Lesson 1: Metacognition by John Flavell
Metacognition is an evaluation or an epistemological process for an individual to assess
themselves in order to know what they know or what they do not know. It is commonly defined
by the quote, “thinking about thinking” in other terms, it is how an individual thinks beyond
about their skills and knowledge.
• Awareness It is the awareness of the scope and limitations of your current
• Evaluation knowledge and skills. Enables the person to adapt their existing
• Generating knowledge and skills to approach a learning task, seeking for the
and Implementing optimum result of the learning experience. Includes keeping one’s
Strategies emotions and motivations while learning in check. The goal of
metacognition is for the student to be a self-regulated learner.
ITS TWO ASPECTS:
• Self-Appraisal – personal reflection on an individual’s knowledge and capabilities
• Self-management – is the mental process that individual’s employ using what he/she have
in planning and adapting to successfully or accomplish a certain task.
Similar Concepts:
• Metacognitive Knowledge – what you know about how you think. This is all the
knowledge and beliefs that have been acquired an stored in long-term memory that
concerns anything pertinent to social cognition.
o Personal variable – this is also known as self-knowledge or self-
awareness—includes general knowledge about how human beings learn
and process information, as well as an individual’s knowledge about their
own learning processes to include their strengths and weaknesses
o Task Variable – this includes knowledge about the nature of the task, as
well as the type of processing demands that it will place on the individual.
This type of knowledge requires knowing that different tasks can be more
or less difficult and, as such, requires a different cognitive approach in order
to successfully complete the task.
o Strategy Variable – this involves goals, sub-goals, and selecting cognitive
processes to use in their achievement. This includes knowledge about
general strategies—both cognitive and metacognitive—as well as
conditional knowledge about when and where it is appropriate to use such
strategies for learning, thinking, and problem solving. This variable can be
applied to all or most academic disciplines and includes knowledge of the
various strategies students might use to memorize material, to extract
meaning from text, and to comprehend what they hear in books and other
course materials.
• Metacognition Regulation – how you adjust your thinking processes to help you learn
better. This involves: setting goals and planning; monitoring and controlling learning; and
evaluating one’s own regulation (assessing results and strategies used).
EXERCISING METACOGNITION
Knowing your limits – knowing the limit of your own memory for a particular task and creating
a menas of external support
Modifying your approach – noticing the strategy if is it approporiate to be used in a certain task
and if it is not, modify the strategy in comprehending the material or task.
Skimming – browsing over a material and keeping an eye on keywords, phrases, or sentences It
is also about knowing where to search for such key terms
Rehearsing – It’s not just about repeatedly talking, writing, and/or doing what you have learned,
but also trying to make a personal interpretation or summary of the learning experience.
Self-Test – Trying to test your comprehension of your learning experience or the skills you have
acquired during learning.
LESSON 2: Albert E. Bandura’s Self-Efficacy Theory
The Bobo Doll Experiment summary: According to Bandura's social cognitive theory, people
actively participate in their surroundings and are not just a product of that environment.
Summary of Self-Efficacy Theory:
Outcome Expectancy An individual doing a certain task to lead a certain outcome
Efficacy Expectation An individual doing his very best effort that a task requires to
produced a desired goal/outcome.
Self-efficacy is relevant when there is a real or perceived risk to one's personal safety or their
capacity to handle terrible situations. Dr. Bandura defined self-efficacy as “people’s beliefs about
their capabilities to produce designated levels of performance that exercise influence over events
that affect their lives.”
The people who have high assurance in their capabilities:
• Approach difficult tasks as challenges to be mastered;
• Set challenging goals and maintain strong commitment to them;
• Heighten or sustain efforts in the face of failures or setbacks
• Attirbute failture to insuffiecient effort or deficient knowledge and skills which are
acquirable; and
• Approach threatening situations with assurance that they can exercise control over them.
