Ch 8 QTC

Consider a lesson plan you might use.  Which metacognitive skills/abilities are involved as students gain facility/knowledge in this domain? Think of an activity or lesson component that explicitly teaches one or more metacognitive and one or more problem solving skills.

My favorite lessons are Math, so I would consider a math lesson plan. One metacognitive skill involved in students gaining math knowledge would be reflecting on the general nature of thinking and learning. When a student participates in reflecting on the information they have just been presented, the process of learning becomes easier because they are already consumed in thinking about that knowledge. Math is usually paired with time limits, for some odd reason, so a student knowing what learning tasks can be realistically accomplished within a certain time period is crucial. The student uses metacognitive skills when he/she thinks about which tasks can be accomplished in a certain time period, because the student is actively engaged in thinking about how they will act on a certain test. Another important metacognitive skill is knowing and applying effective strategies to complete the task. This is important because math can be challenging and thought-provoking, so for the student to be successful, he/she needs to apply different strategies to find the one that is effective. Students must also monitor their own knowledge and comprehension. This metacognitive ability is needed for the student to know when he/she doesn't understand a certain topic or concept. If a student just goes through a task without thinking about if they understand it or not, that student will fall behind the curve (especially in math, because the concepts build on each other!!). A lesson component crucial in teaching metacognitive and problem solving skills would be teaching time management. Especially when it comes to testing, time management is a persistant issue in schools daily. Time management teaches metacognitive skills such as knowing what learning tasks can be accomplished within a time frame and planning an appropriate and effective approach to a learning task. With time management skills, a student can recognize the time required for each step to solve a problem and also find the best, fastest, most accurate strategy to solve that problem.