Identifying Teachers' Supports of Metacognition in the Classroom

• In Event: Investigating Cognition and Motivation at the Classroom Level

Abstract

Purpose: Metacognition consists of both knowledge about one's cognitions and regulation of cognition (Brown, 1987), which can promote learning and transfer (e.g., Zepeda, Richey, Ronevich, & Nokes-Malach, in press). Although prior research has demonstrated effective ways to increase students’ use of metacognitive skills in a classroom setting (e.g., Zepeda et al., 2015), little work has examined how teachers naturally support metacognition. Because metacognition is critical for learning, we examined the extent to which teachers support and encourage student use of metacognition in their classrooms.

Framework: We developed our coding rubric based on constructs identified in both laboratory and classroom research (Shraw, 1998; Veenman & Spaans, 2005). For each instance of teacher-initiated metacognitive support, we coded the type of metacognitive skill (e.g., planning, monitoring, or evaluation), the knowledge utilized (e.g., declarative, procedural, or conditional), the generality of the instance (e.g., problem specific, mathematics specific, or general), and the instructional manner in which it was supported (e.g., prompting, direct instruction, or modeling).

Method: Using the Measures of Effective Teaching database, we identified the instances of teachers' support of metacognition in 40 middle school mathematics classrooms which were selected based on the value added achievement scores on a conceptual math test (20 = high value-added classrooms and 20 = low). We hypothesized that high valued-added classes would engage in more and different types of metacognitive support (e.g., differential use of metacognitive skills) than teachers with low value-added scores.

Results: Preliminary analyses of 18 classrooms revealed that on average 6.05% of classroom talk involved metacognitive support and that there were no significant differences in the total amount of metacognitive talk between high and low value-added classrooms (high: M = .074, low: M = .047, d = .68). However, the amount of specific types of metacognitive supports differed. The high value-added teachers prompted their students more (high: M = .056, low: M = .032, d = .90), supported more monitoring skills (high: M = .026, low: M = .011, d = 1.12) and procedural knowledge (high: M = .019, low: M = .01, d = .90), and made more general supports (high: M = .044, low: M = .025, d = .86). There were no differences in the other teacher supports. The presentation will include the full analysis of all 40 videos.

Significance: These results provide novel insights into teachers’ support of metacognition in the classroom. Critically, this work suggests that particular types of metacognitive support are associated with high achieving classes. From these findings we contribute to the effort to develop a better understanding of how classroom instruction unfolds and supports opportunities for metacognition.

Authors

• Cristina D. Zepeda, University of Pittsburgh

• Christina Hlutkowsky, University of Pittsburgh

• Anne Partika, The College of Wooster

• Timothy James Nokes-Malach, University of Pittsburgh