Metacognitive Approaches

Guide to metacognition, self-regulated learning and study skills

Developing the metacognitive skills of our children is important if they are to become autonomous and independent life-long learners. Yet children need to be explicitly taught metacognitive, cognitive and self-study skills before they will be able to employ them.

What is important when introducing metacognition, self-regulated learning and study skills?

  • We need to ensure that the learning environment feels safe for learning to take place as the links between motivation and learning are very strong.
  • It is hugely important to teach strategies. Explicit instruction of strategy use has the potential to reduce the poverty related gap. Yet all children benefit from explicit instruction.
  • Metacognition and motivation are highly linked. A learner needs to have the desire to improve their work or comprehension before they are likely to employ any metacognitive repair strategy.
  • Whenever you are teaching content, you should also be teaching strategies to help pupils develop their skills and understand the processes involved. They should also be given guidance to help them know what their end product should look like.
  • Effective instruction in strategies includes a series of 7 steps. Each step moves towards the teacher having less, and the learner having more, responsibility for the implementation of their strategy use. While going through the steps with the class, a teacher should periodically review the purpose of any given strategy and how it improves understanding until students can apply it independently.
  • Direct teaching and modelling of strategies encourages children to become more active in the process of learning while also nurturing the development of creativity.
  • Giving children a bank of strategies can lead to an increase in their level of ownership as they became more autonomous learners.
  • “Strategies” are not the same as the skills typically listed in core programs, nor are they teaching activities. A strategy is an intentional mental action during learning that improves understanding. It is deliberate efforts by learners to better understand or remember what is being learnt.
  • Study skills have often been taught as a separate and discrete topic. This is not the best way. It is better to use tasks that are real, embedded and subject specific.
  • When deciding which generic study skills to teach. It is important to consider:
  • What are the generic skills in your subject, programme or course?
  • How to consider the child’s attribution or mindset.
  • How can the use structural aids like writing frames help support learning?
  • Students must be active while they are learning study skills. Teaching them skills so that they create their own reminders and notes will make their learning more meaningful.

What can the Educational Psychology Service do?

To help teachers support children’s development of these important metacognitive, self-regulatory and self-study skills three interactive training sessions are available which will explore: metacognition and motivation, metacognition and explicit strategy instruction and metacognition and study skills. There are supplementary guidance notes to accompany each of the sessions in a PowerPoint format. The CLPL will give examples of strategies and take attendees through some ideas around the process of directly teaching them. EPS can deliver the sessions and support implementation.

Further reading

EEF Metacognition and Self-regulated Learning Guidance

How to Create Autonomous Learners

Helpful websites:

Audit tools

Cognitive Load

Early Years

  • The Institute of Education Sciences (IES) publishes practice guides in education to bring the best available evidence and expertise to bear on current challenges in education. https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED512029.pdf
  • The Effective Pedagogy in the Early Years (EPEY) study was developed to identify the most
  • effective pedagogical strategies that are applied in the Foundation Stage to support the
  • development of young children’s skills, knowledge and attitudes, and ensure they make a good start at school https://dera.ioe.ac.uk/4650/1/RR356.pdf
  • EEF Guidance of effective self-regulation strategies in the early years https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/evidence-summaries/early-years-toolkit/self-regulationstrategies/

Feedback:

Home learning

Metacognition

  • Hacker, D. J., Dunlosky, J., & Graesser, A. C. (Eds.). (2009). Handbook of metacognition in education. Routledge.
  • Weinert, F. E., & Kluwe, R. H. (1987). Metacognition, motivation, and understanding. Hillsdale: Erlbaum.

Mindset

Modelling

Online Safety

Parental engagement

Practical Advice and exemplars

Summarising Techniques

Teaching study skills

  • Hattie,J.(1999). Influences on student learning. Retrieved 26th October 2007 from http://www.geoffpetty.com/downloads/WORD/Influencesonstudent2C683.pd
  • Muijs,S. & Reynolds,D.( 2001).Effective teaching:evidence based practice. London:Paul Chapman. http://oer.educ.cam.ac.uk/wiki/Group_Work_-_Research_Summary
  • Petty,G.( 2006). Evidenced based teaching: a practical approach. Cheltenham: Nelson Thornes.
  • Watkins, C., Carnell, E. & Lodge, C. (2007). Effective learning in classrooms. London: Paul Chapman Publishing.

Thinking aloud

  • McKeown, R., & Gentilucci, J. (2007). Think-aloud strategy: metacognitive development and monitoring comprehension in the middle school second-language classroom. Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy, 51(2), 136-147.
  • Silvén, M., & Vauras, M. (1992). Improving reading through thinking aloud. Learning and Instruction, 2(2), 69-88.
  • Loxterman, J., Beck, I., & McKeown, M. (1994). The effects of thinking aloud during reading on students’ comprehension of more or less coherent Text. Reading Research Quarterly, 29(4), 353-367.
  • Courtney, A., & Gleeson, M. (2010). Building bridges of understanding: a whole school approach to children’s comprehension development. Retrieved from http://www.sess.ie/resources/
  • Kucan, L., & Beck, I. (1997). Thinking Aloud and reading comprehension Research: inquiry, instruction, and social interaction. Review of Educational Research, 67(3), 271-299.
  • Victoria State Government Education https://www.education.vic.gov.au/school/teachers/teachingresources/discipline/english/literacy/speakinglistening/Pages/teachingpracmodelling.aspx
  • Reading Rockets https://www.readingrockets.org/strategies/think_alouds

Working memory