Metacognitive Strategies

Let´s talk about metacognition

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As we already know, previously, and in some current cases, education has been conceived as a process of information transfer. This means that students limit themselves to receiving information and reproducing it, but this only focuses on academic content. We, as teachers, must worry that students, apart from obtaining information, know how to use it in their daily lives. That they know how to get on and defend themselves in adverse situations. So, developing a metacognitive strategy in class is a good option to achieve this.

Metacognition refers to people's ability to reflect or think about their own learning process. Metacognitive strategies are a combination of essential cognitive skills to work on problems solving and on the affective aspect.

From an educational point of view, metacognition is an essential competence for children because in this way they evaluate themselves and verify their ability to solve problems and also guide and improve their own learning process. Basically, they are aware of their evolution. 

They do active learning by relating the information acquired with their previous knowledge in order to obtain a better understanding.

Therefore, teachers must be a guide, we are responsible for accompanying them in the learning process and in reflecting on the knowledge acquired.

Metacognitive strategies are applied by students before, during and after the learning process.

To begin with, promoting linguistic awareness in English is one of the first things we must do to develop metacognitive strategies. To do this, you can start with activities that help children understand the language, and its structure, such as identifying nouns, verbs and adjectives in a text.

During the learning process, the use of visual tools or resources is very useful. For example, using vocabulary cards or making diagrams on the board. By visualizing the children can better organize their thoughts and relate words and concepts. Another resource is collaborative learning, so students discuss and share ideas, and teachers propose group activities.

Finally, after the learning process, we can use resources such as self-assessment, so that the students are the ones who evaluate their process.

Teacher Paula