A tactic to actively promote metacognitive skills as learning strategies in classroom activities using LectureTools

Contributors: Perry Samson, Duncan Sibley, Christy Briles, Jason Mcgraw, Francis Jones and Simon Brassell
Developed at the 2008 workshop, The Role of Metacognition in Teaching Geoscience.

Course level: intro

Description of the metacognitive tactic:
Standard practice for use of LectureTools is augmented by pre- and post metacognitive questions as wrappers to classroom activity and discussion.

Goals for using this tactic

  • Learning goals:
    Encourage interactive questioning by students during class presentations, in particular explaining each of their answers in terms of Bloom's taxonomy.
  • Self-regulation goals:
    This tactic aids student recognition of the breadth of levels of learning.

How this tactic helps students meet that goal:

1. Students rank questions in terms of Bloom's taxonomy.
2. The questions are addresed through class discussion as normal.
3. They re-rank the question after it has been answered.
4. They explain their rationale for their ranking through a further submission to the system.
5. The activity concludes with discussion of the students' explanations.

Additional references or resources:
This tactic presumes prior discussion of Bloom's taxonomy.
Development of a Wrapper tool on the LectureTools website to support their use.

This tactic would also be applicable in upper level classes.

See more examples of strategies for teaching metacognition