Using Visual Tools to Enhance Teachers' Metacognition

• In Event: Educative Experience in Teacher Education

Abstract

This study examines the efficacy of visuals tools in developing teachers’ knowledge and use of metacognition in their own learning and their instructional planning for their students’ metacognitive growth. The context of the study is an online Educational Psychology course that addresses research on human thinking as it relates to classroom instruction. Preliminary findings suggest that teachers’ metacognitive proficiencies can be differentiated along a continuum from emerging to strong. The findings also suggest that visual tools, such as concept mapping, can play an important role in scaffolding teachers’ acquisition of metacognitive proficiency. Results are discussed in terms of diagnosing and supporting teachers’ metacognition related to instructional planning.

Authors

• Diane E. Salmon, National-Louis University

• Melissa Kelly, University of Illinois at Chicago