In contast, people “who doubt their capabilities”:
• Shy away from tasks they view as personal threats
• Have low aspirations and weak commitment goals they choose to pursue;
• Dwell on personal deficiencies, obstacles they encounter, and all kind of adverse
outcomes, rather than concentrating on how to perform successfully;
• Slacken theyr efforts and give up quickly in the face of difficulties;
• Are slow to recover there sense of efficacy following failure or setbacks; and
• Fall easy victim to stress and depression
Dr. Bandura described four main sources of influence by which a person’s
self-efficacy is developed and maintained. These are:
• performance accomplishments or mastery experiences – the best way to increase self-
efficacy because people are more inclined to think they can accomplish something when
they have already done it successfully.
• vicarious experiences – the study of others' successes and failures who are similar to
oneself as role models.
• verbal or social persuasion - People are more likely to complete a task when they are
verbally convinced that they can complete or master it. Others' verbal affirmation of one's
achievement or mastery of a task is very helpful in boosting one's self-confidence.
• physiological (somatic and emotional) states - When someone is considering doing
something, their physical and emotional states can give away whether they will succeed
or fail. Stress, anxiety, worry, and fear can all have a negative impact on one's sense of
self-efficacy and cause one to project failure or an inability to complete the tasks they are
afraid of.
FIXED AND GROWTH MINDSET THEORY by Carol S. Dweck
Dr. Dweck described people with two types of mindset:
Fixed • Individuals dread failure because it is a negative statement
on their basic abilities
• People who believe that success is based on their innate
abilities have a “fixed” theory of intelligence, and goes
under fixed mindset.
Growth • Individuals do not mind or fear of failure as much
because they realize their performance can be
imrpoved and learning comes from failure
• People who believe that success is based on
hardwork, learning, training, and perseverance have
growth theory of intelligence, which goes under
growth mindset.
Individuals may not necessarily be aware of their own mindset, but their mindset can still
be discerned based on their behavior.
Goal Setting Theory by Edwin A. Locke
The basic contents of goal settings theory ar esummarized in terms of 14 categories of findings:
1. The more difficult the goal, the greater the achievement.
2. The more specific or explicit the goal, the more precisely performance is
regulated.
3. Goals that are both specific and difficult lead to the highest performance.
4. Commitment to goals is most critical when goals are specific and
difficult.
5. High commitment to goals is attained when:
a) the individual is convinced that the goal is important;
b) and the individual is convinced that the goal is attainable (or that, at least, progress can be made
toward it).
There are many way to convince a person that a goal is important
• Asking for compliance after providing a credible reasoning for the study (The theory is that
this would make goals more important to the person because one would, at least in part, own the goals.)
• In work situations, the supervisor or leader can use legitimate authority to get initial
commitment. (Making a public commitment to the goal enhances commitment, presumably because it
makes one’s actions a matter of integrity in one’s own eyes and in those of others)
• Continued commitment might require additional incentives such as supportiveness,
recognition, and rewards. (Goal commitment can also be enhanced by leaders communicating an
inspiring vision and behaving supportively)
Financial incentives may encourage performance and participation. Setting goals with
subordinates results in greater commitment than sternly telling people what to do. Self-set
goals can be very successful in gaining commitment; they don't require an explanation.
Commitment can be enhanced by effective leadership. Relevant leadership techniques
include:
• providing and communicating an inspiring vision;
• acting as role model for the employees;
• expecting outstanding performance;
• promoting employees who embrace the vision and dismissing those who reject it;
• delegating responsibility (“ownership”) for key tasks;
• goal setting itself can be delegated for capable, responsible employees;
• expressing (genuine) confidence in employee capabilities;
• enhancing capabilities through training; and
• asking for commitment in public.
6. In addition to having a direct effect on performance, self-efficacy influences:
a) the difficulty level of the goal chosen or accepted;
b) commitment to goals;
c) the response to negative feedback or failure; and
d) the choice of task strategies.
7. Goal setting is most effective when there is feedback that shows progress in
relation to the goal.
