Author: Anton Tolman

Using Metacognition to Facilitate Scholarly Identity

by Anton Tolman, Ph.D., Guest Editor

This is the final and concluding blog for our series. I want to thank my colleagues for their time and effort in this project: Steven Pearlman, Christopher Lee, and Benjamin Johnson. Speaking for all of us, we hope you found our thoughts helpful in enriching your own thinking regarding metacognition and its importance in student learning.

The topics of this series, critical thinking, inclusive classrooms, student motivation, and succeeding with collaborative learning, are all essential themes in local and national discussions right now concerning student engagement and effective teaching. Each of the blogs in the series also touched on resistance to change (faculty or student), either explicitly or implicitly, the role of humility, and the development of metacognitive skills in achieving successful outcomes. Enhancing metacognition in ourselves and in our students is an ongoing progression, a journey, and we are happy to be walking it with you. In this last blog, I address the connection between metacognition and development of students’ personal narrative, their identity as scholars or educated persons. I believe this is the true heart of higher education and the core of its value to society.

photo of a blindfolded business man reaching forward and a big forward-facing arrow painted on the ground in front of him

You Can’t Change What You Can’t See

This phrase is an axiom in clinical work with clients. Clients often come to see a therapist knowing that things are wrong in their lives, but they don’t understand the reasons why or do not see a path forward to healing. They can’t change their lives for the better until they begin to “see” the nature of their problems, accept responsibility for their own role in those problems, and imagine and start to walk the road ahead.

This axiom applies to students. They usually come to college based on the promise of an economic benefit like higher paying jobs, or because they see a degree as a requirement for future goals. Many, if not most, see the purpose of education as learning facts or information and therefore, see the role of professors as experts who teach them content. When they are confronted with assignments that ask them to use critical thinking, solve problems, or work together, they can become easily frustrated. Thus, the terms “jumping through hoops” and “busy work” are commonly found in student conversations about their classes. These forms of resistance (Tolman & Kremling, 2017) are understandable because many students can’t see that the real goal of higher education is skill development, not content; it is not easily visible to them. Like the therapist’s clients, they won’t make progress until they develop the capacity to recognize the underlying issues and see the path ahead as one of purpose and value.

Student resistance to learning begins to diminish when students evaluate their own attitudes and behaviors and connect those behaviors to their academic performance. When they learn to develop metacognitive skills they can “see” previously unseen patterns in themselves and others: they recognize their own complicity in their academic struggles and begin to grasp that they are not just consumers of external information or persons being judged by some authority figure. This empowers them to assume responsibility, take action on their own, to succeed, to grow, and to become part of a community of learners.

wireframe image of a human head facing forward wit blue points like starts surrounding it.

Seeing is Believing: Shifting Identity in Higher Education    

In his recent blog, Taraban (2020) describes identity as an ongoing form of development grounded in episodic memory: the story we tell ourselves about who we are. This self-narrated story is strongly shaped by the boundaries of what students “see” as the purpose of education, their personal goals, and how they approach learning. If students’ sense of identity about who they are does not change from that of being consumers of content or “students”, then we have failed them.

If we were to adopt the model of cognitive apprenticeship (Collins, Brown, & Newman, 1987) in our teaching, seeing ourselves more as mentors to students, then our major task becomes to shift their story, their identity, to that of being apprentices, not students. As apprentices, they are learning new skills under the guidance of an expert who cares for them, and who asks them to constantly re-evaluate what they are learning, consider how they are learning it, and when and how to use what they are learning. This entails a transition towards seeing themselves as participating members of the academy, as scholars and educated persons who contribute to society; metacognition is at the core of this identity shift.

Undergraduate research is a great example of this as articulated by Charity-Hudley, Dickter, and Franz (2017). They explain that the mechanism of action of this “high impact” practice on student success and retention, especially for minority or under-represented students, begins as students enter into a mentored relationship with a professor. Moving away from the traditional “student” role enables them to realize there is more to learning besides getting a grade or completing course assignments. Metacognitive activity like learning to reflect and ask their own questions, carry out their own research, generate new data, challenge their own ideas as well as existing ideas in the discipline, and create new understandings, makes them a contributor to knowledge, not just a consumer. They are a scholar, or at least a scholar-apprentice, and those episodic memories begin to shift their own narrative identity — who they see themselves to be, how they interpret their own life and future. Of course, participating in research is not the only path available to this outcome.

This student progression requires creating opportunities for students to develop and use their metacognitive skills. In both Steve Pearlman’s (this blog series) and Hale’s (2012) potent arguments, the development of metacognitive and critical thinking skills is integral to development of a “personal intellectual narrative”; you cannot discuss metacognition without referencing aspects of critical thinking, and you cannot explain critical thinking without referring to the metacognitive processes involved. As Hale (2012) says, cultivation of an “intellectual language” is a key process in this development; it inducts students into the “Great Conversation” and it becomes part of their own personal history of intellectual development. The more we integrate metacognitive opportunities in our classes, and across the curriculum, the more likely we are to observe this transition occur.

