Meta-Cognition, Motivation, and Affect

PSY504Spring term, 2011January 13, 2010

Today’s Class

• Administrative Stuff• Introduction

Administrative Stuff

• Is everyone signed up for class?

• If not, and you want to receive credit, please talk to me after class

Class Schedule

Class Schedule

• As shown on the schedule

• Class will end at 5:10pm instead of 5:20pm• Some classes will be cancelled• Extra Friday sessions will be added

• The total class time will be equal

Fridays

• What times work for everyone?

• I will schedule a room

Required Texts

• None

Required Readings

• Listed in the course schedule on the web

• Wed, Jan. 19 reading now online

• All readings will be posted online soon

Required Readings

• Are not actually all that required

Required Readings

• This is a graduate class

• I expect you to be motivated and apply meta-cognition

• To decide what is absolutely crucial• And what you should skim to be prepared for

class discussion and for when you need to know it in 8 years

Course Goals

• Learn about three key types of constructs that significantly impact learning and performance in real world settings, ‐including but not limited to educational settings.– Meta-Cognition, Motivation, & Affect

• Gain understanding of the main theoretical frameworks, and major empirical results, that relate individuals‘ meta cognition, ‐motivation, and affect to real world outcomes, both in ‐educational settings and other areas of life.

• Learn how theories and findings in these domains can be concretely used to improve instruction and performance,

• Complete final projects that require applying research in these areas to real world problems. ‐

Along the way

• Studying classical and new ways to measure these constructs– Questionnaires– Experience Sampling Method– Quantitative Field Observation– Expert Ratings of Video or Pictures– Think-Aloud Protocols– Data Mining– Rational Models– Sensor-Based Models

Assignments

• 2 multi-part assignments

• Late policy and turn-in policy is in your syllabus

Assignments

• In order to support you in utilizing meta-cognition and planning your semester, I am handing out the two assignments now

Topic Presentation/Paper

• Each of you will select one class during the semester

• You will run that class, leading the class in a discussion of that topic– Including the required readings but going beyond them

• Between then, and April 20, you will submit an extended paper on that topic

• Please read the assignment quickly– Any questions?– You can ask more questions later

Topics

• Please look at the course schedule

• Who would like to teach which topics?

– Between Friday, Jan. 28 and the end of the semester

Course Project

• A semester-long project• Can be conducted individually, or in groups of

any size• Can be linked to your research – I strongly

encourage this

Course Project

• Proposal Presentation• Methods Paper• Results Paper• Final Presentation

• Please read the assignment quickly– Any questions?– You can ask more questions later

Class Participation

• 10% of final grade

• This is a small class, let’s have good discussions

Examinations

• There will be an incredibly painful and grueling examination on April 1

• Fortunately, it will count for 0% of your grade

Plagiarism and Cheating

• Don’t do it

• If you have any questions about what it is, talk to me before you turn in an assignment that involves either of these

• University regulations will be followed to the letter

Accommodations for Students with Disabilities

• See syllabus and then see me

Surveys

• Periodically, I will put up a survey on the web so that you can anonymously give me feedback on the previous class

• Please fill these out, as it will help me improve this course for you!

Questions

• Any questions on the syllabus, schedule, or administrative topics?

Today’s Class

• Administrative Stuff• Introduction

Who are you

• And why are you here?

• Why are you interested in meta-cognition, motivation, or affect?

Your Definitions

• Meta-Cognition• Motivation• Affect

Meta-Cognition

• “Cognition about cognition”• “Knowing about knowing”• “Metacognition refers to one’s knowledge

concerning one’s own cognitive processes or anything related to them, e.g., the learning-relevant properties of information or data. For example, I am engaging in metacognition if I notice that I am having more trouble learning A than B; if it strikes me that I should double check C before accepting it as fact.” – Flavell, 1976

Motivation

• Desire or drive to accomplish goals

• In education, desire or drive to succeed in learning or educational performance

Affect

• “Emotion in context”• “Experience or feeling of emotion”

Why are these constructs being taughtin the same class?

• Your thoughts?

To elucidate this issue…

• Let’s draw a map

Get out a piece of paper

• And draw a diagram with arrows• Linking (as many of these as you want, plus

other stuff if you want)Affect Motivation Meta-CognitionCognition Learning Strategic BehaviorDisengagement Self-RegulationOff-Task Behavior Goals ValuationInterest Self-Efficacy Self-ConceptProcrastination Drop-Out

Let’s take a look…

• At your diagrams

• What do they share in common?

• How do they differ?

We’ll save your diagrams

• And re-consider at the end of the semester

My thoughts

• M, M, & A influence student behaviors which in turn influence learning– It can be hard to tell which one explains a student behavior– Example: Does a student read help to get answers rather than to

learn because:• They don’t know that’s an ineffective way to learn (Aleven et al., 2004,

2006)• Their goal is to complete the tutor rather than to learn (Martinez-Miron et

al., 2004)• They are bored at that moment (Rodrigo et al., 2007, 2008)

• All three involve higher-order cognition• All three are experiencing a revolution in methods

Next Class

• Wednesday, January 19• 4pm-5:10pm

• Meta-cognition: Definitions and Empirical Foundations

• Hacker, D.J. (1999) Definitions and Empirical Foundations. In Hacker, D.J., Dunlosky, J., Graesser, A.C. Metacognition in Educational Theory and Practice, 1-24.

The End