Effectiveness of Teaching Learning Strategies Cognitive Metacognitive Cognitive and Metacognitive in...

Journal of Social Issues & Humanities, Volume 3, Issue 2, February 2015 ISSN 2345-2633

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Effectiveness of Teaching Learning Strategies (Cognitive, Metacognitive, Cognitive and Metacognitive) In Highschool Students

(Study Group Consisted of Students from the City of Ilam)

Shahram Mami, Abbas Omidi, Soheyla Hori

Abstract The present research evaluated the effectiveness of teaching learning strategies (cognitive, metacognitive, cognitive and

metacognitive combined) on student educational progress and was a quasiexperimental pre and post-test study with three study groups

and no control. Study population consisted of high school students from the city of Ilam during the year 1392-1393. Educational progress

was evaluated using a researcher created test on the topics of biology and statistics at the level of the third year of high school. The

reliability of the test was assessed by examining a group of 30 students using the preliminary test questions and the Cronbach alpha

coefficient was calculated. Statistical analysis of the data was performed by obtaining indicators of observational measures (mean and

standard deviation) and inferences were made using analysis of variance, paired student t-test and Scheffs method. Results showed that

significant correlation exists between the three teaching methods and educational progress. Progress was more pronounced in the

combined cognitive and metacognitive group compared to the metacognitive and cognitive groups alone. Additionally, the Scheff post hoc

test showed that the difference between mean scores for the three groups was significant.

Index Terms Teaching Learning Strategies; Cognitive; Meta-Cognitive.

1 INTRODUCTION

NY progress such as cultural, economic and political re-quires thoughtful, creative and critical individuals to make the right decisions and plan appropriately. As a

result, there is need for active and dynamic educational sys-tems. Therefore, it can be concluded that any progress results from a proactive and correct educational system and this is correlated with various factors such as change in teaching methods and norms so that new and active approaches are applied (Gardner & Jewler, 2000). Student educational pro-gress is one of the important indicators of assessing the educa-tion and development system whose goal is to help in various ways including cognitive, emotional and personality wise for individuals to grow, progress and achieve advancement (Alibakhsi, 2011). Educational progress is important because institutional advancement has led to learning and has influ-enced progress. To increase student motivation about learn-ing various materials, the teacher needs to improve learning conditions and the quality of the method of teaching so that students can succeed and acquire self confidence about their own learning ability (Mardani, 2008). Educational and study-ing strategies (cognitive and metacognitive) and methods, ways of learning, correct use of the learning strategies and

educational progress in various ages and stages have been incorporated in studies (Kadivar 2005). Cognitive strategies in learning include: repetition and review, extension and expan-sion of meaning and organization (Seif , 2011). Meta-cognition is an individuals knowledge about his or her own learning

(Slavin, 2006, translation by Seif, 2011). In the recent few years, cognitive strategies have been considered important and effective in the arena of cognition and teaching. Learning about how to learn in the era of informatics is the most im-portant focus of teaching systems (Flavel, 1976). Most stu-dents can improve their educational progress with better un-derstanding learning by self regulation. As a result, familiari-ty with learning strategies (cognitive and metacognitive) is very effective. Learning strategies are tools that are used for solving educational problems and helping students develop and extend the skills they need during their education. Un-derstanding and promoting these strategies help individuals rely on their own abilities, discover and strengthen them and become capable of completing university education success-fully (Salehi, 2009). Before the discussion of these strategies, it is important to de-fine cognition and meta-cognition. Cognition refers to mental ways by which information is processed, or information comes to attention, is understood and codified and stored and used at times of need (Bieler & Snowman, 1993). Metacogni-tion is awareness of cognition and cognitive processes and control, regulation and active overseeing of cognition. In oth-er words, metacognition refers to peoples ability to control and supervise over their cognition (Oscar Grouse, 2009). Met-

A

Assistant professor, Department of Psychology, Ilam science and research branch, Islamic Azad University, Ilam, Iran.

MA Student in General Psychology, Department of psychology, Ilam sci-ence and research branch, Islamic Azad University, Ilam, Iran.