Suggestions for Teaching

Here are some thoughts about ways to incorporate metacognitive practices that promote personal narratives in students:

  • Emphasize transparency and relevance. Explain the purposes of our assignments not just for short-term outcomes (learn something for a grade), but for the long-term (learn something to enhance a career and personal life, contribute to society); define and set expectations about the value of metacognition and its role in professional thinking within your discipline.
  • Assign metacognitive tasks that require students to evaluate their strengths and weaknesses as learners, identify learning strategies they are using and those they are not, and ask them to connect this information to their personal and career goals. Benjamin Johnson’s description of the Personal Learning Plan (this blog series), based partly on completing practical metacognitive inventories and evaluating how to improve is an example.
  • Emphasize the value of students thinking about their own development over time and their personal histories; reflective writing assignments, in all fields, are useful for this.
  • Use inquiry assignments requiring students to develop their own questions, do their own research, and apply it to course content and their lives.
  • Create opportunities for students to make their own thinking visible to themselves. Encourage them to question their learning, their assumptions, and acknowledge their areas of confusion as a community of learners. Hale (2012) suggests learning logs, real-time student writing of their thinking, questions, and descriptions of how they are approaching content, assignments, and preparation.
  • Shift your role from “sage on the stage” to a mentor of cognitive apprentices. Model professional thinking; demonstrate metacognition and critical thinking and help the students recognize it and practice it. One way I do this is to ask, and continuously reinforce, that students call me Coach T. In my syllabus I explain the rationale for this: my purpose is to facilitate their learning, give them exercises to improve, and to clarify or assist, but the basic responsibility for their learning, as with any athlete, actor, or musician, lies with themselves.
  • Evaluate your course design: what are the memories and personal experiences your students will take away relevant to metacognition? Do your assignments focus primarily on content acquisition or do they promote skill development, a sense of growth and progress towards becoming a scholar, ability to speak the intellectual language of the discipline and to reason within its context? What are your course objectives and where do they point your students: towards content, or towards becoming scholars?

photo of a woman peeking out from under a black blindfold

These teaching practices help students “connect the dots” and see patterns they did not know existed: how they approach learning, how well they are learning, the purpose of education, and their own intellectual growth and development. Doing this reduces resistance and shifts their understanding of learning and of themselves. When we move our perspective from content to skills and weave metacognitive development into the fabric of our class, we create an environment encouraging the exploration of new personal narratives and identity for our students. This brings us closer towards achieving the potential that higher education has to offer. If you are already doing these things, hone your work, expand your empathy, and become more transparent. If you are not, you can see the road ahead, and you don’t have to travel it alone. Reach out, learn from others, and find greater joy in what you do.

References:

Charity-Hudley, A.H., Dickter, C.L., & Franz, H.A. (2017). The Indispensable Guide to Undergraduate Research: Success In and Beyond College. New York: Teachers College Press.

Collins, A., Brown, J. S., & Newman, S. E. (1987). Cognitive apprenticeship: Teaching the craft of reading, writing and mathematics (Technical Report No. 403). BBN Laboratories, Cambridge, MA.

Hale, E. (2012). Conceptualizing a personal intellectual history/narrative: The importance of strong-sense metacognition to thinking critically. In M.F. Shaughnessy (Ed). Critical Thinking and Higher Order Thinking. Nova Science Publishers, Inc.

Taraban, R. (2020, June 25). Metacognition and the Development of Self. ImproveWithMetacognition.com. https://www.improvewithmetacognition.com/metacognition-and-self-identity/

Tolman, A.O. & Kremling, J. (2017). Why Students Resist Learning: A Practical Model for Understanding and Helping Students. Sterling, VA: Stylus Publishing.


Boosting the Effectiveness of Collaborative Learning Using Metacognition

by Anton Tolman, PhD, Guest Editor, Utah Valley University

The introductory blog for this series included a figure of the Integrated Model of Student Resistance (IMSR; Tolman & Kremling, 2017). That image (shown below) illustrates that student resistance is the outcome of systemic factors, including lack of metacognition. The IMSR demonstrates that family and the larger culture (including institutional culture) may promote consumer expectations and that these elements (poor metacognitive skills and culture) often intersect with instructor behaviors and attitudes, leading to negative experiences in education. This, in turn, increases student resistance, especially towards active learning.

These elements are also exacerbated by student cognitive development, which is overlooked by many instructors as a relevant element in metacognition, classroom experiences, and resistance. For example, Nufher (2014) summarizes the work of William Perry (1999) who carried out longitudinal studies of college student cognitive development. Students react with varying degrees of resistance to education depending on their level of cognitive development. Progressing in cognitive development can take time, but several authors have noted that effective use of metacognition and other strategies may accelerate this process, including careful metacognitive exercises (see Nuhfer, 2014; Nelson, 2015; Kloss, 1994).

The IMSR was created to help instructors begin to see resistance differently than they typically do; it is a communication signal from students that something is not working and, rather than dismiss it or try to assert their authority, the solution lies in addressing the underlying causes, including lack of metacognition. A recently published study in nursing (Stover & Holland, 2018) reported that use of the IMSR to redesign a collaborative learning-based course resulted in reduced resistance to collaborative learning, a greater sense of belonging to a community of inquiry, higher student satisfaction, and less negative comments or concerns. For a full explanation of the model, see Tolman and Kremling (2017).

flow chart showing components of the Integrated_Model_of_Student_Resistance

Students not actively using metacognitive skills are more likely to resist active teaching efforts because they see themselves as passive consumers of information whose main concern is to meet requirements set by an authority figure in order to graduate. My experience is that student resistance is greater in courses requiring collaborative learning because students are expected to work together on activities important to their grade. Now, imagine the level of resistance to collaborative learning in my online Abnormal Psychology course! When students see the syllabus, the most common resistant comment I receive is “I took this course online so I would not have to work with others.”

We should acknowledge that some of that resistance is justified. Collaborative learning pedagogies are not simple, and unfortunately are sometimes implemented ineffectively, leading to negative experiences for students. U.S. culture is highly individualistic and emphasizes personal success rather than group efforts despite the fact that society depends on the ability of people to work effectively together. Students often see collaborative learning as either a potential threat to their grade, or often based on prior experiences, as an added burden due to social loafing by peers. Many students have never been explicitly taught how to manage conflict, work with others, seek understanding of alternate viewpoints, and are unaware of the data indicating that diverse groups usually reach more effective problem solutions.

