Implications for Instructional Design

The main implication of metacognition on instructional design is that we need to design so that learners are taught not only a strategy, but how to use the strategy and when to apply it. As in Keller's ARCS model, telling the learners how and when to use a strategy is motivational in that they see a use for the instruction (it is relevant to them).

(ARCS is attention, relevance, confidence, satisfaction - see Keller, J. M. (1979 Motivation and instructional design: A theoretical perspective. Journal of Instructional Development, 2, 26-34.)

Definition

The term "metacognitive strategy" is difficult to nail down concretely.

It can be defined as, "Thinking about thinking: knowing what we know, what we don't know, and how we can best learn what we don't know."(Blakey, E. and Spence, S. 1990)

As a graduate student, you have incorporated many metacognitive strategies already.

Many learning strategies can be both cognitive and metacognitive. It depends on how you use them. One strategy that incorporates metacognition is the SQ3R method of reading.

SQ3R and Metacognition

On strategy that we'll cover later in the course is SQ3R stands for Survey, Question, Read, Recite, Review. The survey part of the method helps you orient yourself to the material.

After a quick survey (preview) of the material, if it seems very easy for your to understand, you will probably read it quickly.

If it seems somewhat more difficult, you will read it more carefully and deliberately.

If it seems very difficult, you will probably take notes on it, use other materials to help clarify the material, ask someone else for clarification, or use another means to learn the material presented in the text.

The question part of SQ3R is metacognitive in that it involves predicting what types of questions you think the instructor might ask. Particularly if questions come naturally and frequently, it also helps you determine what you don't know very well :) You must then select a clarification strategy. To do this, you must think about how you will learn.

Read, Recite, and Review all incorporate thinking about what you are reading as you read it. To be able to recite and review, most of us need to read short sections of text at a time. Thinking about how much text to read before determining if you actually remember and understand what you read is a metacognitive strategy. You have to think about your reading to do that.

*** Stop now and go back to the course site and complete the application 2.1.