Leveraging Metacognition to Enhance Learning Astronomy

Details Leveraging Metacognition to Enhance Learning Astronomy Leveraging Metacognition to Enhance Learning Astronomy

Jan 2010

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2010aas...21521704v&link_type=abstract

American Astronomical Society, AAS Meeting #215, #217.04; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 42, p.438

Computer Science

Learning

Scientific paper

For students to think deeply about their own thinking (to be metacognitive) is critical to the enterprise of science and science learning. Scientists integrate new knowledge gained through investigations only when that knowledge is examined in relation to what they already know, tentatively believe, or previously doubted.
We will summarize the research on the crucial role of metacognition in learning astronomy and science in general. We will emphasize two essential components of metacognition: (1) Elicitation of students’ prior knowledge, and (2) Students’ reflection on how their initial ideas are changing over time.
Research has shown convincingly that students do not come to class as empty vessels. They come with ideas and beliefs gleaned from books, television, movies, real-life, and previous classroom experiences. These ideas can either facilitate or impede their learning as explained in "How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School” (NRC, 2003). In many cases, students have ideas that get in the way of learning new ones. Considerable evidence from research shows that instruction is most effective when it elicits students’ initial ideas, provides them with opportunities to confront those ideas, helps them formulate new ideas based on evidence, and encourages students to reflect upon how their ideas have evolved ("Effective Science Instruction: What Does Research Tell Us?", Horizon Research, Inc., 2008). Without these opportunities, students "may fail to grasp the new concepts and information that are taught, or they may learn them for purposes of a test but revert to their preconceptions outside the classroom” ("How People Learn", NRC, 2003, page 14).
Multiple approaches are needed in order for students to develop the ability to think about scientific thinking. We will briefly discuss a variety of techniques and resources to elicit student ideas and to reflect on how students’ ideas change over time.

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