Thus, we have a storm of interacting elements here of culture/consumerism, negative prior experiences (with both peers and instructors), student lack of awareness of their own level of communication and collaboration skills and how to monitor and improve collaboration, and usually cognitive development where some students on the team see collaborative assignments as about “getting the right answer” rather than being about enriching their understanding of the material and promoting critical thinking (see Nelson, 2015). Let’s use the specific example of my Abnormal Psychology course to illustrate these issues and how promoting metacognition can help.

Example of Incorporating Metacognition: An Online Abnormal Psychology Course

Students know from the syllabus that the class will involve working in teams; they also know that course objectives are weighted towards development of professional skills as well as content learning. They begin to engage with metacognitive assignments by completing two instruments1:

  1. the TTM-Learning Survey (TTM-LS) assesses the student’s degree of readiness to change how they learn and their readiness to engage with a collaborative team, and
  2. the Learning Strategies Self-Assessment (LSSA) measures how often they use known effective learning strategies and engages them with reflective questions.

These assignments are due the first two weeks, before team activities begin.

A comparison of typical responses across two particular LSSA questions reveals some helpful insights on student thinking about collaborative learning. One LSSA reflective question asks them about their personal goals for the course. Despite knowing the class will involve teamwork, only 5% of the students indicated any related personal goal for improving their teamwork skills and learning (Fall, 2018 class). However, when the LSSA asks students to review their learning strategy scores and identify their strengths and weaknesses as a learner, 39% of them acknowledged weakness in collaboration or a reluctance to work with others. For instance,

 

  • Student A wrote, “I have a hard time asking for help when I get frustrated or confused. I feel like it is my responsibility to learn the material and do not want to put someone else out by making them take the time to teach me a concept I should be able to learn on my own.”
  • Student B replied, “I noticed that I’m very good at doing things on my own but when it comes to asking for help or working in groups, I don’t do it as often.”
  • Student C said, “I have learned many strategies throughout my academic experience on working with teams and they were mostly negative.”

 

At the beginning of the semester, these instruments opened the door for students to own these emotions and experiences, to think about how they could do better, how ready they were to change, to take responsibility for their own skill development, and to at least be willing to consider the value of collaborative learning. Instructors using instruments like this have the opportunity to provide feedback, lower resistance, and engage with these students in productive ways to prepare them to do well in a collaborative course, even if it is online.

Sibley and Ostafichuk (2014) describe some interventions instructors can take to help students “buy in” to the value of Team-Based Learning (TBL) including explaining the purpose and relevance of TBL, acknowledging negative experiences, and demonstrating the difference in quiz scores by teams compared with individuals (teams do better). These efforts are useful, but they are not inherently metacognitive and could be seen as just more instructor justification. The critical task for the instructor is to foster, across the semester, metacognitive thinking and evaluation of how collaborative experiences enhance their learning and strengthen their critical thinking and communication skills. Other aspects of TBL such as self and peer evaluation, if done well, also promote metacognitive development and learning.

Making Metacognition Pervasive

To be effective, metacognitive activities in collaborative environments must occur across the semester; single assignments or events will be insufficient. For example, a week after completing the two instruments above, students complete a Personal Learning Plan. They are asked to reflect on their TTM-LS readiness to change stages and to explain their next steps to become more effective learners and team members. They also create a personal study plan for the semester.

As students launch their teams, they engage in readings about the value of professional team skills in the workplace and engage with sites like Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse (https://teamwork.umn.edu/) to identify common myths contributing to negative experiences and devise a plan for working together. A later team workshop asks them to evaluate team progress and identify areas for improvement. Online videos and class discussions on these topics, connecting the themes to professional practice in the field, are also vital. These metacognitive “boosters” help them continue progress in the development of these skills.

photo of 5 hands making a circle by gripping adjacent wrists

Wirth and Perkins (2013) note that metacognitive skills must be developed in the disciplinary context, with students questioning their own mastery, progress, and applying relevant concepts. Designing collaborative learning courses to engage students in metacognitive activities from the very beginning and then continuing that dialogue can lead to significant gains in learning content and development of metacognitive, critical thinking, and collaboration skills.

At the end of the semester, my students complete the TTM-LS and LSSA again. Some questions ask them to identify activities that enriched their learning and how they will use what they learned in the future.

  • Student A stated, “I will try to form a study group or a team to try to learn the material, because I felt the more I taught the others the more I learned for myself.”
  • Student B noted, “…Meeting in a group was probably the most beneficial way for me to learn the course material. Looking back, it’s kind of ironic that that is my favorite aspect because I fought it so hard in the beginning”, and
  • Student C, who had a difficult semester, reflected, “[My] attitudes have been changing and so [has]my way of dealing with group work. I learned I had to change my attitude in order to change the way I think about an issue…”

In total, 80% of the students made statements positive about team work and how it benefitted them in response to these questions. Building ongoing metacognitive activities into collaborative learning environments makes a significant difference to student success.

References

Kloss, R.J. (1994). A nudge is best. College Teaching, 42(4), 151-159.

