**4. Using SOAR to teach for metacognition**

Our research and professional development experiences over the past decade have convinced us that many teachers struggle to acquire and apply the conceptual understanding and skills necessary to develop students' metacognitive knowledge; in other words, the ability to teach for metacognition. One reason for this is that reflecting on and improving performance on a task is easier when the task requires physical action, e.g., hitting a golf ball. You can watch a video of yourself engaged in this task or listen to feedback from a coach who observed you. Cognitive tasks, on the other hand, are invisible and cannot be directly observed, making it harder for students to reflect on their performance and take action to correct it when necessary. So, the instructional challenge most teachers face is how to help students improve their performance on tasks that are dependent upon invisible cognitive progresses. Our research indicates that SOAR can support teachers in this endeavor [3, 27].

As we explained in the preceding section, the Disciplinary Discussions Teaching Frame as a whole—High-Impact, Cross-Cutting, and Foundational Practices provides the lens that enables instructors to teach with metacognition. Using SOAR to teach for metacognition requires a narrower focus: the Cross-Cutting Practice of Fostering Metacognition for Disciplinary Learning. This practice's emphasis on visibly enacting and deconstructing metacognitive processes and strategies enables teachers to design instruction that will develop and activate their students' metacognition. Students will become aware of what they know and do not know by engaging in reflective processes, and they will be able to take action to address flaws or gaps in what they know by employing self-regulation strategies.

Consistently engaging students in reflective processes and explicitly teaching metacognitive strategies are at the heart of teaching for metacognition. But as is the case with any learning, not all students progress at the same pace. We have identified stages of awareness and action that learners typically go through as they develop their metacognitive abilities (see **Figure 3**).

**Figure 3.** *Metacognitive continuum—students.*

The first stage represents a student who does not reflect on his learning and is therefore unaware of how well or poorly he is doing on the assigned task. And because awareness triggers action, he cannot take action to correct any problems that may arise. For instance, think of a student who does not recognize, and therefore mispronounces, many words as he attempts to read a story aloud. But because he does not realize he is mispronouncing them he does not stop to correct himself. This student was unaware that he was not reading the words correctly, so he did not/could not take any action, i.e., use reading strategies to address the problem.

The second stage depicts a student who is reflective, that is, he is aware that he is experiencing problems with an assigned task. However, this student is unable to take any action to address the problem because he has not been taught strategies to use in this situation. Imagine a reader who, unlike one at the first stage of the continuum, is aware that he does not recognize the words he is reading. However, this reader is unable to take action because he has not been taught reading strategies to use when this occurs, e.g., use phonics to sound out unknown words.

Students at the third stage of the continuum have developed a deeper understanding of metacognition as evidenced by their ability to use strategies when problems arise. The challenge these students experience is that they have a limited range of strategies to use, so they struggle if the one or two strategies that they have ownership of do not prove to be successful. For instance, a reader at the third stage realizes that he has trouble recognizing and pronouncing certain words, but he has only been taught (or has only learned) to use phonics to sound out unknown words and, when that does not work, he asks the teacher for help. Students at this stage are certainly progressing metacognitively, but they are not yet at the level where they can apply a range of strategies flexibly and independently.

Finally, students at the last stage have become aware of what they know and do not know by engaging in reflective processes, and they are able to take action to address flaws or gaps in what they know by employing a variety of self-regulation strategies flexibly and independently. A reader at this stage, who encounters words he does not recognize and is unable to pronounce, is able to try a range of strategies.

**23**

don't know.

metacognition is."

*Teaching with and for Metacognition in Disciplinary Discussions*

**5. Teaching for metacognition in disciplinary discussions**

teachers can use to implement these ideas in their teaching.

For instance, he is confident of his ability to use phonics to sound out words, but he knows that is not the best strategy to use with polysyllabic words. So, when he encounters "photosynthesis" he breaks the word into parts using the morphological

Through our research and work with educators in schools we have identified key stages that represent what teachers need to do when teaching for metacognition in disciplinary discussions. These five stages begin with helping students understand what metacognition is and progress through student reflection on their thinking, understanding metacognitive strategies, and then applying them independently. **Figure 4** outlines these five stages. Below we provide an explanation of each stage, a scenario to illustrate what this might look like in instruction, and some strategies

Teaching for metacognition in disciplinary discussions must begin with an explicit explanation of what we mean by metacognition. In our experience "thinking about thinking" is too abstract and vague a definition to resonate with most students. Our work with instructors and learners across the grade level spectrum has led us to this: metacognition is awareness of what you know and do not know, and the action you take to address flaws or gaps in what you know. The following scenario demonstrates how a teacher who has worked with us introduces the concept to his students and provides a model that others can adapt for their settings.

*Scenario for introducing metacognition*: Mr. Carter is introducing metacognition to his young students. He says, "I have a really big word I want us to know and understand. It is metacognition. Say it with me, friends. Metacognition. Has anyone ever heard that word before? A few of you. I am going to write it on the whiteboard. Let's clap it out. Met-a-cog-ni-tion. Excellent. It has five syllables. One part of metacognition is being aware of what you know and what you don't know. An example would be us learning our high frequency words. We each have our stack of words. When we can read them automatically, we move them out of our stack. We know that we know those words. The words that are left in our stack are the words we don't know well. So, I am aware of which words I know and which words I don't know. That is one part of metacognition. I am going to draw a lightbulb here to represent us being aware of what we know and

The other part of metacognition is knowing what action to take to learn what you don't know. Let's think about the high frequency words we still need to learn. What can we do to learn them? What action can we take? Talk to a neighbor and see what ideas you can come up with." Students share out some ideas like practicing more and looking for the words when they read. "Very good. Those are all actions you can take. I am going to draw the brain driving a car to represent the

So, metacognition is being aware of what you know and don't know and then taking action to learn. This anchor chart (see **Figure 5**) will help us as we continue to work on our metacognition. Turn to your neighbor and explain what

action we are taking to learn what we don't know.

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86665*

skills his reading teacher taught him.

**5.1 Introducing metacognition**

For instance, he is confident of his ability to use phonics to sound out words, but he knows that is not the best strategy to use with polysyllabic words. So, when he encounters "photosynthesis" he breaks the word into parts using the morphological skills his reading teacher taught him.
