Presentation for SEF on metacognition applied to online/remote learning.

1. METACOGNITION APPLIED TO
ONLINE/REMOTE LEARNING
Christian Bokhove
@cbokhove
Associate Professor, University of Southampton

2. Who am I ?
• Christian Bokhove
• From 1998-2012 teacher maths and computer science,
secondary school Netherlands
• PhD from Utrecht University
• Associate Professor at
University of Southampton
• Maths education
• Technology use
• Large-scale assessment
• Computer Science stuff
• Jolly Skeptic on social media

3. Introduction
• Self-regulation and metacognition are among the most downloaded
elements of the EEF toolkit Guidance report
• Increasing interest, but:
• A lot of interventions don’t show any effects
• Poor implementation
• Not a silver bullet
• Term can remain rather vague
• Domain-specific
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4. WHAT DOES THE THEORY SAY?

5. What is metacognition?
Cognition
Metacognition
Motivation/affect
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6. Cognition
• Information gathering
• Memorisation
• Understanding
• Applying
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7. What is metacognition?
• Knowledge of cognition :
• Knowledge about yourself as a
learner
• Knowledge about strategies and
procedures such as reviewing,
interleaving and selecting main ideas
• Knowledge of why and when to use a
particular strategy.
• Regulation of cognition:
• Planning e.g. activating relevant prior knowledge, selecting
appropriate strategies, and the allocation of resources.
• Monitoring e.g. self-testing
• Evaluation
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8. What is metacognition?
• Cognition and metacognition
continuously interact
• For example, when memorising
something, learners will:
• Determine what they think is
the ‘Ease of Learning’ (EOL)
of a particular piece of
content, leading to a strategy.
• The learner will also make a
‘Judgement of Knowing’, by
deciding how well s/he knows
the content already, and
allocate study time.
• A ‘Feeling-of-Knowing’
judgement will then lead to a
decision as to when to stop
study
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Metacognition
Cognition
control monitoring
Flow of Information

9. For more…
https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/tools/guidance-
reports/metacognition-and-self-regulated-learning/
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10. WHAT CAN WE LEARN FROM THE
EVIDENCE?

11. General strategies
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Teacher knowledge and skills
• Strong understanding of the metacognitive demands of
the topics you are teaching.
• One thing you could do is look up specific domain-
oriented studies that involve metacognition.
Explicitly teach metacognitive strategies
• Closely related to the first point. Closely linked to the
specific domain.
• Plan: what do I know, what do I need, where do I want to go?
• Monitor: am I doing well, is this challenging, anything I need to stop
and change?
• Evaluate: how did I do, what did I learn, did my strategy work?

12. Model cognitive and metacognitive skills
• Teacher modelling
• Make steps explicit
• Deliberate/desirable
difficulties
• Scaffolding
https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/tools/guidance-
reports/metacognition-and-self-regulated-learning/
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13. HOW CAN WE PUT IT INTO PRACTICE?
Some online examples

14. Disclaimers…
• One tricky thing now is that you ideally need to set this up
while everything is ‘normal’.
• Setting it up during a crisis is much harder.
• Little steps at a time; rather do one small thing right than
immediately go for the most ambitious plans.
• Socio-economic challenges re online.
• Might look different for subjects (domain-specificity)
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15. • In a classroom you would maybe use a quiz, dialogue or
whole-class questioning
• But many of those can also be done online
• Quizlet, Google Forms quiz
• These can also be open e.g. Mentimeter
• Forums (although risk a few students dominate discussions)

16. Consistently use terminology
• Plan: what do I know, what do I need, where do I want to go?
• Monitor: am I doing well, is this challenging, anything I need to stop
and change?
• Evaluate: how did I do, what did I learn, did my strategy work?
This could be aided with online agendas

17. • Modelling their own thinking – what is often referred to as
‘thinking aloud’ (EEF, 2018)
• Self-explanation has also been shown to be much more
effective for learning than commonly used techniques such as
re-reading and highlighting (Dunlosky, 2013).
• Can be combined online: write paragraph, blog, audio/video.
• If you are looking at Dunlosky any way, check out the book on
metacognition with Metcalfe (Dunlosky & Metcalfe, 2009).

18. • Lots of online systems to support guided practice.
• Explore the ones that are useful for your subject.
• For example, for my subject we have things like Hegarty
maths or Times Tables Rockstars.
• Ideally, a system has some provision for feedback, some
even ‘process feedback’.
• It also is useful if you as teacher can see how the student did.
•
• But then you also want students to be able to do this without
feedback (‘fade’ the feedback away).

19. • Digital portfolios to support metacognition.

20. Concluding thoughts
• Metacognition is a broad concept and within it there are
multiple strategies that combine cognition and
metacognition.
• There are differences between domains, so check for your
subject. However, some strategies work across multiple
domains.
• Strategies are not digital per se; think about how you can
use online/digital tools in (meta-)cognitive ways.
• Don’t just try it now because we have a crisis but see how
can build routine.
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21. • C.Bokhove@soton.ac.uk
• University of Southampton
• Twitter: @cbokhove
• Monthly TES research column

22. Some sources
Badger, C., Horrocks, S., Turton, C., & Lewis, H. (2019). Using technology to
promote metacognition. Impact. https://impact.chartered.college/article/using-
technology-promote-metacognition/
Dunlosky J (2013) Strengthening the student toolbox: Study strategies to boost
learning. American Educator (37): 12–21.
Dunlosky, J., & Metcalfe, J. (2009). Metacognition. Sage Publications, Inc.
EEF. (2018). Metacognition and self-regulated learning. Available at:
https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/tools/guidance-
reports/metacognition-and-self-regulated-learning/ (accessed 2020).
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