Metacognitive Skills for Adult Learning. Trends and Issues Alert.

Metacognition refers to the ability of learners to be aware of and monitor their learning processes. Cognitive skills are those needed to perform a task, whereas metacognitive skills are necessary to understand how it was performed. Metacognitive skills are generally divided into two types: self-assessment (the ability to assess one's own cognition) and self-management (the ability to manage one's further cognitive development). Successful adult learners employ a range of metacognitive skills and effective teachers of adults attend to the development of these skills. According to the research on self-assessment, learners who are skilled in metacognitive self-assessment and are therefore aware of their abilities are more strategic and perform better than those who are unaware. Most of the literature on metacognition in adult learning deals with self-management skills. Much of this material stresses the role of instructors in enhancing learner cognition. Teachers who are aware of their own metacognitive functioning tend to play a more significant role in helping learners develop skills in metacognition. One important theme in the area of developing self-management skills in metacognition is the relationship between metacognition and constructivist learning theory. (A 17-item annotated bibliography and list of 4 World Wide Web sites constitute approximately 80% of this document.) (MN)