8. Goal setting (along with self-efficacy) mediates the effect of knowledge of past
performance on subsequent performance
9. Goals affect performance by affecting the direction of action, the degree of effort exerted,
and the persistence of action over time.
10. Goals stimulate planning in general. Often, the planning quality is higher than that which
occurs without goals. When people possess task or goal-relevant plans as a result of experience
or training, they activate them automatically when confronted with a performance goal. Newly
learned plans or strategies are most likely to be utilized under the stimulus of a specific,
difficult goal.
11. When people strive for goals on complex tasks, they are least effective indiscovering suitable
task strategies if:
a) they have no prior experience or training on the task;
b) there is high pressure to perform well; and
c) there is high time pressure (to perform well immediately).
12. Goals (including goal commitment), in combination with self-efficacy, mediate or
partiallymediate the effects of several personality traits and incentives on performance.
13. Goal-setting and goal-related mechanisms can be trained and/or adopted in the absence of
training for the purpose of self-regulation.
14. Goals serve as standards of self-satisfaction, with harder goals demanding higher
accomplishment in order to attain self-satisfaction than easy goals. Goals can also be used to
enhance task interest, reduce boredom, and promote goal clarity. When used to punish or
intimidate people, however, goals increase stress and anxiety.
LESSON 3: STRESS AND HUMAN RESPONSE by Hans Selye
Hans Selye – who hypothesized a general adaptation syndrome or most commonly known as,
STRESS. The General Stress Syndrome affects the whole body. It always manifests itself by a
syndrome, as sum of changes, and not by simply one change.
The General Adaptation Syndrome has three components:
a) The alarm stage – individuals woud feel heightened anxiety, feeling butterflies in their
stomach
b) The stage of resistence – the battle of questions in the mind of the individual, anxiety
would run through them
c) The exhaustion stage – the stage of giving up, in a sense that individuals will not do
their supposed tasks and it affects their physical body.
Stress diseases are maladies caused by principally by errors in the body’s general adaptation
process. Stress causes a fluctuation or an imbalance in our homeostasis (any self-regulating process
by which an organism tends to maintain stability while adjusting to conditions that are best for its survival).
Stress can affect he individual physically and psychologically. Stress response begins in the
brain.
The autonomic nervous system has two components:
• The sympathetic nervous system – triggers the fight or flight response, providing the
body with a burst of energy so that it can respond to perceived dangers.
o Fight response – if an individual encounters a situation that may trigger them
and stress them out. For instance, a their barged in their house, they would
rapidly fight the thief
o Flight response – personally, commonly known as, the Adrenaline rush. It is
when an individual chose to remove themselves in the situation they are
feeling stressed.
• The parasympathetic nervous system – promotes the “rest and digest” response that
calms the body down after the danger has passed.
Techniques to counter Chronic Stress
• Relaxation response. These include deep abdominal breathing, focus on a soothing word (such as
peace or calm), visualization of tranquil scenes, repetitive prayer, yoga, and tai chi.
• Physical activity. People can use exercise to stifle the buildup of stress in several ways. Exercise,
such as taking a brisk walk shortly after feeling stressed, not only deepens breathing but also
helps relieve muscle tension.
• Social support. Confidants, friends, acquaintances, co-workers, relatives, spouses, and companions
all provide a life-enhancing social net, and may increase longevity.
The Cultural Dimension of Stress and Coping
• A person’s internalized cultural values, beliefs, and norms affect the appraisal process of
stressors and the perceived appropriateness of coping responses;
• Stress and coping are universal experiences faced by individuals regardless of culture,
ethnicity, and race;
• Members of different cultures might consider and respond to stressors differently with
respect to coping goals, strategies, and outcomes
• Avoidance, withdrawal, and forbeardance coping method are common among Asians;
• Spiritual, religious, and ritual based coping are common among African-American and
African-Canadians;
• Spritual and religious coping and coping through family support are common among
individuals of Latino/Latina backgrounds.