Nelson, C. (2015, February 15). Fostering Metacognition: Right-Answer Focused versus Epistemologically Transgressive. ImprovewithMetacognition.com. https://www.improvewithmetacognition.com/fostering-metacognition-right-answer-focused-versus-epistemologically-transgressive/

Nuhfer, E. (2014, July 15). Metacognition for Guiding Students to Awareness of Higher-level Thinking (Part 1). ImprovewithMetacognition.com. https://www.improvewithmetacognition.com/metacognition-for-guiding-students-to-awareness-of-higher-level-thinking-part-1/

Perry, W. G., Jr. (1999). Forms of intellectual and Ethical Development in the College Years. (Reprint of the original 1968 1st ed). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Sibley, J. & Ostafichuck, P. (Eds). (2014). Getting Started with Team-Based Learning. Sterling, VA: Stylus Publishing.

Stover, S. & Holland, C. (2018). Student resistance to collaborative learning. International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, 12(2), Article 8. https://doi.org/10.20429/ijsotl.2018.120208

Tolman, A.O. & Kremling, J. (2017). Why Students Resist Learning: A Practical Model for Understanding and Helping Students. Sterling, VA: Stylus Publishing.

Wirth, K.R. & Perkins, D. (2008). Learning to Learn. Retrieved from: http://www.macalester.edu/geology/wirth/CourseMaterials.html

1 These instruments are available under a Creative Commons license, so feel free to contact me (Anton Tolman).

 


Change Instead of Continuity: Using Metacognition to Enhance Student Motivation for Learning

by Benjamin A. Johnson, Ph.D., Utah Valley University

“New occasions teach new duties”
James Russell Lowell

In 2020, as we start a new decade, continuity appears to have taken a backseat to change. While change rapidly spreads through and disrupts such areas as health (including a viral pandemic), education, culture, economy, and technology, continuity offers stability, knowledge gained from the past on the human condition and peoples’ capacity to flourish. In this current climate of change, the expression, “new occasions teach new duties” resonates well (Lowell, 1890, p. 184) and appears to have a double meaning for our situation: not only do the events or “new occasions,” require us to “teach new duties,” but the “new occasions” can actually teach us “new duties.” As students navigate the many disruptions in our schools and communities, they urgently need professors who encourage metacognitive strategies to assess and enhance student motivation for engagement and learning.

It seems that student resistance and motivation not to engage is often driven by the motivation to maintain continuity, to stay in safe territory, to avoid anxiety. Students are often motivated to do what is familiar, such as engaging in surface approaches to learning: to memorize, recite, or do the minimum. As students advance through their majors, they may become more intrinsically motivated because they see the courses as relevant to their career goals. Even then, they can become overwhelmed at exams, and may have other priorities that push them towards continuity. On the other hand, effective teaching and engaged learning is all about change. Considering the current pandemic and the sudden transition to online and hybrid learning, faculty and students must be metacognitively aware as never before. 

A 2-Step Framework for Change

Some students will not come prepared to class, will not engage at a high level with the assignments, and will not take owernship for their own learning. This can be extremely challenging for professors. Rather than staying frustrated, here is a two-step framework a professor could cultivate to enhance student strengths and encourage positive change:

Step 1: Become more broadly aware of student resistance behaviors, including types and contributing factors.

Step 2: Create self-assessment opportunities for students to become more self-aware of their own openness to change. 

Step 1: Identifying Student Resistance to Change

The Forms of Student Resistance Matrix (Tolman & Kremling, 2017) below offers insight on how students may reveal their motives for resistance to learning. The matrix categorizes fundamental forms of resistance, each with different emotional foundations. It shows that students in the accommodation/anxiety (“Preserving Self”) column want continuity, education delivered in the way they find comfortable and familiar, while those in the anger/frustration (“Asserting Autonomy”) column seek change and validation.

cartoon image of man showing dismay over a broken arrow

Once we have identified types of student resistance, we can effectively focus our energy on helping students think metacognitively about their own learning needs and goals, and help them evaluate their own contributions to obstacles to their success (such as use of relatively ineffective learning strategies). As they better understand their own needs and challenges through self-assessment, they are more likely to decrease their resistance to learning.

Forms of Student Resistance Matrix
Adapted from Tolman & Kremling, 2017

 

Asserting Autonomy
(Seeking Change)

Pushing against external influence
Emotions: anger, frustration, resentment

 

Preserving Self
(Seeking Continuity)

Trying to accommodate to external influence
Emotions: anxiety, fear

 

Active Resistance
  • Arguing or disagreeing with professor in the classroom
  • Repeatedly asking for the rationale for assignments
  • Saying they paid for the class and want it taught how they like
  • Inciting other students to rebel or not collaborate; disrupting class activities
  • Complaining to higher authority

 
  • Repeatedly asking for detailed clarification of grading criteria
  • Taking over group assignments to ensure an adequate grade
  • Arguing with the professor over grades received, seeking additional points or consideration
  • Focus on surface approach to learning

Passive Resistance
  • Refusing to come to class
  • Refusing to participate during in-class exercises (does not get into groups, does not comply with assignment tasks)
  • Does not turn in assignments at all or is consistently late
  • Complaining about the professor to other students

 
  • Expressing concerns about working with others
  • Avoidance of conflicts and refusing to resolve situations or bring them to the professor’s awareness
  • Minimal participation in class (withdrawn, doesn’t speak or give feedback, lets others make all decisions)

Step 2: Student Self-Assessment—Helping Students Recognize Stages of Change         

Helping students assess their own openess to adopting new behaviors is key to supporting their learning. Self-assessment helps them recognize that their own attitudes and choices shape their educational outcomes and that their learning is not simply a product of their professors’ work. One assessment tool that can help students self-assess and self-regulate is the TTM Learning Survey (Tolman & Kremling, 2017), based on Prochaska and DiClemente’s (1983) Transtheoretical Model (TTM). Most often utilized in clinical settings, TTM theory provides a useful model for understanding a person’s path towards adopting new behaviors. TTM readiness to change stages include precontemplation, contemplation, preparation, action, and maintenance.

