Metacognitive instructional strategies: a study of e-learners self-regulation

1

• Metacognitive instructional strategies a study
  of e-learners self-regulation
• Liliana Cuesta Medina
• Lecturer-Researcher
• Department of Foreign Languages and Cultures
• Universidad de La Sabana
• Selected Plenary
• CALL conference Motivation and Beyond
• Antwerp, Belgium
• August 20, 2010

2
Overview

• Background
• Literature review
• Methodology
• Results
• Conclusions

The complete paper accompanying this plenary can
be found in Cuesta, L (2010). (forthcoming).
Self-regulation of online graduate learners
through metacognitive instructional strategies.
3
Rationale

• Behind the study. My own motivations...
• Search for instructional models to use technology
  as a tool?access,deliver knowledge
• Strategies to foster learner autonomy
• (Palloff Pratt, 2001 Salmon, 2002 Hauck, M.
  ,2005 Warschauer, 2006 Reinders and Lázaro,
  2008).

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Rationale

• F2F and virtual scenarios. What to do? What to
  adjust? (Hampel Stickler, 2005).
• Where to go? Warschauer (2004) new literacies,
  new genres, identities, pedagogies?
• New tendencies Virtual action learning (VAL)
  (Dickenson, Pedler, Burgoyne, 2008, 2009),
  networked learning (Salmon, 2000), connectivism
  (Siemens, 2005), and virtual group working
  (McConnell, 2006).

5
This implies...

• Learning by making?learning by thinking.
• Metacognition
• John H. Flavell (1976), numerous disciplines
  psychology, natural sciences, linguistics.
• (See Glaser, 1994 Martí, Pozo Monereo, 1999
  Hacker, Dunlosky Greasser, 1998 Zimmerman,
  1989 Mateos, 2001 Argüelles Nagles, 2007
  Campanario, Cuerva, Moya Otero, 1997 Maturano,
  Soliveres Macías, 2002 Oxford, 1990 O'Malley
  and Chamot, 1988 Chapelle, 2001 Rubin,
  2001Hampel, 2003 Hampel Hauck, 2004).

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Defining Metacognition

• Areas Memory, attention, problem-solving
  strategies, language learning and learning
  itself.
• Flavell (1976)focused on defining metacognition
  as the domain and regulation that the individual
  has over his/her own cognition. He referred to
  metacognition on one hand, as "the knowledge
  concerning one's own cognitive processes and
  products or anything related to them" (p. 232).

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Defining the term

• "Metacognition" is often simply defined as
  "thinking about thinking.
• Metacognition refers to higher order
  thinking?active control over the cognitive
  processes?planning a learning task, monitoring
  comprehension, and evaluating progress toward the
  completion of a task.
• (Livingston,
  1997)

8
Once in history...

• Brown (1978) defined metacognition as "the
  deliberate conscious control of one's own
  cognitive activity (p.35). In her later studies,
  (1981) she elaborated on the features of
  knowledge and regulation of metacognition,
  pointing out a major difference between expert
  and novice learners is the relative control they
  have over cognitive activity.

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Metacognition?intervention?Scaffolding...

• Mateos (2001) argues that students should be led
  to gradual participation through growing
  competence levels until the instructor sees that
  they are able to build and progressively better
  control their own degree of autonomy a process
  in which, according to Martí (1999), the
  activities regulated by the teacher and the
  gradual self-regulation of the student are
  modified.

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All by the teacher
Gradual transfer of control
In the study, the intervention held during Weeks
18 used explicit instruction (cognitive modeling
processes) and guided practice Weeks 9-13 used
guided, collaborative, and independent practice
to implement selected metacognitive instructional
strategies.
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To highlight...

• The main responsibility for educators is to
  provide and scaffold guidance that enables
  students to assume control of their learning.

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Metacognitioninstructionstrategy?

• For Martí (1999)metacognitive occurrences can be
  viewed from the perspective of the teacher and
  the student. Both may differ at some point what
  is metacognitive for the teacher may not be so
  for the student. Modifications of activities are
  regulated by both teacher and learner (Martí,
  1999), and the degree of involvement of each
  agent directly impacts learner performance.
• Metacognitive strategies Chamot and O'Malley
  (1995)strategies that frames the thought or
  knowledge of the process of learning, Kuhn et al.
  (1988) refer to metacognitive strategies as
  skills Wenden (1998) described them as the
  "general skills through which learners manage,
  direct, regulate, guide their learning (p.519).
  Hauck self-management strategies.

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So...

