The Influence of Clickers Use on Metacognition and Learning Outcomes in College English Classroom

Literature Review

Metacognition is referred to as “the ability to reflect upon, understand, and control one's learning” (Schraw & Dennison, 1994, p. 460) or simply thinking about thinking (Flavell, 1979). Flavell (1979, 1987) argues that metacognition involves metacognitive knowledge and metacognitive experiences or regulation of cognition. Metacognition is also considered as higher rank thinking which can actively control over the cognitive processes engaged in learning. Activities such as planning how to approach a given learning task, monitoring comprehension, and evaluating progress toward the completion of a task are metacognitive in nature (Livingstone, 1997). Learners with higher levels of metacognition tend to apply more cognitive strategies, so they may achieve more favorable learning outcomes.

It is important to cultivate students’ metacognitive level in order to improve students’ learning outcomes. Higher achievements are often achieved by those with more metacognitive awareness (Mayer, 2008). Metacognitively imbedded students tend to possess the ability to self monitor and self regulate the learning process and to use cognitive learning strategies (Wolters, 2010) in order to set up learning goals which lead to desired learning outcomes (Zimmerman, 2000). Studies have indicated that metacognition is one of the strongest predictors of learning in general (Flavell, 1976, 1979; Veenman & Elshout, 1995). In case Clickers can be evidenced by strong facilitation of metacognition, then it is most likely that Clickers will lead to more positive learning achievements than otherwise.