Assigning the TTM-LS along with a Personal Learning Plan (PLP; a reflective follow-up exercise that asks the individual to identify how to improve and to plan for the semester) may help students work metacognitively to identify their readiness to change (Tolman & Kremling, 2017). Part of the PLP requires the student to evaluate their stage of readiness to change and then describe how they can move forward and overcome their own forms of resistance. I have observed that using these instruments two to three times during the semester improves student metacognition, as evidenced by student reflections.

Additionally, by working through these self-reflective activities, students become more intentional or mindful about their own motivation to change, providing them multiple opportunities to think through their own behavior and learning. Though students may advance or step up higher through the stages of change, they may also revert back to a previous stage. Professors should help them view this regression as developmental and invite them to persist.

Surveys and reflective assignments like the TTM-LS and PLP help students think more about why they might not be not willing to adopt new behaviors and help them acknowledge their own reluctance to change their learning strategies (Tolman & Kremling, 2017; Yanqun, 2019).

Using the Forms of Student Resistance matrix above (Tolman & Kremling, 2017), an actively resisting autonomous student (left column) may acknowledge in their PLP that when they become frustrated, they request the professor be available regularly to explain the rationale for assignments. On the other hand, an actively resisting preserving-self (or an anxious) student (right column) might respond with fear to conform to the expectations of the professor while arguing for a better grade. Self-assessment helps the student better understand their own motivations, fears, and goals, so they can then move forward more deliberately.

This focus on intentionality is a core aspect of genuine metacognitive thinking because it can help students accept their own role in learning—understanding that what they choose to do shapes how they learn and that the main responsibility for learning resides with them, not with the professor. Once students begin to recognize their patterns of resistence and strategies for overcoming this obstacle, they will take more ownership over their learning. Assessments like these help students to shift their education from something that is being forced on them externally (by parents, society, employers) to something that they can personally control (Perry, et al., 2019).

Asking Students to Think Metacognitively Requires Change

Due to changes in this pandemic year, we can also invite students to become more metacognitive about:

  • technology use: their feelings toward new technology used for virtual or hybrid class settings and their level of mastery of that technology
  • learning on their own (less interaction in the classroom) – what works and what doesn’t
  • monitoring their own progress and anxieties in this dynamic environment

The more we support their metacognitive skills in these areas, the more willing they may be to intentionally make this shift. For example, as universities phase into more online learning, students who are motivated not to engage in new learning strategies may struggle to adapt. They may resist actively participating in online learning in its many forms. Professors can implement surveys such as the TTM-LS and a PLP to open the door to key conversations about students’ goals, what they hope to achieve from the class, and especially, how they might need to adapt to become successful in the new modality.

Learning in itself is a process of change, and as students use metacognition to accept rather than resist learning as an individual responsibility, their motivation can shift for the better. At its core, metacognition is about being open to seeing new possibilities and being willing to change (moving from the precontemplation to contemplation stage, for instance). As students practice self-assessment, they can accept the need for change and embrace “new duties.”

References

  • Lowell, J. R. (1890). Poems. Riverside Press. (Original poem published 1844)
  • Perry, J., Lundie, D., & Golder, G. (2019) Metacognition in schools: What does the literature suggest about the effectiveness of teaching metacognition in schools? Educational Review, 71(4), 483-500.
  • Prochaska, J. O., & DiClemente, C.C. (1983). Stages and processes of self-change of smoking: toward an integrative model of change. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 51(3), 390-395.
  • Tolman, A. O., & Kremling, J. (2017). Why students resist learning: A practical model for understanding and helping students. Stylus.
  • Yanqun, Z. (2019). The Significance and Instruction of Metacognition in Continuing Education. International Forum of Teaching & Studies 15(1), 29-37.

Metacognition and the Fish in the Water

by Steven J. Pearlman, Ph.D. The Critical Thinking Initiative

As the saying goes, you cannot ask a fish about water. Having had no other environmental experience as a counter reference, the fish cannot understand what water is because the fish has never experienced what water isn’t.

Cognition—broadly meaning that the mind is working—is to homo sapiens as water is to fish. So steeped are we in the water of our own cognitive processing that we cannot recognize it. Even though we all possess an extensive list of examples of other people failing to think well, we nevertheless lack an internal reference point for being devoid of thought; every consideration we might make of what it would be like to not-think can only happen through the process of thinking about it.

cartoon drawing of a goldfish on a blue background

This is the difference between metacognition, which is being intentionally self-aware of what we are doing when we are thinking, and critical thinking, which, loosely speaking, is the capacity to reason through problems and generate ideas. In one sense, we seem to do just fine thinking critically without that metacognitive awareness. We solve problems. We invent the future. We cure diseases. We build communities. But in another all-too-real sense, we struggle, for if we lack the metacognitive acumen to understand what critical thinking is, then we equally lack the capacity to improve our capability to do it and to monitor and evaluate our progress.

The Problem and the Need

Case in point, even though research shows that critical thinking is typically listed among necessary outcomes at educational institutions, “it is not supported and taught systematically in daily instructions” because “teachers are not educated in critical thinking” (Astleitner, 2002). Worse than that, one study of some 30 educators found that not a single one could provide “a clear idea of critical thinking” (Choy & Cheah, 2009). Thus, even though “one would be hard pressed to construct a serious counterargument to the claim that we would like to see students become careful, rigorous thinkers as an outcome of the education we provide them. … By most accounts, we remain far from achieving it” (Kuhn, 1999).

