Metacognition and Learning  The term metacognition has been said to be the new ‘buzzword’ in education (Tarricone, 2011, p3). Since John Flavell coined the term in the 1970’s, there has been much research into how metacognition and self- regulation affect the achievement of learners. DO NOW THINK, PAIR, SHARE What is your understanding of the concept of metacognition?

Metacognition has been described as a ‘young and emerging discipline Metacognition has been described as a ‘young and emerging discipline.’ (Tanner, 2012, p114). However, it is a concept which has been widely researched in the last four decades since John Flavell introduced it in the 1970’s. He described metacognition as:   ‘one’s knowledge concerning one’s own cognitive processes or anything related to them… For example, I am engaging in metacognition if I notice I am having more trouble learning A than B, if it strikes me that I should double check C before accepting it as fact.’ (Flavell, 1976, p232). In its purest form metacognition is simply knowing and understanding (meta) one’s own thinking (cognition).

The Learning Cycle Planning Monitoring Evaluating What is the nature of the task? What is my goal? What kind of information and strategies do I need? How much time and resources do I need? Monitoring Do I have a clear understanding of what I am doing? Does the task make sense to me? Am I reaching my goals? Do I need to make changes? Evaluating Have I reached my goal? What worked? What didn’t work? Would I do things differently the next time?

The role of the teacher See six strategies for effective learning! ‘Like this game called 60 seconds. You’ve got to talk non-stop about something for 60 seconds but you can’t repeat or stopping or saying ‘err’. And like, we done these mind maps of different things to show how things were connected. It helped me answer the essay questions.’ Ellie The role of the teacher is an important one. Teaching should facilitate metacognition by providing students with strategies, tools and options of how to approach problems and should encourage them to develop their skills. See six strategies for effective learning! ‘Like in some subjects [revision cards] are helpful because the teacher helps with what to put on them and how to do them. So you know. Like in History last year [my teacher] showed us how to do them properly, not just saying ‘do a revision card for this.’ Then I knew and did them for everything and it helped me remember key facts for my exams. That proper helped me in my exam I think.’ Taslima

The role of the teacher Before WALT’s and WILF’s!  ‘When teachers gave too prescriptive instructions or intervened too often with ideas/suggestions they often suffocated the level of metacognition that was able to take place.’ (Larkin, 2009, p157) Providing choice of activity with the same learning outcome can provide opportunity for students to choose the strategy that they think will help them learn the most.

Collaboration and metacognition  ‘Well, I suppose (pause), in fact, group activities are the best cos we all get to talk and give our opinions on things and you know if somebody’s, if you’re talking in a small group, you don’t mind talking or you don’t mind coming up with the wrong answer cos you can all work it out together.’ Ellie Collaborative work can create an environment where the students become familiar with talking about why they are doing something a certain way, questioning others and questioning themselves.

Reflections Students write down their learning experiences and try to explain them. Some prompt questions or sentence starter can be used to help the students e.g. What did you learn today? How did you learn it? Which part of the lesson did you find the most challenging? Why? Which learning activity did you find the most helpful? Why?

Thomas and Anderson argue that the learning environment of a classroom can be changed if the teacher changes their language and encourages students to talk about their learning in the classroom (2014). ‘Metacognitive talk’ is the talking in the classroom which focuses on the how of the learning rather than the what i.e. talking about how you learnt something rather than what you learnt.

To summarise... The role of the teacher is important in facilitating metacognition. Teachers should provide students with the ‘tools’ or strategies which they can apply in other situations thereby developing their metacognitive skills. Collaboration (if done effectively) is a good way of promoting metacognition and getting students to talk about how they approach their learning. Building reflections into lessons can encourage students to think about how they are learning.

Some useful websites which offer tips on how to incorporate metacognition in the classroom. https://www.edutopia.org/blog/8-pathways-metacognition-in-classroom-marilyn-price-mitchell http://inclusiveschools.org/metacognitive-strategies/ http://www.readinghorizons.com/blog/how-to-promote-metacognition-in-the-classroom

Flavell, John. H. (1976). Metacognitive aspects of problem solving Flavell, John. H. (1976). Metacognitive aspects of problem solving. The nature of intelligence, Pages 231-236, Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum Larkin, Shirley (2009) Socially Mediated Metacognition and Learning to Write, Teaching Skills and Creativitiy, Vol 4 Pages 149-159. Tanner, Kimberly. D (2000), Promoting Student Metacognition. Feature: Approaches to Biology teaching and learning, CBE- Life Sciences Education, Vol 11, Pages 113-120. Thomas, Gregory. P, Anderson, David, (2014) Changing the metacognitive orientation of a classroom environment to enhance students’ metacognition regarding chemistry learning, Learning Environ Res, Vol 17, Pages 39-55