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CHÂU THỊ HOÀNG HOA

EFFECTS OF METACOGNITVE
STRATEGY INSTRUCTION ON
STUDENTS’ READING COMPREHENSION
Trung tâm Học liệu ĐH Cần Thơ @ Tài liệu học tập và nghiên cứu

LUẬN VĂN THẠC SĨ: GIÁO DỤC HỌC
Chuyên ngành: Lý luận và Phương pháp dạy học bộ môn Tiếng Anh

CẦN THƠ, 2009


BỘ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO
TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC CẦN THƠ

CHÂU THỊ HOÀNG HOA

TÁC ĐỘNG CỦA VIỆC HƯỚNG DẪN
CHIẾN LƯỢC ĐỌC PHẢN TĨNH ĐỐI VỚI
Trung tâm Học
liệuNĂNG
ĐH CầnĐỌC
Thơ @HIỂU
Tài liệu
học tập
và nghiên
KHẢ


Supervisor: Le Thi Tuyet Mai (M.Ed.)

CAN THO, 2009

iii


Luận văn Thạc sĩ với đề tài:
“The Effects of Metacognitive Strategy Instruction on Students’ Reading
Comprehension” do học viên Châu Thị Hoàng Hoa thực hiện và báo cáo đã được
Hội đồng Chấm Luận văn thông qua.
Ủy viên

Thư ký

…………………………

…………………………

Giáo viên phản biện 1

Giáo viên phản biện 2

Trung tâm Học liệu ĐH Cần Thơ @ Tài liệu học tập và nghiên cứu

…………………………

…………………………


Quoc Lap who trained me research methodology and initiated the idea of choosing the
research field, and research topic. He spent his time giving valuable comments to my
proposal. His encouragement was unforgettable to me. My thanks are also sent to Dr. Le
Phuoc Loc, who taught me how to research in Vietnamese.
Secondly, I would like to show my deep appreciation and to my supervisor, Ms. Le Thi
Tuyet Mai for her intellectual and material assistance. She was the one who first taught me
what metacognitive reading was. I also owed her for valuable advice as well as supports. I
am indebted to her for her patience to read the drafts of the thesis and gave feedback on
them again and again. She not only leaded me to make first steps in researching way but
also helped me how to be a good teacher. I admired her devotion, sympathy and
responsibility because they all made my research work burdenless but full of happiness.

Trung

Next, I appreciate Mr. Le Van Don, Director of Tra Vinh Teacher Training College
(TVTTC) and Mr. Vo Hoang Khai, Vice-Director of TVTTC because of their acceptance
and support for my participation in the postgraduate program in TEFL at Can Tho
University. My deep thanks go to all the people at the Department of Administration at
tâm
Học liệu ĐH Cần Thơ @ Tài liệu học tập và nghiên cứu
TVTTC especially Ms. Le Thi Kim Loan - my chief – and Ms. Nguyen Thi Ngoc Hieu, my
colleague. They covered most of my work during the time I studied at Can Tho University
and implemented my M.A. research.
I am heartedly grateful to those who contributed much to my research. I would like to thank
Ms. Cao Thi Hong Cam, a teacher of English at TVU, for her assistance to score the
students’ reading tests and Ms. Hua Thi Tuong Vi, for her control of metacognitive
instruction on the control class. Besides, my thanks go to Ms. Tran Nhu Minh Phuong, Ms.
Nguyen Thi Ngoc Lan, members in my MA class who helped me to read and gave me
ideas for improving my questionnaire. I could never forget their affection and cooperation
in studying together.