MA Student in General Psychology, Department of psychology, Ilam sci-ence and research branch, Islamic Azad University, Ilam, Iran.


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acognition is a key for cognitive ability that enables individu-als to control and reiterate their thoughts and plays an im-portant role in learning (Guass & Wiley, 2007, cited in At-tarkhameh, 2008). Additionally, metacognition can be ex-plained as a persons awareness of his or her own thoughts

and the ability to control this process (Cakiroglu, 2007; Desoete & Ozsoy, 2009, Hacker & Dunlosky, 2003). Metacog-nition is an example of cognition that is active at a higher level and is based on supervision and control (Efklides, 2001). The process of cognition refers to any behavior, thought, or action that the learner uses during learning and its goal is to help learning, organizing and storing information and skills and using them easily in the future. Cognitive strategies pro-vide a plan or method for solving problems. Ababaf believes that cognitive strategies are explorations for processing of in-

formation. During the process of information gathering, indi-viduals need organization of external stimulants, scientific and creative activities and cognitive strategies provide this need (Ababaf, 2010).

2 MATERIALS AND METHODS

Teaching learning strategies sessions have been developed based on the theoretical background in the study of Electronic teaching for individual learning (Nunez, 2011), and the study of Zimmerman and colleagues titled Developing self regulat-ed learners , and the theory of cognitive and metacognitive strategies by Seif (2007) and the researchers opinion was in-cluded in the educational protocol. The summary of the teach-ing learning strategies program is as below:

SUMMARY OF THE TEACHING LEARNING STRATEGIES PROGRAM Educational Content 1-Introduction of the therapist and tests, description of session rules and explanation of the method of teaching, explanation of the purpose of attendance at the educational sessions by the therapist 2-Teaching strategies for goal setting and planning which includes three issues: setting goals, time management and strategies for dealing with procrastination. Teaching information processing by strategies for memorizing, remembering, understanding the material which includes sensory register, short term memory and active memory. Strategies for learning and studying (First section: cognition), homework for use of these strategies was handed out which included the following topics: a)strategy for repetition of simple and basic topics (without meaning) b)extension and expansion of meanings (strategies for expansion of simple and basic topics) 1-At the beginning of the session homework is addressed and next strategies for learning and studying (second part: cognition) is taught 2-In this section, extension and expansion of the meanings of strategies of expansion for complicated material is explained and eventually organization of the material and use of the meaning map is discussed.

TEACHING METACOGNITIVE STRATEGIES Teaching material Teaching learning and studying strategies (metacognitive) which includes metacognitive strategies, studying in groups and tech-niques for motivation of learners and next group work is assigned. In the section on problem solving, three issues including solving problems, teaching the process of solving problems and providing suggestions for increasing ability to solve problems by the learners is discussed. In the section on preparing for the exam, it was tried to provide explanation about the following three issues: a) preparing for the exam b) methods of relaxation, explanation of the importance of focusing in learning and how to focus your attention c) teaching learning strategies. Explanations about concentration methods in learning and decreasing anxiety and additionally in this session, information about exam anxiety, and various effective therapeutic measures for decreasing exam stress and how to control factors leading to lack of concentration will be discussed.

3 RESEARCH HYPOTHESIS

The aim of this research was to study the effectiveness of three methods of teaching involving cognitive, metacognitive and both cognitive and metacognitive strategies on educational progress of high school students and the following hypotheses were evaluated: 1-Teaching cognitive strategies to students has positive effect on their educational progress. 2-Teaching metacognitive strategies to students has positive effect on their educational progress. 3-Teaching metacognitive and cognitive strategies to students has positive effect on their educational progress. 4-The degree of effectiveness of teaching cognitive, metacogni-tive and both strategies to students on educational progress is different.

