Metacognitive Awareness

This study examined the differences among high، mid and low ambiguity tolerance groups in their reading comprehension ability and their metacognitive awareness of reading strategies. To this end، 123 first-year college students majoring in Engineering with an age range of 19-25 were stratified into three groups of high، mid and low ambiguity tolerance to participate in the study. They took part in the Nelson test of proficiency and a reading comprehension test and also filled out two questionnaires: the Metacognitive Awareness of Reading Strategies Inventory، and the Tolerance of Ambiguity Scale. The results showed significant differences between Low and High groups. That is، high ambiguity tolerance students scored higher on reading comprehension test، displayed higher metacognitive awareness of reading strategies، and showed higher perceived use of Global and Problem-Solving metacognitive reading strategies. However، no significant differences were found between the middle group and the other two groups in these variables. Also، no significant difference was found in the use of Supportive strategies among these three groups. The findings are interpreted to have implications for syllabus designers and EFL teachers.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of teaching critical thinking on meta-cognitive awareness and epistemological beliefs of high school students. Method: The present study was a semi-experimental study with pre-test, post-test and follow up with a control group. The statistical population of this study was all second-grade high school students in Zahedan. The sample consisted of 30 subjects who were selected by randomized cluster sampling and were randomly assigned to either experimental (15 subjects) or control (15 People). The data collection tool was a meta-cognitive awareness questionnaire by Shrow and Denison (1994) and an epistemological questionnaire (EQ) (Schumer, 1990, 1993). At first, subjects of both groups were pre-test and then the experimental group received 12 critical thinking training sessions. While the control group did not receive any intervention. Finding: for analyzing the data, covariance analysis was used by SPSS software. The results showed that there is a significant difference between the mean scores of meta-cognitive awareness and epistemological beliefs in the experimental and control groups in the post-test (P <0.01). The effect of teaching critical thinking on metacognitive awareness and epistemological beliefs of students in the follow-up phase has continued. Conclusion: teaching critical thinking was effective on metacognitive awareness and the epistemological beliefs of students. Teaching students to improve the effective use of abilities, improve their performance and provide them with reasonable decision making and thinking.

Fluent reading is a multifaceted ability that integrates several linguistic and non-linguistic processes. Accordingly, recognizing the critical components of fluent reading is highly significant in planning and implementing effective reading programs. This study was undertaken to evaluate the predictive power of syntactic knowledge, vocabulary breadth, and metacognitive awareness of reading strategies in the reading fluency of Iranian EFL learners. To this end, a sample of 149 Iranian EFL language learners took the Vocabulary Levels Test, Survey of Reading Strategies Questionnaire (SORS), a TOEFL PBT, and a fluency test. The linear regression results indicated that vocabulary breadth was the first predictor of readers' performance on reading fluency, followed by metacognitive awareness of reading strategies. At the same time, syntactic knowledge was not entered into the regression model. Moreover, the findings confirmed the contribution of both linguistic and non-linguistic processes to reading fluency. Having a clear picture of fluency components can be advantageous to teaching reading comprehension and test score predictability.

A major concern of language testing researchers has for long been the identification of construct-irrelevant influential cognitive and psychological bias factors in test takers’ language test performance and recently the identification of the tentative models of interactions among such factors. With the same purpose in mind, the present study investigated the direct and indirect interrelationships among EFL learners’ test anxiety, test-wiseness, reading metacognitive awareness, and reading comprehension test performance through a path analytic research design. To this end and on the basis of the related literature and the previous research findings, first a hypothesized model of the interrelationship among the variables was assumed. Next, 317 undergraduate and graduate students took the related questionnaires and tests. Finally, the obtained data were analyzed through AMOS statistical package and the hypothesized model of the interrelationship among variables was tested. According to the final verified model, test-wiseness directly predicted reading comprehension test performance, while test anxiety did not. Moreover, while reading strategies metacognitive awareness did not directly predict reading comprehension test performance, it was indirectly associated with reading comprehension test performance through the mediation of test-wiseness. In addition, both correlational and path analyses confirmed a strong negative relationship between reading strategies metacognitive awareness, and test anxiety. The findings highlight the importance of the language test takers' less test anxiety and enhanced metacognitive awareness of reading strategies and test-wiseness for their more reliable test-taking performances.