• Metacognitive instructional strategies are
  defined as the conscious processes (represented
  in actions)that allow teachers to model the
  learning activities systematically and influence
  students self-regulation.
• (Cuesta, 2009)

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Self-regulation

• It includes knowledge of the task (the whats,
  whens and as hows of learning) as well as
  self-knowledge of personal skills, interests and
  attitudes. Self-regulated learning requires
  learners to have a solid knowledge of the
  requirements of the task, as well as of the
  personal qualities and strategies needed to
  develop the task (Schunk, 2004, p. 225).

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Banduras self-regulation proposal
Table 1. Subproccesses of self-regulation
Source Social foundations of thought and
action, by Bandura, A. (1986).
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Sub-process 1

• Self-observation
• This is a stage similar to self-monitoring.
  Bandura (1986) considers two important criteria
  for self-monitoring regularity and proximity.
• Regularity means observing behaviour on a
  continual basis instead of intermittentlyhow
  often. Proximity means that behaviour is observed
  close in time of occurrence rather than long
  afterward how soon (Schunk, 2004, p. 67).

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Sub-process 2

• Self-judgment
• This refers to a comparison of present
  performance level with ones goal. Self-judgments
  depend on the type of self-evaluative standards
  employed, the properties of the goal, and the
  importance of goal attainment and attributions
  (Schunk, 2004, p.124).

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Sub-process 2

• Schunk (1987) states that standards inform,
  motivate and enhance self-efficacy (understood as
  the belief in ones capabilities to organize and
  execute the courses of action required to manage
  prospective situations(Bandura, 1995, p.2).

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Sub-process 3

• Self-reaction
• According to Bandura (1986), self-reactions to
  goal progress motivate behavior, and these
  reactions can be either positive or negative in
  nature.

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Sub-process 3

• Self-motivating incentives may be tangible
  outcomes or self-evaluative reactions.
• Tangible incentives are granted upon performance
  attainment, and they mobilize the effort to get
  things done. E.g. recreational and relaxing free
  time activities (work breaks or new clothes).
• The power of these two incentive systems
  (tangible and self-incentives) is determined
  partially by the degree of personal or external
  control that the individual may have.

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What about VLE?

• Ávila and Bosco (2001), a virtual learning
  environment constitutes the physical space that
  favours the learning attainment through contents,
  experiences and pedagogic and communicational
  processes. Salmon (2000) and Hunter (2002) assert
  that in a virtual learning environment there is a
  mutual knowledge-building process taking place
  (p.96).

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Methodology

• Participants
• (N 17) Students of second semester of the
  Master in English Teaching-Autonomous Learning
  Environments at the Universidad de
• La Sabana, Colombia.
• Aged 25-35 years

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Research question

• What is the effect of metacognitive
  instructional strategies in the process of
  self-regulation of learning of a group of
  graduate learners in a virtual learning
  environment?

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Design

• Qualitative, exploratory study
• Action research
• Data analysis followed a sequential exploratory
  design strategy and a concurrency triangulation
  strategy (Creswell, 2003).

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Design

• Implementation and data collection lasted 13
  weeks, with data emerging from 3028 messages
  posted in a Moodle platform, registered through
  observational protocols, surveys, and
  questionnaires for later coding.

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Design

• For each of Banduras stages (1986), a specific
  method of instruction (derived from Mateos, 2001)
  was proposed and used along with a series of
  metacognitive strategies proposed by Cuesta
  (2009).

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Matrix of the study (Cuesta, 2009)
Table 2. Matrix of the study
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Background course design

• Salmon (2000, 2002) 5 Step model

Applied in the VLE?Course Autonomy and Learning
Environments(Core principles in Educational
Technology applied to Language Teaching)
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ADDIE model
Figure 2. ADDIE model
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Keller ARCS model (1987)
Figure 3. ARCS model
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E-tivities Salmon (2000, 2002)
Figure 4. Sample E-tivity in the course
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Three basic steps...
1
2
3
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Metacognitive instructional strategies (Cuesta,
2009)
Sub-process 1 Self-Observation Directed Action
(moderator)Qualitative Assessment
(moderator)The Reflection Forum (all
participants)Summaries (moderatorstudents)
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Metacognitive instructional strategies (Cuesta,
2009)

• Sub-process 2 Self-judgement
• Self-comparison with absolute standards
• (set in the lesson)
• Using Checklist as a performance comparison
  standard
•  
• Self-comparison performance with peer normative
  standards
•  
• Self-comparison performance with moderator
  normative standards (post-feedback)
•  
• General Abstraction Questioning strategies
  (higher order questioning concepts?relations
• (Biggs Collins, 1982)

