem solving is
exploration. Following the identification and definition
of the obstacles to understanding, the student
explores solution options. Expert learners are more
reflective and open-minded to possible solutions,
while novice learners are more rigid and narrow. Both
expert and novice learners act on their solution
options, but only expert learners think purposefully
before acting (Byrnes, 1996).
The last strategy in IDEAL, after trying a solution
option, is for the student to look and to note which
actions lead to successful resolution and which do
not. This is a critical step. Comparison research
indicates that only experts‟ learners monitor the
outcomes of their choices, while novices are
inattentive (Byrnes, 1996).
Techniques for Enhancing Metacognitive Abilities
in Classroom
Modelling
One important aspect of teaching metacognitive
awareness is modelling. The teacher should discuss
explicitly why choices were made to teach certain
materials, demonstrate self-questioning and reflection
(discussed below), and provide a running dialogue or
classroom
discussion
about
problem-solving
strategies while resources are being taught.
Predicting Outcomes
An important skill for promoting metacognitive
awareness is the ability of the student to predict
outcomes, either of the strategy they are engaging or
of their own abilities. So, when working on a problem
or constructing a lesson plan, one task would be for
the students to complete a statement predicting how
well their strategy will work. Initially, students may not
be very good predictors of outcomes. However, this
exercise encourages the students to reflect on their
level of knowledge, how good their skills are, and
what the potential benefits and risks are of the
research strategy they have chosen. Additionally, if
the students share with their colleagues their
predictions after completion of the assignment, it can
be an opportunity for student modelling of
metacognitive ability to their peers.
Direct Student Teaching
Another effective technique for promoting
metacognitive abilities is directed student teaching.
This can be either impromptu or planned. Students
may be assigned a particular topic to teach, required
to create a teaching plan, and scheduled to meet with
the teacher to discuss and improve the teaching plan.
In the alternative, students can be selected in class to
lead a discussion on a specific topic. The teacher
provides a critical role in both situations by asking
questions designed to keep the discussion on track,
discussing why those questions are important, and
otherwise modelling metacognitive behaviour. The
student teaching the topic is also providing modelling
for her colleagues.
The Value of Increasing Student Metacognition
Recent research in metacognition has started to
examine the relationship between individual
differences in students and cognitive learning.
Researches demonstrated that lower-ability students
especially gain from Metacognitive instruction.
Further, training in Metacognitive strategies has been
reported to enhance the thinking and social skills of
learning-disabled students (Powell and Makin, 1994;
Rosenthal-Malek, 1997). But, what about cultural
differences? Will differences in gender or learning
styles or race/ethnicity or language influence the use
of Metacognitive strategy? They certainly can. Several
studies in recent years have reported possible links
between such individual differences and student use
of Metacognitive problem solving strategies (Hartman
et al. 1996; Carr and Jessup, 1997; Lee et al. 1995;
Turner, 1993). Yet further study is needed in this area,
especially as we try to understand why and how
differences in cultural groups influence cognitive
learning. The effective teacher nonetheless tries to
take into consideration the need for varied
approaches that may be required in a diverse
classroom.
Conclusion
Strengthening metacognitive ability allows
students to build skills that they can take into other
school classes, the bar exam, and practice. Students
who understand what they know and understand how
to control their own learning are more likely to
understand how to apply what they have learned
previously to new situations. Transparency is
important because students are much less likely to
learn to plan, monitor, and evaluate their learning
unless they understand what the goal is. New
techniques that promote metacognitive abilities may
be applied without distracting from teaching learning
materials and strategies. Teaching metacognition is
vital for increased student performance in the
classroom and for successful transfer of skills.
A number of researchers have proposed
alternative models of metacognitive development over
time. Although individual developmental models may
vary, in general, they all postulate massive
improvements in metacognitive ability during the first
6 years of life, with the most dramatic changes
occurring between the ages of 3 and 4. Cognitive
knowledge tends to emerge first, with regulation of
cognition
not
appearing
until
much
later.
Metacognition improves with both age and
appropriate instruction, with substantial empirical
evidence supporting the notion that students can be
taught to reflect on their own thinking. Researchers
recommend a number of specific instructional
strategies, including providing explicit instruction in
both cognitive knowledge and cognitive regulation,
using collaborative or cooperative learning methods,
using tasks and activities that make student
conceptions and beliefs visible, promoting awareness
of metacognition through teacher modelling, and
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attending to the affective and motivational aspects of
metacognition.
Finally, assessment of metacognition is
challenging for a number of reasons: (i) metacognition
is a complex construct, involving a number of different
types of knowledge and skills; (ii) it is not directly
observable; (iii) it may be confounded in practice with
both verbal ability and working memory capacity; and
(iv) existing measures tend to be narrow in focus and
decontextualized from in-school learning. Common
methods for measuring metacognition include the
somewhat artificial tasks typically used in controlled
laboratory experiments, self-report methods such as
questionnaires
or
rating
scales,
think-aloud
approaches that attempt to make student thinking
visible, and methods based on teacher observation of
student learning. This latter category of approaches
may have more ecological validity than the others,
because it is somewhat independent of the student‟s
verbal ability and working memory capacity, can
include nonverbal metacognitive behaviours, can take
into consideration social processes that may be
important for acquisition of metacognitive skills, and
may be embedded in the context of instruction and
learning.
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