But we do need to achieve that rigorous thinking, because nothing is arguably more important than improving our overall capacity to think. To do so, we must seek to understand the relationship between critical thinking and metacognition, for though interrelated, they’re not the same. In fact, we can think critically without being metacognitive, but we cannot be metacognitive without thinking critically. And that might make metacognition the seminal force of true critical thinking development.

Some Classroom Examples

Consider, for example, asking a student, “What is your thinking about the assigned readings about the Black Lives Matter movement”? Were the student to respond with anything substantive, then we could loosely say the student exercised at least some critical thinking, such as some analysis of the sources and some evaluation of their usefulness. For example, were the student to state that “by referencing statistics on black arrests, source A made a more compelling argument than source B,” then we could rightly say that the student generated some critical thinking. But we cannot say that the student engaged in any metacognitive effort.

But what if the student responded, “Because of its use of statistics on black arrests, Source A changed my thinking about the Black Lives Matter because I was previously unaware of the disparities between white arrest rates and black arrest rates”? Is that metacognitive? Not truly. Even though the student was aware of a change in their own thoughts, they expressed no self-awareness of the internal thinking process that catalyzed that change. There is not necessarily a meaningful distinction between what that student did and someone who says that they had not liked mashed potatoes until they tried these mashed potatoes. They recognized a shift in thought, but not necessarily the underlying mechanism of that shift.

However, if the student responded as follows, we would begin to see metacognition on top of critical thinking: “I realized upon reading Source A that I held a tacit bias about the issue, one that was framed from my own experience being white. I had been working under the assumption that race didn’t matter, and it wasn’t until the article presented the statistics that my thinking was impacted enough for me to become aware of my biases and change my position.” In that sentence, we see the student metacognitively recognizing an aspect of their own thinking process, namely their personal biases and the relationship between those biases and new information. As Mahdvi (2014) said, “Metacognitive thoughts do not spring from a person’s immediate external reality; rather, their source is tied to the person’s own internal mental representations of that reality, which can include what one knows about that internal representation, how it works, and how one feels about it.” And that’s what this example demonstrates: the student’s self-awareness of “internal mental representations of … reality.”

The Value of Metacognition to Critical Thinking

When metacognition is present, all thinking acts are critical because they are by nature under reflection, and scrutiny. While one could interpret a love poem without being metacognitive, one could not be metacognitive about why they interpret a poem a certain way—such as in considering one’s biases about “love” from their personal history—without thinking critically. Since metacognition can only happen when we are monitoring our thinking about something, the metacognition inherently makes the thinking act critical.

Yet, even though metacognition infuses some measure of criticality to thinking, metacognition nevertheless isn’t synonymous with critical thinking. Metacognition alone does not successfully critique existing ideas, analyze the world, develop meaningful questions, produce new solutions, etc. So, we can think without being metacognitive, but if we want to improve our thinking—if we want to understand and enhance the machinations of our mind—then we must seek and attain the metacognitive skills that reveal what our mind is doing and why it is doing it.

Accomplishing that goal requires an introspective humility. It means embracing the premise that our own thinking process is at best always warped, if not often mortally wounded, by our biases, predisposition, and measures of ignorance. It means that we often cannot efficiently solve problems unless we first solve for ourselves, and that’s not easy to do for a bunch of fish who are steeped in the waters cognitive.

References

Astleitner, H. (2002). Teaching Critical Thinking Online. Journal of Instructional Psychology, 29(2), 53-76.

Choy, S.C. & Cheah, P.K. (2009). Teacher perceptions of critical thinking among students and its influence on higher education. International Journal of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education, 20(2), 198-206.

Kuhn, D. (1999). A developmental model of critical thinking. Educational Researcher, 28(2), 16-25.

Madhavi, M. (2014). An Overview: Metacognition in Education. International Journal of Multidisciplinary and Current Research, 2.


How Metacognition Can Foster Inclusivity in the Classroom

by Christopher Lee; Snow College

Kelly Field (2018) reports that “A growing body of research suggests that students who feel they belong at their college are more likely to remain there [and] that first-generation and minority students are less likely to feel a connection to their colleges” (para. 27). As an instructor at a 2-year college, I recognize the important role that my institution plays in functioning as a bridge to further educational opportunities, particularly for underrepresented students. Crucial to this mission is ensuring that I do my part to facilitate a classroom environment in which these students feel valued and included.

Inclusivity means working to ensure that curricula and teaching practices don’t exclude marginalized minority students and help to close existing achievement gaps. It means not only valuing diversity but creating a space for diverse groups of students to actually feel included. It entails serious introspection from faculty (before we even enter the classroom) about implicit biases we may hold toward others, opportunities for privileged students to examine their attitudes about underprivileged peers, and opportunities for minority students to critically reflect on their own academic abilities. An inclusive classroom, then, is contingent on honest metacognitive reflection from both faculty and students.

a hand holding a mirror

Faculty: Holding Up the Mirror

Inclusivity requires holding the mirror up to ourselves as instructors and asking how our behaviors, teaching practices, and curriculum choices may confirm or exacerbate student feelings of exclusion. As we strive for an inclusive classroom – in relation to race, class, gender identity, sexual orientation, religious affiliation, age, culture, or ideology – it’s critical that we examine the hidden biases we may hold about certain groups of students and recognize how these biases manifest in the classroom.