4 METHODS

This study was quasiexperimental, with two groups and two variables with the goal of assessing the effect of the independ-ent variable of the method of teaching cognitive and metacog-nitive strategies on the dependent variable of educational pro-gress of the students. Study population was all students in the city of Ilam in the year 1992. Among the schools, one high school for boys was randomly chosen with eight classes and from them three classes of 30 students from the third year of high school majoring in experimental sciences were randomly chosen as study samples. The three classes were assigned to three experimental groups teaching cognitive, metacongnitive and combined strategies. To evaluate educational progress, a test prepared by the re-searcher was used which was administered before and after


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the teaching for the three groups. Test questions were pre-pared as regularly done including biology and statistics for experimental science students. The preliminary test included 20 questions and was taken by 30 randomly selected students from the third year of high school. Based on the Cronbach coefficient and identification of unclear questions, some were omitted or revised. The content of a test should include a pre-cise sample of study material and represent educational goals;

as a result, the test questions should represent the topic that it intends to test. For evaluation of content and external validity of the tests, the opinions of guiding professors and counselors and specialists in the field of biology, particularly exemplary teachers were incorporated. For evaluating the reliability of the test, the Cronbachs alpha coefficient was calculated on the

tests taken by the 30 initial randomly selected students and later on the pre and post test results.

TABLE 1 CRONBACH COEFFICIENT OF RELIABILITY OF THE EDUCATIONAL PROGRESS TEST AT THE PRELIMINARY, PRE AND POST TEST EXAMS

Cronbach Alpha No of Questions Test Variable 0.84 0.81 0.91

20 20 20

Preliminary Pre-test Post-test

Educational Progress

After the teaching sessions and post-test, including the pre

and post-test results analysis of the data was done in two parts observational and referential (using analysis of variance,

paired student t-test and Scheffs method) which is shown below.

TABLE 2 MEAN AND STANDARD DEVIATION OF TEST GROUPS PRE AND POST-TEST

Standard Devia-tion

Number Mean Group Test

0/51 35 5/84 Cognitive Strategies Pre-test 1/31 31 6/27 Metacognitive Strate-

gies 1/36 30 6/61 Cognitive and Meta-

cognitive Strategies Standard Devia-tion

Number Mean Group Post-test

2/18 35 10/58 Cognitive Strategies 2/00 31 12/74 Metacognitive Strate-

gies 2/5 30 16/26 Cognitive and Meta-

cognitive Strategies

Hypothesis one: Teaching cognitive strategies to students has positive effect on their educational progress. Looking at the statistical analysis in Table (3), teaching cogni-tive strategies has positive influence on student educational progress. For this purpose, mean scores on the pre and post-tests in experimental group (1) who underwent cognitive

strategies teaching, were compared using the paired student t-test. This teaching in effective in educational progress at a meaningful level of 0/001 and the hypothesis is accepted. As a result, with 99% assurance, it can be concluded that this method is effective on educational outcome.

TABLE 3 COMPARISON OF MEAN TEST SCORES ON PRE AND POST-TESTS FOR STUDENTS IN THE COGNITIVE TEACHING GROUP

Significance level T(paired) Standard devia-tion

Degrees of Free-dom

Difference in Means

Group

0/001 31/25 2/10 18 4/74 Cognitive Strate-gies

Hypothesis 2: Teaching metacognitive strategies to stu-

dents has positive effect on their educational progress. Table (4) shows that mean scores on educational test on biology and statistics in the experimental group has increased from pre to

post-test and this increase was statistically significant. As a result, education at significance level of 0/001 was influential on student educational progress and since this level is less than 0/05, this hypothesis is accepted.

TABLE 4 COMPARISON OF MEAN TEST SCORES ON PRE AND POST-TESTS FOR STUDENTS IN THE METACOGNITIVE TEACHING GROUP

Significance level T(paired) Standard deviation Degrees of Free-dom

Difference in Means

Group

0/001 38/7 2/29 18 6/47 Metacognitive Strategies


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Hypothesis three: Teaching metacognitive and cognitive strategies to students has positive effect on their educational progress. Table (5) shows that teaching cognitive and meta-cognitive strategies combined have positive influence on stu-dent educational progress. To reach this conclusion, mean pre and post-test scores of experimental group (3) who were

taught cognitive and metacognitive combined strategies was compared using the paired student t-test and this test showed effectiveness at significance level of 0/001 on educational out-come and this hypothesis is accepted. As a result, it can be concluded with 99% certainty that this method improves edu-cational progress.