trong đề tài này là 61 sinh viên học Tiếng Anh không chuyên ở trường Cao đẳng Sư phạm
Trà Vinh: có 31 sinh viên trong nhóm thực nghiệm và 30 sinh viên trong nhóm đối chứng.
Đề tài sử dụng bảng câu hỏi trắc nghiệm và bài kiểm tra đọc hiểu để đo trình độ nhận thức
và khả năng đọc hiểu của sinh viên trước và sau khi thực nghiệm. Bên cạnh đó, sinh viên
viết nhật ký học tập để ghi nhận lại quá trình vận dụng chiến lược đọc phản tĩnh trong khi
đọc. Kết quả nghiên cứu khẳng định rằng nhận thức về chiến lược đọc phản tĩnh của nhóm
thực nghiệm tăng nhưng nhóm đối chứng không tăng. Khả năng đọc hiểu của hai nhóm đều
được cải thiện nhưng nhóm thực nghiệm thể hiện sự vượt trội hơn so với nhóm đối chứng.
Qua các bài nhật ký học tập của sinh viên và kết quả của phép toán thống kê, đề tài này
khẳng định có sự tương quan giữa nhận thức phản tĩnh và khả năng đọc hiểu của sinh viên
sau chương trình thực nghiệm. Cho nên, tác giả đề tài khẳng định vai trò tích cực của việc
dạy sinh viên đọc phản tĩnh để cải thiện kỹ năng đọc của mình và từ đó kiến nghị rằng
chiến lược đọc phãn tĩnh cần được chú trọng và sinh viên nên luyện tập thường xuyên để
nhận thức về chiến lược này trở thành kỹ năng. Tuy nhiên, một vài điểm mà đề tài này cần
chú ý là đề cập đến các yếu tố như sự khác nhau về giới, kinh nghiệm và thói quen đọc
trong Tiếng mẹ đẻ của đối tượng tham gia trong đề tài. Đó cũng chính là hướng tác giả đề
tâm
Học
ĐH
@ vực
Tàinày.
liệu học tập và nghiên cứu
xuất cho
cácliệu
nghiên
cứu Cần
sâu hơnThơ
trong lĩnh

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Control

Com/Compre: Comprehension
EFL:

English as a Foreign Language

Exp/e:

Experimental

IRA:

Index of Reading Awareness

K-W-L:

Know – Want to know – Learned

M:

Mean

Max:

Maximum

Meta:


Declaration ..................................................................................................................... v
Acknowledgements ........................................................................................................ vi
Abstract in Vietnamese ............................................................................................... viii
Abstract in English ........................................................................................................ ix
Abbreviations ..................................................................................................................x
Table of Contents .......................................................................................................... xi
List of Tables and Figures .......................................................................................... xiv
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................1
1.1. Rationale ..................................................................................................................1
1.2. Research aims ..........................................................................................................2
1.3. Research questions ..................................................................................................2
1.4. Hypotheses ...............................................................................................................2
1.5. Significance of the study .........................................................................................3
1.6. Thesis organization .................................................................................................3
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW .............................................................................5
2.1. Introduction .............................................................................................................5
2.2. Metacognition and its related aspects ...................................................................6
2.1.2. Metacognition: definitions and components .................................................6
tâm Học2.1.2.
liệuCognition
ĐH Cần
@ Tài........................................................................8
liệu học tập và nghiên cứu
and Thơ
metacognition
2.1.2. Metacognition and reading comprehension ................................................. 9
2.3. Reading comprehension .......................................................................................11
2.3.1. Reading and comprehension .......................................................................11
2.3.2. Levels of comprehension .............................................................................12
2.4. The possible relationship among the three factors: metacognitive strategy

4.1.3. Comparison of the mean scores of metacognitive reading awareness
and reading comprehension ability within each group before and after the
intervention ....................................................................................................................34
4.1.4. Correlation between metacognitive awareness and reading
comprehension ability ....................................................................................................39
4.2. Qualitative analysis ...............................................................................................41
4.2.1. Introduction .................................................................................................41
4.2.2. Analysis of students’ journals .....................................................................41
4.2.3. Summary .....................................................................................................52
tâm
Học
ĐH Cần Thơ
@ Tài liệuLIMITATIONS
học tập và nghiên cứu
CHAPTER liệu
5: DISCUSSIONS,
IMPLICATIONS,
SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER RESEARCH AND CONCLUSION .........................53
5.1. Summary and discussions of the findings ...........................................................53
5.2. Implications of the findings ..................................................................................56
5.3. Limitations of the study ........................................................................................57
5.4. Suggestions for further research .........................................................................58
5.5. Conclusion .............................................................................................................59
REFERENCES ......................................................................................................................61
APPENDICES .......................................................................................................................65
CURRICULUM VITAE......................................................................................................107

