Developing Students’ Metacognitive Skills Through Using Reflective Learning Journals

Metacognition is referred to as “cognition about cognition” (Flavell, 1979), which is awareness of one's thought processes and the strategies used to regulate their own learning behaviors. Metacognition plays a central role in learning and achievement. It enables learners to develop an awareness of how they learn and to evaluate their own thinking skills to become increasingly effective at learning. Furthermore, the value of metacognition is related to promoting cognitive abilities of higher-level thinking about how a learning task is handled. Flavell (1979) describes three core components of metacognition to improve academic performance:

1. Metacognitive knowledge, also called metacognitive awareness, describes what you know about yourself and others in terms of thinking and learning processes (what, when, and why of cognition)
2. Metacognitive regulation refers to what learners do about learning, and how learners monitor and control their cognitive processes (e.g., actions taken in order to learn).
3. Metacognitive experiences are about a person's awareness and feelings elicited in a problem-solving situation (e.g., thoughts and feelings while studying and learning something).

Developing metacognitive skills is crucial in any learning, including in online education. Among the several pedagogical approaches to teaching online, applying metacognition strategies through reflective learning journals both boosts learning and encourages students to manage their own learning instead of passively absorbing teaching material. The concept of reflective learning journals has long been established as an effective learning strategy (Hurst, 2005) since this method helps reveal students' perceptions or misperceptions of the information and captures how they are reacting to the way the material is being taught. Students record the process they go through in learning something new, and any questions they may need to have clarified. This allows students to make connections to what they have learned, set goals, and reflect upon their learning process and experience. Thus, the act of thinking and writing about one’s own learning promotes metacognition.

Online instructors can use reflective learning journals for a range of learning activities that help students deepen their knowledge and as a communication tool to detect students’ difficulties and challenges and further learning needs. In my graduate-level online classes, students’ reflective learning journals have become an integral part of my teaching and have had a major impact to personalize learning as well as developing more independent learners and thinkers. I have been using structured, unique prompted learning logs in my online classes for several years now. This method of learning has allowed my students to share their weekly learning experiences with me using an evidence based-education method. At the same time, it gave me more perspectives and a deeper understanding of the process of learning, reflection, and experience as they occur in individuals over a period of time.

This information session will focus on the educational values of reflective learning journals to develop students’ metacognition with the three dimensions by using examples from the presenter’s own best practices in her online course. The session will also address how to design a structured reflective learning journal (expectations, entries, length, and format), the processes and uses of a reflective learning journal as an interaction tool to deepen students learning online, and the methods of assessment techniques (scoring or grading of reflective learning journal) in online courses. Finally, the session will discuss effective strategies for implementing reflective learning journals, including advantages and challenges.

Learning Objectives

By the end of the session, participants will be able to:

• Describe the three core components of metacognition in the context of student learning using reflective learning journals in an online course 
• Define the critical questions for a well-designed reflective learning journal that would help students improve meta-cognitive skills for deepening their learning
• Discuss effective strategies for developing students’ metacognition through the implementation of a reflective learning journal, including advantages and challenges

Level of Participation:

This 45-minute information session is structured to create a mutual learning experience with a combination of interactive presentation (25 minutes), large group discussion (10 minutes), and participants’ questions (5 minutes). Both experienced faculty instructors and instructors who have no experience will gain crucial knowledge about the importance of helping students develop metacognition in online courses through using reflective learning journals.

References:

Flavell, J.H. (1979). "Metacognition and cognitive monitoring. A new area of cognitive-development inquiry". American Psychologist. 34 (10): 906–911.

Hurst, B. (2005). My Journey with Learning Logs. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 49(1), 42–46. doi:10.1598/JAAL.49.1.5