It’s one thing to acknowledge that we may have negative biases, but can we actually identify and control them? Patricia Divine’s (cited in Nordell, 2017) research suggests that it is possible to identify and mitigate biases, noting that they can be overridden, but not overwritten. In other words, completely removing our biases doesn’t seem to be a realistic goal, but we can moderate them, once recognized. Divine offers a model for faculty that incorporates key components of metacognitive thinking.

First, we must become aware of our own implicit biases. Although there’s no silver bullet, the Implicit Association Test at Harvard’s Project Implicit can be a useful resource. Second, we must become concerned about the implications and outcomes of our biases, acknowledging that there are very real and harmful consequences to holding unchecked biases. Finally, we must work to replace biases with more productive attitudes that align with our conscious or aspirational values. Subsequently, we can design strategies to monitor and assess our progress.

Metacognitive Practices for Students

The work of creating an inclusive, “decolonized” classroom (Seward, 2019) can’t be reduced to a short and simple list; however, these three practical suggestions can be effectively implemented in any course in an effort to utilize the benefits of metacognition toward increasing inclusivity.

  • Assign Reflective Exercises: Start students reflecting on their thinking processes and assumptions early in the semester, particularly in relation to their abilities and potentially flawed preconceptions about themselves, others, and college. I have students write a short essay about their writing and thinking processes, previous experiences with English courses, including negative internalized experiences, and their expectations about our current class. Students can choose to share their thoughts and experiences openly with each other, demystifying the idea that there’s one “correct” (i.e. white, male, middle class, etc.) way to approach writing, thinking, and other academic skills. Previous negative experiences aren’t necessarily exclusive to them individually and won’t act as permanent barriers to their educational goals.

With opportunities to metacognitively reflect, students are more likely to feel included in the classroom environment, early on, if they see a variety of effective approaches to learning tasks. With this understanding, they need not feel pressure to conform to the norms of a hidden curriculum (Margolis, 2001).

  • Invite Former Underrepresented Students to Speak: Former students, particularly those who are underrepresented, can be a powerful reference point and model for current students, in both bolstering the self-efficacy of underrepresented students and busting negative minority stereotypes held among other students. Encourage students who have successfully navigated your course to candidly discuss successes, failures, and effective learning strategies. This could be followed-up with a quick one-minute reflection paper that students complete in which they acknowledge their own struggles and make plans for addressing them.

Although we need to be careful not to inappropriately spotlight students (which usually results from us “volunteering” students), this can help underrepresented students to feel more represented and included. We can also use underrepresented student work as models, particularly work that reinforces the idea that there can be multiple ways to reach course goals.

  • Engage Students in High Impact Practices: Design projects that allow for greater engagement. Opportunities to participate in undergraduate research, for instance, require students to design, monitor, and adjust their work with faculty mentoring and peer feedback. I incorporate such research opportunities in my freshmen research writing courses to various degrees. As Draeger (2018) notes, “undergraduate research allows students the opportunity to become co-inquirers within an existing scholarly conversation” (para. 4). Actively contributing to an existing academic conversation, rather than passively reporting, requires a number of metacognitive traits, such as identifying and working to mitigate existing biases about topics, assessing what they already know or think they know, how to weigh and prioritize information (including where research gaps exist in the broader conversation), and how to adjust a research question when source material presents new and often contradictory evidence. I scaffold assignments with reflective components to serve as individual checkpoints along this path.

First generation and other minority students, in particular, have been shown to benefit from undergraduate research because of increased interactions with faculty and the institution, developing closer relationships with peers, and the opportunity to challenge existing knowledge and power structures with their own primary research contributions (Charity Hudley et al., 2017). These outcomes help to alleviate some of the most prominent barriers to an inclusive classroom.

Practices like these, in addition to reflecting on our own potentially excluding attitudes and behaviors, can aid us in shaping our classroom spaces to be more inclusive and, ideally, help further serve the mission of colleges and universities in recruiting, retaining, and advancing minority students.

References

About Us. (2011). Project Implicit. Retrieved July 7, 2020, from https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/aboutus.html

Draeger, J. (2018, June 22). Metacognition supports HIP undergraduate research. Improve with Metacognition. https://www.improvewithmetacognition.com/metacognition-supports-hip-undergraduate-research/

Field, K. (2018, June 3). A third of your freshmen disappear. How can you keep them? The Chronicle of Higher Education. https://www.chronicle.com/article/A-Third-of-Your-Freshmen/243560

Charity Hudley, A.H., Dickter, C.L., & Franz, H.A. (2017). The indispensable guide to undergraduate research: Success in and beyond college. New York: Teachers College Press.

Margolis, E. (2001). The hidden curriculum in higher education. New York: Routledge.

Nordell, J. (2017, May 7). Is this how discrimination ends? The Atlantic. https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2017/05/unconscious-bias-training/525405/

Seward, M. (2019, April 11). Decolonizing the Classroom: Step 1. National Council of Teachers of English. https://ncte.org/blog/2019/04/decolonizing-the-classroom/


Series Introduction – Ways Metacognition Can Enhance Student Success

by Anton O. Tolman, Ph.D., Utah Valley University Guest Editor

There appears to be growing interest among faculty and researchers on the topic of metacognition. This is evidenced, in part, by increasing research and published works related to the subject such as Saundra and Stephanie McGuire’s (2015) book regarding teaching students how to learn. Other recent works (e.g., Doyle & Zakrajsek, 2018; Bain, 2012) are aimed primarily at students, encouraging them to recognize how the brain works and how they can adopt behaviors and strategies that will enhance their learning. These are laudable efforts that provide a solid foundation for faculty to introduce to students thereby increasing students’ chances of success. Yet, faculty and others who approach metacognition only from the perspective of enhancing student learning strategies or behaviors (process metacognition) are missing the opportunity for a deeper understanding of metacognition’s central role in learning.