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Checklist for Online Assessment
Figure 5. Checklist for online performance
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Metacognitive instructional strategies (Cuesta,
2009)

• Sub-process 2 Self-judgement
•  
•  
• Use of performance-based objectives
• Use of tangible motivators in moderator
  assessment (progress judgement) praising, future
  error-correction documented readings,
  encouragement to develop personal and
  professional products.
•  Continuous moderator assessment
•  
•  

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Metacognitive instructional strategies (Cuesta,
2009)

• Sub-process 3 Self-reaction
•  
•  
• Use of tangible motivators in moderator
  assessment (progress judgement) praising,
  suggesting future error-correction documented
  readings, encouraging ss to develop personal and
  professional products.
•  Time extensions
•  
•  

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Results
Self-observation stage Self-monitoring leads to
self-efficacy   Explicit instruction provided
through moderators directed actions influenced
progress and achievement throughout the study.
With regards to the criteria of regularity and
proximity, the study showed that most
participants visited the learning platform to
evaluate their performance within 2448 hours
(proximity)after a given task set in the Course
Forums. Participants read ownpeer
feedback. This seems to confirm that "... the
immediate observation provides continuous
information and therefore the best chance of
self-assessing performance is to evaluate it
while it is still being produced ... (Bandura,
1986, p. 363).
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Results

• Reasons to monitor their performance
• 1. professional development immediate
  opportunities
• 2. indicators to self-motivate and self-commit
• 3. indicators on performance standards.
• 4. indicators of learning and improvement in a
  collaborative learning environment.
• 5. indicators of learning and teaching
• Results also show that the most common type of
  regularity (how often) was Type B (within 24-48
  hours after performance).

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Results

Entries to the virtual classroom/comments to own contributions Time range to observe, retrieve and comment upon self and peer-performances Type
(12-24 hours) A
(24-48 hours ) B
(48- 72 hours ) C
(72 hours ) D
Legend
Figure 6. Sample of Observational protocol
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ResultsSelf-observation stage Self-monitoring
leads to self-efficacy

• The conversations are starting points for
  meaningful internalization and socialization
  processes, relationships which influence (a)
  exchange of information, (b) expansion of the
  shared knowledge, (c) recognition and value of
  the other, and (d) externalisation of feelings.

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Sample

• Re W8 E-1
• From Student A jueves, 23 de abril de 2009,
  0131
• Dear XXX
• (Can I call you like this?? XXX does... -In fact,
  XXXX seems to be very serious for me, lately...-)
• We agreed on the approach we chose. I also found
  out that my strategy perfectly fits into your
  Community-embedded learning. It is inside my
  workplace that I would like to implement my idea
  of a 'Virtual Teaching Club.' I especially want
  to highlight a sentence from your post "learning
  can be seen as a dialectic and social process
  raising from but especially affecting the
  community where it takes place." I want to
  emphasize the word 'dialectic' because it reminds
  me of great philosophers who took care of
  discourse to communicate their ideas. In this
  case, as you say, learning is not an isolated
  process. It arises from a given situation in a
  social context.
• As always, thanks a lot for your
  thought-provoking post!!
• DD
•  

Figure 7. Studentsconversation 1
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Results

• The directed action strategy? provides explicit
  feedback over performance and enhances the
  moderators ability to promote academic
  discussion, interact and socialize with students.
  
• The use of non-verbal, represented language on
  mood icons (emoticons), can contribute to a
  congenial atmosphere in the virtual environment,
  which is bonded through personal and social
  relations.
• The use of emoticons, together with a
  professional and polite use of language
  (netiquette), sets effective models of
  communication and interaction worthy of imitation
  (Cuesta, 2010).

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Results

•  
• Re W9 E-1
• de CUESTA MEDINA LILIANA MARCELA - jueves, 30 de
  abril de 2009, 0008
• Nicely done.
• Hope the suggestions were helpful.
• P.S Add a Why not in 5.
• Sleep well. Time to go to bed!
• Best,
• L
• Re W9 E-1
• de XXXXXX - sábado, 2 de mayo de 2009, 1833
• Dear Liliana
• Thanks for your suggestions and comments.
• It is nice to take advantage of this virtual tool
  to get your tutorial and opinions.
• Have a great weekend.
• XXXX.
•  

Figure 8. Studentsconversation 2
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Results

• The study showed that students observed and
  responded to the feedback from moderator between
  12 and 24 hours (Type A).
• Students actions
• (a) detailed reading of comments produced by
  moderator
• (b) comparison of feedback produced by
  moderator and second observation of students
  performance (recorded in the platform)
• (c) comparison of the performance standards
  required for the activity with the feedback of
  the moderator
• (d) dialogue with the moderator about feedback
  occurred
• (e) comparison of individual performance with
  one or various peers
• (f) self-evaluation of the quality and effort
  involved in the activity.

