ÉCOLE K L O MIDDLE SCHOOL
#23 Central Okanagan
School Question
How can the integration of educational technologies support the development of student metacognition?
Leadership Team:
Jason Elder, Valerie Kolesar, John Morrone, Ashley Ragoonaden, Mohyna Ragoonaden
Contacts
jmorrone@sd23.bc.ca, aragoona@sd23.bc.ca
School Context/Community:
École KLO Middle School is a dual-track French Immersion / English program school located in the urban centre of Kelowna. It is the only middle school in our district offering the French immersion program for students in grades 7 - 9. Immersion students make up about 40% of our current enrolment of 820+ students. École KLO Middle School has a history of having a very stable population with little transiency. We have a small but active and involved Parent Advisory Council who provide input on school programs, assist with clubs and coaching, organize fundraisers, and coordinate workshops relevant to parents of adolescents. In addition to curricular opportunities, there are many sports, clubs, spirit activities and leadership opportunities offered for students. These opportunities are a result of the commitment and dedication of the KLO teaching staff and parent community. The Central Okanagan School District has also made significant investments in the area of technology. As a result of those investments, École KLO Middle School has two traditional desktop computer labs, 12 portable laptops carts, take-home laptop computers for student sign-out, LCD projectors in most classrooms, three interactive SmartBoards, and a projection document camera.
School Inquiry and Action Technology & Student Metacognition
Focus of Inquiry
As a group, we are interested in finding meaningful ways to integrate educational technologies across the curriculum in all grades (7-9). As a partial continuation and expansion of last years’ inquiry, we have continued to explore how technology can be used to develop student metacognition. This year, we designed several multidisciplinary technology-based instructional units that emphasize metacognition including self-knowledge, strategic knowledge, self-awareness and self-correction. We have chosen a case study approach where stratified random samples of three students from our classes were interviewed about a particular classroom project. We then measured their responses in conjunction with our observations and students’ products using a self-constructed scoring guide for metacognition.
Strategies
Our interest in educational technology continues to stem from a previous district-wide one-to-one laptop initiative; therefore, our technology integration strategies are highly dependant upon individual, on-demand access to laptop computers. Those laptops provide access to many software applications such as Inspiration, Microsoft Office, Microsoft Student, and Internet. Additionally, we are also using interactive SMARTboard technology. For the purpose of this report, we are focusing specifically on the implementation of cross-curricular electronic progress and process portfolios using Microsoft PowerPoint as well as a Science 9 specific multimedia, self-directed learning module in DVD format.
Focus on Formative Assessment Strategies
The premise of our integration strategies has been threefold: (1) to establish and clarify the learning targets, (2) to have students become partners in the assessment process, and (3) to enable students to set
personal goals for improvement. The learning activities were scaffolded and designed to facilitate opportunities for student feedback including self assessments, peer assessment and teacher assessments; therefore the feedback loops allow students to reinforce classroom concepts and deepen understandings. The construction of portfolios also provides students with an engaging method to package, to organize and to consolidate their learning.
School Findings
In simple terms, metacognition is defined as “thinking about one’s own thinking,” We have further conceptualized metacognition to include self-knowledge (motivations, learning preferences, attitudes), strategic knowledge (knowing what strategies to apply and when), self-awareness (recognizing personal strengths and areas requiring improvement) and self-correction (the ability to apply appropriate strategies and implement action plans for improvement).
Based on the results of our student conferences in conjunction with classroom observations and the student products, we discovered that our students demonstrate competence in the domain of metacognitive knowledge and need improvement in domain of control of processes. More specifically, students are able to select appropriate strategies and reflect accurately upon personal learning preferences; however, they require further support regarding the recognition of disparities between self-assessments and actual performances.
Metacognition |
NY |
A |
M |
E |
% |
# |
% |
# |
% |
# |
% |
# |
Knowledge |
Self-Knowledge |
-- |
-- |
21 |
3 |
36 |
5 |
43 |
6 |
Strategic Knowledge |
-- |
-- |
14 |
2 |
43 |
6 |
43 |
6 |
Control of Processes |
Self-Awareness |
-- |
-- |
21 |
3 |
57 |
8 |
21 |
3 |
Self-Correction |
-- |
-- |
21 |
3 |
36 |
5 |
43 |
6 |
School Plans for 2009-2010
Next year we will continue to explore options to further develop our electronic portfolios such as creating multidisciplinary portfolios between teaching teams. We would also consider other content applications for the DVD learning modules. We discovered this year how difficult it can be to measure the metacognitive processes of our students. We created our own scoring guide based on current research and theory, but the guide will require further development and refinement. We also need to further refine the language of our interview questions to more closely relate to our scoring guide. Additionally, with a better understanding of metacognition, we will purposefully plan to teach metacognitive strategies in a more explicit manner.
Reflections, Advice
The concept of metacognition is difficult to measure in the classroom; however, despite the abstract nature of metacognition, it is clearly a fundamental tenant of assessment for learning pedagogy that requires our attention. As we continue to become more aware of the importance of critical reflection in learning, we have realized that teaching strategies that support metacognition require explicit instruction. More teacher modelling and guided practice should precede independent practice for students. The more able students are to recognize their own learning styles, motivations and abilities to think critically about their own work, the better able they will be to construct meaning in new situations. Educational technologies provide teachers and students with a powerful vehicle to further assess students’ thinking, and it offers students more opportunities to consolidate their learning and determine how they learn best. Overall, we discovered that integrated educational technologies not only supported the development of student metacognition, it became part of the learning process itself.
|
