Metacognition
Metacognition is the conscious awareness of, and the conscious control over
one’s learning. In essence, it is thinking about thinking. “Metacognition, in reading... involves
a turning inward—at first purposefully and later automatically—to examine
how we comprehend a text... Readers become successful when they can apply needed skills and strategies automatically” (Chapman and King 2003). This theory places emphasis on the reader’s control over the learning process. The reader has ultimate responsibility to monitor his or her compression and use appropriate strategies to comprehend meaning.
The teacher can model metacognition by performing a "think-aloud," while reading a short piece of text. The teacher would read the text and then share his or her questions or thoughts with the students. In this way students will learn how to think about what they are reading. This is a big step for a young reader. Without metacognitive thinking a student will not comprehend.
Once students have a conscious awareness of their ability to comprehend, they can have control over their reading and stop themselves whenever they are confused by what they have read.
In order to comprehend what is read a student must develop a cognitive interaction with the text. There are two additional theories that help explain how readers derive the authors intended meaning. They are:
- Schema theory
- Interactive/Transactive