Prompting metacognition via abductive reasoning tasks and digital video

Tristan Currie, Ed.D. Candidate, University of Technology Sydney

1) Personal background

2) The research project

3) My field - Pragmatics

4) How I teach with video - Abductive reasoning

5) My research findings

6) Application of findings to open learning

Prompting metacognition – Table of contents

4 years teaching English to non-adults

2 years teaching adults (Australia & Hong Kong)English and Video Production subjects

HKFTU (learning context)

Prompting metacognition – personal background

Prompting metacognition – The research project

What / Who?12 week English Pragmatics course Intermediate-level HK Adult learners aged 18-50

Why?The course is a research project into the use of video viewing and self-and-group recording to enhance spoken English

How?Tasks involving abductive reasoning on a video-based curriculum evaluated for their success at prompting metacognition

Prompting metacognition – Pragmatics definition

Pragmatics is the EFFECT of context and shared knowledge on meaning

effect

Prompting metacognition – Pragmatics examplesPragmatics is the EFFECT of context and shared knowledge on meaning

Psychological effects Directness effects

Unspoken effects

effect

Prompting metacog. – Teaching with video and abductive reasoning

EXAMPLE

You have a cough, a fever of 30 degrees, a runny nose, chills, an aching body, nausea and diarrhoea. You have had these symptoms

for five days. Given this information, your best guess is that you have the flu. But you are not completely certain.

Abductive reasoning is finding the best explanation from competing hypotheses.

EXAMPLE - Abductive reasoning tasks and video

Who is haggling in each picture? Will they be successful? Why / Why not?

Prompting metacog. – Teaching with video and abductive reasoning

Prompting metacognition – Teaching objective

The objective of Abductive reasoning tasks is to draw learners attention to pertinent contextual information that provides the listener clues to the speaker’s intended meaning

Figure 2.0 – Abridged speech act transcript

Prompting metacognition – Methods

[FLUENCY]

Measure 1 – Phonation time ratio: % of time the student spoke during the recording Measure 2 – mean length of pause [lower = fluency]Measure 3 – mean length of fluent run: the speech between pauses [higher = fluency].

[COMPLEXITY]

Measure 1 – Lexical variety (pragmatic focus): the ratio of functional to lexical wordsMeasure 2 - Phrasal complexity (measured as words/clause)

[ACCURACY]

Measure 1 – Native-like: the percentage of error-free clausesMeasure 2 – Repair fluency: ratio of self-repairs to errors.

Figure 1.0 – Measures of fluency, complexity and accuracy

Prompting metacognition – Methods

• Strengthen a learner’s confidence in their analytical judgment

• Encourages a problem-solving approach to language learning that is modifiable to individual adult learners’ needs

• Builds confidence and leads to effective communication strategy inside and out of the classroom.

Prompting metacognition – Research Findings

Benefits of abductive reasoning tasks using video:

Did abductive reasoning tasks prompt metacognition?

Prompting metacognition – Research Findings

• The Video medium is easily accessible for review and puts language use-in-context quickly and makes unspoken meaning visual, and thus discussable.

• Video is a great prompt to detailed discussion for students, and for teachers a quick way to reveal the way students typically think, and what learning beliefs and habits might require modification to ensure successful, independent monitoring of their own learning progress.

Prompting metacognition – application to open learning

How can this research be applied to open learning?

HKFTU (photo, slide 4) - http://www.ftu.org.hk/en/participate?id=105

The acquisition of Pragmatics (cartoon, slide 5) – http://www.slideshare.net/Q7MustafaQ7/language-acquisition-48599909

Psychological effects (image, slide 6 upper left) – http://englishliteraturecenter.blogspot.hk/2012/06/language-varieties-in-sociolinguistics.html

Directness effects (image, slide 6 upper right) – http://www.buzzle.com/articles/communication-styles-in-the-workplace.html

Unspoken effects (image, slide 6 bottom) – https://i.ytimg.com/vi/ILIf7eoE5Kc/maxresdefault.jpg

Abductive reasoning (table, slide 7) –http://www.designthinkingeval.com/definition-deconstruction-design-methods-part-2-of-3/

Responsible lending (cartoon, Slide 8 upper left)http://www.cartoonstock.com/directory/r/responsible_lending.asp

Seasonal/Celebrations (cartoon, Slide 8 lower right) –http://www.cartoonstock.com/cartoonview.asp?catref=aton4205

Context is the matrix of meaning (Image, slide 9) – http://johnteleska.blogspot.hk/2010/12/context-is-matrix-of-meaning.html

Metacognitive strategies example (Bar diagram, slide 13) – http://www.etc.edu.cn/eet/Articles/metacognition2/start.htm

Prompting metacognition – REFERENCES