Using stories to facilitate the development of metacognitive awareness of young learners in the Intermediate Phase

[摘要] ENGLISH ABSTRACT: A fundamental goal of education is to promote the development of self-regulated learning.Although the importance of metacognition has been established by various researchers, metacognitive knowledge and strategies are seldom explicated in schools, and especially inthe early years of education. This design-based research study presents the findings of anintervention aimed at developing metacognitive awareness among early Intermediate Phaselearners. Self-reflection, the language of thinking and metacomprehension strategy use in thecontent areas were modelled using storytelling.The aim of the intervention was twofold: Firstly, at the design level, the main objective was todevelop and refine a learner-centred intervention in the form of a series of stories engaginglearners in learning about and reflecting on themselves as learners and how they learn.Secondly, at the practice level, the main aim was to assess the feasibility and influence of theintervention on learner self-knowledge, metacognitive strategy awareness and comprehension performance. The research was conducted among two intact Grade 4 class groups, along with their teachers from two public schools that differed in terms of socioeconomiccontext. The study comprised iterative cycles of design, implementation, analysis and review. A case study research methodology was employed and a pragmatic paradigm supported the use of a mixed-methods, non-experimental design. During the second iteration pre- and post-intervention data gained from metacognitive strategy awareness questionnaires, focus group interviews, self-reflective tasks and reading comprehension tests, were compared.The primary contribution of this research study is the set of design principles accompanying the conceptualised intervention, providing insight into the function and key characteristics of the story-based intervention, as well as the procedural conditions guiding implementation.The results obtained were encouraging, with most learners showing a marked improvement in terms of metacognitive awareness on most measuring instruments. The questionnaire testing learners' knowledge of metacomprehension strategies, for instance, revealed an improvement after the intervention of between 41 and 94%. The data gathered by means of the qualitative measures, however, indicated that the learners in both groups particularly struggled to verbalise their thoughts. Even after the intervention, only a slight improvement in terms of frequency of metacognitive elements mentioned was noticed, although the variety increased.In the school that serves a very poor community, low literacy rates had a significant impact on both data collection and the outcome of the intervention. The results clearly show a correlation between reading ability and overall scholastic performance. Those learners struggling with reading comprehension also seem to struggle to develop effective metacognitive learning strategies such as self-questioning, summarising and applying fix-up strategies.From the study it is clear that the story-based intervention is a feasible and effective learningtool to develop metacognitive awareness, within the context described in the present study.Strengths and limitations are discussed, and future prospects that could result from the study are considered.

[发布机构] Stellenbosch University