Conceptualizing and Assessing Metacognitive Development in Young Children.

Abstract

Though metacognition—the knowledge, monitoring and regulation of cognition—is strongly associated with learning and academic success, it has rarely been studied in early childhood when it is most likely to affect subsequent developmental and academic trajectories. A series of three studies examined metacognition at this important age (n = 125 preschoolers). Study 1 demonstrated that preschoolers were able to articulate their metacognition related to a meaningful task and, as predicted, showed significant growth over a school year. In Study 2, the convergent validity between two measures of preschoolers' metacognition was examined. Findings indicated that, while there was some overlap across components of metacognition, there were substantial unique elements left to examine. Moreover, SES moderated these associations. In Study 3, the facilitation of emerging metacognitive processes was examined using a Dynamic Assessment intervention. Children who received the metacognitive intervention obtained significant gains on metacognitive strategies and knowledge as well as cognition skills (memory) whereas the children in the comparison group did not. Some individual differences were found related to executive functioning and expressive vocabulary as well as SES. Importantly, children with higher metacognitive skills had higher pre-academic achievement regardless of SES status. Results from multiple methods in this series of programmatically linked studies will contribute in critical ways to psychological and educational theory by explicating this critical developmental capacity and its importance to learning and academic success. Notably, findings from this program of research will also inform the design and implementation of effective interventions to accelerate the learning and academic achievement of young children, particularly those at risk for learning difficulties.