With a broader understanding, all faculty and staff who have contact with students can promote and advocate for metacognitive skill development in general education, course development, across programs and curricula, and as valued skills in students’ personal and professional lives.

Three Ways Metacognition Can Enhance Student Success

Here are three quick examples of how metacognition furthers student success as well as promoting the overarching goals of colleges and universities:

  1. Fostering process metacognition helps students understand how they learn and promotes the acquisition and development of effective learning strategies across subjects (including General Education) as well as within the major. This promotes content mastery and improved academic skills and performance as well as transfer across knowledge domains, but only if the use of these skills is perceived as valued by instructors across courses and within the major. Otherwise, students tend to see this emphasis as restricted to a particular course or professor. If student advisors also encouraged buy-in of the value of these skills and their value to professional careers, this could also have a significant impact.
  2. Metacognition reduces student resistance to learning. Students, especially in their first years, often see themselves as consumers, functioning primarily in a passive “student” role they know well and are comfortable with. Resistance to learning is ubiquitous in education and plays a major role in decreasing student motivation to learn. Resistance arises due to systemic influences (see Tolman & Kremling, 2017), one of which is the lack of metacognitive awareness (see Figure below).

flow chart showing components of the Integrated_Model_of_Student_Resistance

Students’ lack of self-awareness of learning strategies, their relative effectiveness, and the ability to monitor and evaluate their learning (beyond grades) naturally leads to negative classroom situations, frustration, and anxiety. In their consumer or “student” role, pushed in part by social expectations and institutional culture, many believe that if they have put in good effort, they should receive excellent grades. If this does not occur, natural targets of that frustration are the instructor (she doesn’t teach well), the content (I’m no good at this subject), or the generalization that they do not belong in college.

Promoting student metacognition, especially, shifts the responsibility for learning back towards the student who hopefully realizes they can succeed by using better learning approaches and encourages them to seek help when they realize they have not mastered important skills or concepts. This also increases student motivation and desire to learn and can curtail the sense that they do not belong. Instructors, advisors, and others who emphasize the relevance of metacognitive skills in professional careers, or even effective parenting, can help students see value and meaning in using these skills in many environments and across their lives.

  1. Another vital aspect of metacognition is that in becoming self-aware of their own motives, approaches, level of resistance, and personal responsibility, students begin to shift their personal narrative and identity away from that of consumer to that of someone capable of success. They begin to see themselves as someone who can be a lifelong learner and a learned person in their profession and in society. Taraban (2020; Taraban & Blanton 2008) described this process of personal narrative development as inherently metacognitive. In addition, Hale (2012) likewise explores the powerful interdependent relationships between metacognition, critical thinking, and personal narrative.

These relationships are so interdependent and so potent, they underlie the documented effectiveness of what are called “high impact practices” in learning and retention. A good example of this is the power of undergraduate research, an enterprise heavily laden with metacognitive experiences if done well, to shape students’ personal narratives and create a new sense of identity as a scholar, as someone capable of asking their own questions and finding answers. These experiences are especially powerful for first-generation and minority students as clearly described by Charity Hudley, Dickter, and Franz (2017) and the work of Tarabon and Blanton (2008).

Overview of this Guest Editor Series

Even with these limited examples, it should become obvious that metacognition is central to successful learning. The purpose or goal of this Mini-series is to explore several pivotal aspects of learning in higher education related to student resistance and motivation and to encourage all faculty and students to explore these boundaries. In the upcoming blogs, you will hear from the following authors on several important subjects:

  • Christopher Lee on How Metacognition Can Facilitate Student Inclusion in the Classroom
  • Steven Pearlman on Metacognition and the Fish in the Water
  • Benjamin Johnson on Change Instead of Continuity: Using Metacognition to Enhance Student Motivation for Learning
  • Anton Tolman on Boosting the Effectiveness of Collaborative Learning Using Metacognition

I will conclude the series with a blog focusing primarily on personal narrative and self-identity. Above, I noted that student resistance is a common occurrence in our classrooms. However, resistance is not limited to students. It is time that we, as professors, go beyond the constraints of thinking of ourselves as “content experts” and consider the broader scope of what we are capable of achieving by promoting metacognition in our assignments, our curriculum, across the major, and our institutions. We hope this blog series will help you see some new possibilities.

References

Bain, K. (2012). What the Best College Students Do. Belknap Press.

Charity Hudley, A.H., Dickter, C.L., & Franz, H.A. (2017). The Indispensable Guide to Undergraduate Research: Success In and Beyond College. New York: Teachers College Press.

Doyle, T. & Zakrajsek, T.D. (2018). The New Science of Learning: How to Learn in Harmony with Your Brain (2nd Ed). Sterling, VA: Stylus Publishing.

McGuire, S. Y. & McGuire, S. (2015). Teach Students How to Learn: Strategies You Can Incorporate Into Any Course to Improve Student Metacognition, Study Skills, and Motivation. Sterling, VA: Stylus Publishing.

Taraban, R., & Blanton, R. L. (Eds.). (2008). Creating Effective Undergraduate Research Programs in Science: The Transformation from Student to Scientist. New York: Teachers College Press.

Taraban, R. (2020, June 25). Metacognition and the Development of Self. ImproveWithMetacognition.com. https://www.improvewithmetacognition.com/metacognition-and-self-identity/

Tolman, A.O. & Kremling, J. (2017). Why Students Resist Learning: A Practical Model for Understanding and Helping Students. Sterling, VA: Stylus Publishing.