Define metacognition
- The process in which you think about your own cognition
- “Thinking about thinking” and reflecting on your cognitive process
- Includes: monitoring, reflecting, evaluating, and planning
Metacognition is the process of which of the following knowledge and skills? Examples?
o Knowing what one’s own learning and memory capabilities are and what learning tasks one can realistically accomplish
o Knowing which learning strategies are effective and which are not
o Planning a viable approach to a new learning task
o Tailoring learning strategies to the circumstances
o Monitoring one’s present knowledge state
o Knowing effective strategies for retrieval of previously stored information
What is difference between cognitive (study) strategies for learning and metacognitive strategies?
- Metacognitive: higher level—being the executive
- Cognitive: the actual process of reading
- Metacognitive follows cognitive
What are the differences between “good” readers and “poor” readers?
- Good readers understand and effectively remember what they read
o Elaborate on what they just read; clarify their purpose for reading that passage; draw of prior knowledge; etc. - Poor readers have trouble learning and remembering what they read
o Little focus and sense of purpose as they read a passage; little metacognitive awareness of what they should be doing while reading
Provide examples of person knowledge, task knowledge, and strategy knowledge
- Person knowledge: visual vs. auditory learner
o Understanding own capabilities (strengths, weaknesses, accommodations, etc)
o i.e. I know that I - Task knowledge: read and comprehend biology text vs. novel
o How we perceive the learning task; ability to perceive and analyze the task
o Knowing difficulty, length, type of assignment, relevance, content, etc.
o i.e. I have difficulty with word problems - Strategy knowledge:
o Awareness of strategies that we can use to improve our learning as well as when and why to apply them
o Using strategies, not just knowing them
o i.e. so I will answer the computational problems first and save word problems for after
Define self-regulation
- Controlling your own actions, motivations, and thoughts
List ways in which students use self-regulated learning or what do self-regulated learners do? Those who use self-regulated learning reap the benefits of what in school?
- What do self-regulated learners do? o Set goals o Plan an approach o Control their attention and effort o Use effective strategies o Monitor their progress o Self-evaluate and self-reflect - When students are self-regulating learners, they set higher academic goals for themselves, learn more effectively, and achieve at higher levels
Define the four different types of metacognitive knowledge.
o Declarative: “that” a particular strategy exists
o Procedural: “how” to enact a particular strategy
o Conceptual: “why” to enact a particular strategy
o Episodic: “when and where” to enact a particular strategy
List and describe effective study strategies that you would recommend to a student who has trouble learning and remembering class material
- Meaningful learning and elaboration
o Meaningful learning: process of relating new material to knowledge already stored in long term memory
o Elaboration: process of using prior knowledge to interpret and expand on the material - Organization
o Internal organization: finding connections and interrelationships within a body of new information - Note taking
o Keeps students’ attention, facilitates encoding of the material, and serve as a form of concrete external storage for information presented in class - Identify important information
o Must separate main ideas from details - Comprehension monitoring
o Def: steps to remediate any comprehension difficulties they have
o i.e. asking questions or rereading passage - Mnemonics
o Memory tricks to facilitate learning and memory of many forms of hard-to-remember information
+ Define epistemic beliefs. Explain different kinds of epistemic beliefs. Which beliefs are harmful to students? Which ones are beneficial?
- Our ideas about what ‘knowledge’ and ‘learning’ are
- Different kinds:
o Certainty of knowledge
o Simplicity and structure of knowledge
o Source of knowledge
o Criteria for determining truth
o Speed of learning
o Nature of learning ability
List different types of transfer
Positive vs. negative Near vs. far Vertical vs. lateral Specific vs. general Low road vs. high road Forward reaching vs. backward reaching
Describe positive vs. negative transfer; examples?
Positive:
• Something that we’ve learned before makes it EASIER for us to learn something new
o i.e. driving in another country; using someone else’s phone
Negative:
• Something that we’ve learned before makes it HARDER for us to learn something new
o i.e. way learn to study for tests for different professors; xbox vs. play station; downhill skiing vs. water skiing; reading vs. mathematics
Describe near vs. far transfer; examples?
Near: similar in both underlying relationships and their surface features
• i.e. transfer of using different sizes of knife and fork; using different buses
Far: similar in underlying relationships but different in their surface features
• i.e. drinking hot coffee from mug vs. drinking hot coffee from thermos; transfer from using knife and fork vs. using chopsticks
Define vertical vs. lateral transfer; examples?
Vertical: a learner acquires new knowledge or skills by building on more basic information and procedures
• i.e. should master addition before moving onto multiplication
Lateral: when knowledge of first topic is helpful but not essential to learning the second one
• i.e. knowing French isn’t essential for learning Spanish, but can help b/c very similar languages/words
Define specific vs. general transfer; examples?
Specific: What we learned before overlaps with what we’re learning now
**more common
General: Learning in one situation affects learning and performance in somewhat dissimilar situation; the original task and learning task are different in both content and structure
• Tasks are different in content, but skills may be similar
• i.e. if knowledge of Latin helps student learn physics
Define low road vs. high road; examples?
Low road: Transfer of well-established skills in spontaneous and possibly automatic fashion
• Primarily automatized procedural knowledge and declarative knowledge
High road: Transfer involving abstraction through an explicit conscious formulation of connections between situations
• Declarative, procedural, and conditional knowledge, and complex production systems
Define forward reaching vs. backward reaching transfer; examples?
- Forward reaching: you intend the transfer at the time you are learning what ever you are learning
- Backward reaching: you realize the applicability of what you learned in the past only after it becomes relevant
Understand the factors that affect transfer
- Meaningful learning promotes better transfer than rote learning
- The more thoroughly something is learned, the more likely it is to be transferred to a new situation
- The more similar two situations are, the more likely it is that something learned in one situation will be applied to the other situation
- Principles are more easily transferred that discrete facts
- Numerous and varied examples and opportunities for practice increase the extent to which information and skills will be applied in new situations
- The probability of transfer decreases as the time interval between the original task and the transfer task increases
- Transfer increases when the cultural environment encourages and expects transfer
Define problem solving
Using knowledge and skills we’ve previously learned—that is, transferring them—to address an unanswered question or troubling situation
Differences between well-defined problem and ill-defined problem
• Well-defined problem: desired end result is clearly stated, all needed information is readily available, and particular sequence of operations will lead to correct solution
o i.e. fixing a computer problem; diagnosing a patent
• Ill-defined problem: goal is ambiguous, some essential information is lacking, and there’s no guaranteed means of achieving the goal
o i.e. win an election; design a better car
List examples of problem-solving strategies
Trial and error
Insight
Heuristics
(Algorithms)
Describe trial and error; examples?
- Remember Thorndike and the puzzle boxes?
- Trial and error is something we use
- Not effective and not reliable
- Can even have negative effects
- **Should not be your go-to problem solving strategy
Describe insight; examples?
- Definition: a sudden awareness of a likely solution; “Ah-ha” moments
- Research indicates 4 steps:
- Preparation: time to learn and gather information
- Incubation: time to think
- Inspiration: Eureka!
- Verification: time to test
Describe heuristics; examples?
- Mental shortcuts
- General methods for solving problems that use principles (rules of thumb) that usually lead to a solution
- Informal, intuitive, speculative strategies that sometimes work
- Versus algorithm: sequence of operations that when repeated over and over again guarantees success
- Benefits:
- Working with unfamiliar content in unfamiliar domain
- Provides a more systematic method
- Drawbacks:
- Can be limiting to the “process”
- When learners can use established procedural knowledge, heuristics are not as effective/efficient
