**1.3. Teachers' knowledge in the context of teaching HOT and metacognition**

A deep knowledge of the principles of the educational reform highlighting HOT and metacognition is necessary for successful and thoughtful enactment. Such knowledge must go beyond the acquisition of a fixed set of teaching skills [17], otherwise, teachers will revert to a "mechanical" way of teaching that may preserve external elements of the reform while ignoring its deep core. In the context of the present chapter, the main thing is that teachers need to be highly proficient with specific knowledge that pertains specifically to teaching HOT and metacognition. Like in any other field, in order to teach successfully, teachers need familiarity of whatever it is they attempt to teach as well as sound knowledge of how to teach it. In order to delineate the unique nature of HOT and metacognition, Zohar [6, 15, 18] suggested that teachers' knowledge in this context can be addressed using the terms: "knowledge of elements of thinking and/or metacognition" and "pedagogical knowledge in the context of teaching HOT and/or metacognition." These terms highlight the fact that teachers' knowledge in this field has unique characteristics and is both domain general and domain specific (for a more detailed explanation, see [15, 18]).

**2.2. Methodology**

**2.3. Participants**

**2.4. Interview**

This is a qualitative study based on in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 18 instructional leaders who had prominent roles in large-scale implementation programs designed to teach HOT. Data analysis applies a pragmatic qualitative research approach that is particularly suitable for professional fields because it provides the descriptive information that can inform professional practices [28]. The research conducted within this approach is just what the name implies: research that draws upon the most sensible and practical methods available in order to answer a given research question. It aims for description of experiences and events as interpreted by the researchers, and therefore marks the meeting point of description and interpretation, in which description involves presentation of facts, feelings, and experiences in the everyday language of participants, as interpreted by the researcher. Analysis typically consists of qualitative content analysis using modifiable coding systems that correspond to

Challenges in Addressing Metacognition in Professional Development Programs in the Context…

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Participants in this study are 18 educators, each of which had a prominent role in leading a comprehensive, large-scale change process that aims to foster students' HOT by implementing thinking-rich instruction. Eight participants are (or were until recently) National Subject Superintendents who are responsible for curriculum development and implementation, for professional development, and for assessment in a specific school subject across the whole school system. Four participants have (or had until recently) prominent roles in the development and implementation of programs in the area of teaching HOT on the national level, and three participants had a similar role on the district level. Two participants have leading pedagogical roles in a large school network, and one participant is an academic who has been deeply involved in national efforts to improve learning and instruction in a specific school subject. Because all participants are well-known educators who could easily be identified and because confidentiality was promised to the participants, all details (such as names of programs or subject domains) were omitted from the quotations used throughout this chapter.

**1.** At least two years of experience in leading a wide-scale pedagogical change process that is

**2.** Intense involvement in leading the pedagogical sides of the change process (rather than

The semi-structured interview protocol consisted of 13 core questions and numerous examples of follow-up questions to be asked according to need, for deeper probing into participants' initial responses to the core questions. The core questions addressed the following

**3.** Developing students' HOT is an explicit and central goal of the change process.

the data collected. Interpretation stays close to the data [28].

The selection of participants applied the following criteria:

closely related to instruction of HOT.

leading only its administrative sides).

A precondition for teachers' metacognitive knowledge in this area is their familiarity with thinking strategies and processes on the cognitive level, that is, with **knowledge of elements of thinking**. In addition, previous researchers noted that in order to use metacognition successfully when teaching HOT, teachers need robust knowledge of **elements of metacognition**, that is, of the pertinent **metacognitive knowledge and skills** related to HOT [19, 20]. Moreover, the domain-specific aspects of **metastrategic knowledge (MSK)** suggest that teachers may need diverse types of MSK for the diverse thinking strategies they would address in class. Teachers obviously also need to be proficient with the **metastrategic skills (MS)** that are relevant for planning, monitoring, evaluating, and regulating thinking processes in the area of HOT. Such complex knowledge of metacognition is a precondition for sound **pedagogical knowledge** in this area. Zohar and Barzilai [15] further elaborated the component of the pedagogical knowledge noted earlier, describing several pedagogical principles, two of which are particularly significant for the present chapter: (1) deliberate attention to general thinking structures and skills, and (2) fostering explicit awareness of metacognition in the classroom.

Despite researchers' agreement about the value of teachers' knowledge about metacognition, studies show that in effect, the knowledge of most teachers in this area is slim [1, 20–27]. Teacher education programs may cultivate that knowledge using multiple means. For example, while small groups of student-teachers engage in problem-solving, one member of the group is asked to record the thinking strategies her peers have been using during that process. At a later stage of the lesson, this member of the group shares the data she recorded, thereby making the thinking strategies explicit and an object of discussion and evaluation. Other examples may consist of watching and analyzing a video of a lesson in which the teacher applied metacognitive teaching or of a task presenting a thinking-rich lesson plan, and then asking student-teacher to add metacognitive components to the lesson.