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Results
Student Comment
12 after every post or E-tivity I liked to revise the answers constantly just to know if I was right. Besides that I was always after the tutors feedback which was always kind and motivating.
7 Performance is the final product of learning processes. Reflective learning and teaching are required to better performance
9 I really like to see my progress when I am learning.
6 The possibility of working with first drafts of a paper has been quite useful to identify own mistakes and correct them for the final version
Table 3. Studentscomments 1
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Results

• Self-Judgement stage Discovering oneself through
  the other
• Most students found self-observations and
  self-comparisons with known standards very
  beneficial. Categories of data included revealed
  that those stances were (a) professional
  development opportunities, (b) indicators of
  self-motivation and self-commitment, (c)
  performance indicators over academic standards
  given by the instructor, and (d) learning
  improvement indicators in a collaborative
  learning environment.

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Results

• Accordingly, self-performance can be evaluated
  by assessing performance of the other. A
  meaningful other reference point is a factual
  standard defined by the performance or attributes
  of another individual who is meaningful to the
  evaluator, either because of the relevance or
  appropriateness of the individuals attributes
  for social comparison (Bernstein Crosby,
  1980 Festinger, 1954 in Higgins Sorrentino,
  1986).
• Participants self-compared their performances
  with those of colleagues they considered similar
  to themselves or who (they believed) had slightly
  greater academic capacities. 62 of students
  reported a classmate as such a meaningful
  other 10 identified the course instructor as a
  "meaningful other. Both others provided
  participants with motivational incentives and
  resources to improve performances and skills.

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Sample
Participant Comment
1 Mrs. X because she gave me support and she pushed me to try to do things on time. I trust on her knowledge and her way of being detailed when doing things.
5 Mr. XHe was always cheering me up, and analyzing why I did the way I did. It sounds redundant but every time Mr. X had the chance to participate in my threads, I felt he was reflecting on my products and ideas. This was useful to keeping up the good work.
7 Mrs.Y and Mrs.Z helped me reflect on different issues. Mrs.A kept me motivated because she enhanced my awareness on different issues.
Table 4. Studentscomments 2 Criterion
Normative standards set by peers
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Results

• Self-Reaction stage Achievements are
  self-rewards
• Evaluation standards are closely connected to
  learners beliefs about their progress (Schunk,
  2004). When learners believe in their own
  progress, their motivation and confidence grows.

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Results

• Tangible goals are understood as actions and
  rewards that the student takes on due to their
  academic progress (Schunk, 2004).
• When ss achieved goals...
• (a) exploring additional resources and tools,
  (b) reading more documents, and (c) dialoguing
  and interacting with classmates on lesson themes.
  
• Time extensions acted as routine-breakers and
  allowed students to pursue course activities at
  their own pace. It represents a surprise
  element Keller (1987) unexpected rewards.
  Beware Dont exceed its use!

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Results

• Self-reward Go for it!
• Two main groups of achievers
• a. those who self-reward after progress
  attainment
• b. those who waited to be rewarded by their
  tutor and/or peers, they were generally the
  low-achievers.
• Self rewards were also an indicator of the
  different levels of satisfaction and contentment
  that individuals may have after a learning
  experience.

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Reactions
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Conclusions

• The taxonomy of metacognitive strategies
  developed in this study helps learners
  understand, develop, and control their cognitive,
  behavioural, and emotional activity by
  establishing direct relationships with academic
  and personal goal achievement.
• The sequentiality of this study, proved to be a
  dynamic and structured proposal for
  self-regulation of learning process in
  virtualbut not solely virtuallearning
  environments.

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Conclusions
Having the opportunity to record students and
moderators performances in a virtual platform
enables students to regularly and proximally
self-monitor, judge and react to performances.
Verbalization and sharing of thoughts in the
virtual learning environment helps students to
develop their self-awareness but also increases
goal-attainment, confidence and satisfaction,
regardless the level of difficulty tasks may
have. Further research could explore a vast
array of options in which one may consider the
effect of metacognitive instructional strategies
in specific skills production contexts and also,
the correlation between learning styles and this
type of strategies.
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"I cannot teach anybody anything, I can only make
them think." - Socrates
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Thanks for coming!

• lilianamar_at_yahoo.com
• Liliana Cuesta Medina
• Lecturer-Researcher
• Department of Foreign Languages and Cultures
• Universidad de La Sabana
• Colombia, South America