TABLE 5 COMPARISON OF MEAN TEST SCORES ON PRE AND POST-TESTS FOR STUDENTS IN THE COGNITIVE AND METACOGNITIVE COMBINED

TEACHING GROUP Significance level T(paired) Standard deviation Degrees of Free-

dom Difference in Means

Group

0/000 65/7 2/58 18 9/65 Cognitive and Metacog-nitive Strategies

Hypothesis four: The degree of effectiveness of teaching cogni-tive, metacognitive and both strategies to students on educational progress is different. Tables (6,7) show that the three groups dif-fer significantly (at significance level of 0/05) in performance. As a result, the fourth hypothesis is supported. Mean improvement in scores of students who were taught cognitive and metacogni-tive strategies was more than students who were taught cogni-

tive strategies (at significance level of 0/05). Mean improvement in scores of students who were taught cognitive and metacogni-tive strategies was more than students who were taught meta-cognitive strategies (at significance level of 0/05). Mean im-provement in scores of students who were taught metacognitive strategies was more than students who were taught cognitive strategies.

TABLE 6 RESULTS OF ANALYSIS OF VARIANCE FOR THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN PRE AND POST-TEST SCORES OF TESTED GROUPS

Significance level F Mean squares Degrees of Freedom Sum of squares Source of change 0/000 69/84 379/31 2 758/63 Between groups

5/41 191 1073/30 Within groups

193 1795/93 Total

TABLE 7 RESULTS OF SCHEFFS TEST FOR THE TESTED GROUPS

Significance level Difference of Means Group 0/000 4/74 Metacognitive-cognitive and

metacognitive strategies 0/000 6/47 Cognitive-cognitive and meta-

cognitive strategies 0/000 9/65 Cognitive-metacognitive strate-

gies

5 DISCUSSION

One way analysis of variance for each strategic group was per-formed. Results showed that significant difference in educational progress between the three methods of teaching learning strate-gies exists and the three research hypotheses were supported. Additional Scheffs test was done which supported that the three groups have significant (at significance level of 0/05) differ-ence in performance tests. The results of analysis of variance of multivariables showed that educational progress in the experi-mental groups is significantly different and educational outcome was shown to significantly improve in the group which was taught cognitive strategies which is similar to what Chiu (1997) and Khorami (2000), McCland (1953) found. Additionally, teach-ing metacognitive strategies also has positive influence on this variable (educational progress) which agrees with the studies by Karami (2002) and Daygart (2009) that showed that using meta-cognitive strategies has positive correlation with educational per-

formance of students and it is significant. Abedi, Ghaderi Najafabadi, Shoushtari and Golshani (2012) showed that the met-acognitive method has been effective in improving problem solv-ing by students with special deficiencies. Additionally, cognitive and metacognitive teaching combined in comparison to the other two methods showed differences in fa-vor of the cognitive and metacognitive experimental group. This result agrees with Farokhis (2012) findings who also studied and compared effectiveness of teaching cognitive and metacogni-tive strategies on text comprehension and educational progress of students. In the study, two experimental groups of teaching cog-nitive and metacognitive strategies and a control group of stu-dents from the second year of junior high school were included. Results showed that teaching cognitive and metacognitive strate-gies of learning increases text comprehension and educational progress. Also in studies by Samadi (2008), analysis of variance showed effectiveness of teaching self-regulation strategies on learning by student girls; this teaching compared to the control group who did not receive the teaching, improved educational outcome in students who had been taught self-regulation strate-


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gies in learning. In the opinion of Zimmerman and colleagues, learning strategies involving self-regulation are specific methods whose goal are to reach knowledge and skillfulness. These strat-egies are relatively new point vistas in learning and educational progress, because they have considered how students personally activate their own learning process, change and regulate it (Zim-merman, 1969).

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