Metacognition in the classroom

Understanding students' capacity to direct their own learning has been a central topic of discussion among educational practicioners. Researchers argue that the capacity to self-regulate is central to our assumptions about learning, decision making, problem solving, and resource management in education. Basic research questions are "What is self-regulation?" and" what is metacognition?". In this paper, we first look at various conceptualisations of self-regulation prominent in the educational psychology research literature, then discuss the metacognitive strategies which will enhance their self regulation and compare and contrast the university students' use of metacognitive strategies in the mother tongue and target language. (C) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.