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experimental group and control group in the pre – test
Table 4: Descriptive Statistics of the mean scores of reading comprehension ability of the
experimental group and control group in the pre - test
Table 5: The result of comparison of the mean scores of reading comprehension in the pre test of the control and the experimental group
Table 6: The result of comparison of the mean scores of reading comprehension in the pre test of the two groups with the average score (2)
Table 7: Descriptive Statistics of the mean scores of metacognitive reading awareness
within each group in the pre - and post – questionnaire
Table 8: The result of comparing the mean scores metacognitive awareness of the pre - and
post - questionnaire within each group by Paired – Samples T Test
Table 9: Descriptive Statistics of the mean scores of reading comprehension ability within

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Học liệu ĐH Cần Thơ @ Tài liệu học tập và nghiên cứu
each group in the pre - and post – test

Table 10: The result of comparing the mean scores of the pre - and post - reading test
within each group by Paired – Samples T Test
Table 11: The result of comparing the mean scores of reading comprehension in the post test between the control and experimental group by Independent – Samples T Test
Table 12: Correlations between metacognitive awareness of the participants in the pre - test
and post - test
Table 13: Correlations between reading comprehension ability of the participants in the pre
- test and post - test
Table 14: Correlations between metacognitive awareness and reading comprehension
ability of the control group and experimental group in the pre - test and post – test
Table 15: Gained scores of six selected cases in the pre - tests and post – tests on reading
comprehension ability and metacognitive awareness
FIGURES
Figure 1: Students’ metacognitive awareness of the two groups in the pre - and post – test
Figure 2: Students’ reading comprehension ability of two groups in the pre - and post – test


ten minutes in a week, no more than six hours in a year. Not all of the students do the real
reading in that six - hour time; they might think of something out of the texts, or do
something not related to the tasks. To improve students’ reading efficacy, we could not
require more time for in – class reading practice but the innovation of reading strategy
instruction should be entailed.
Cognitive and metacognitive reading strategies are essential parts in reading strategy
instruction. In fact, cognitive strategies enable the readers to comprehend the text and
metacognitive strategies regulate the use of cognitive strategies, enabling them to control
their reading process (Grow, 1996). On that basis, the current research is the introduction
of metacognitive strategy into reading instruction to enable the readers to plan, monitor
and assess their reading process for better achievement in comprehension.
There are considerable research studies indicating that the relationship between reading
comprehension ability and metacognitive strategy awareness is positive. El-Koumy
1


(2004) claimed that many educators (e.g., Collins, 1994; Maitland, 2000; Urquhart and
Weir, 1998) considered knowledge about metacognitive strategies was essential to
reading comprehension. However, another researcher, McLain (1993) argued that
metacognitive reading strategy instruction just increased students’ metacognitive
awareness, not reading comprehension; or just made good strategy users, not good
readers. The problems in the teacher – researcher’s teaching context and different
findings about the effects of metacognitive instruction on reading comprehension inspire
her to research in this field with the hope that metacognitive strategy reading instruction
could be a good therapy for students’ insufficient reading comprehension efficacy.
1.2.

Research aims

Some researchers proved that there was a correlation between metacognitive strategy

metacognitive strategy awareness?
2. To what extent does metacognitive strategy instruction affect students’ reading
comprehension ability?
3. Is there correlation between students’ metacognitive strategy awareness and

their reading comprehension ability after the treatment?
1.4.

Hypotheses

From a variety of research into the effects of metacognitive reading strategy instruction
and the acknowledgement about the benefits of reading instructions on students’ reading
comprehension ability, the research has three hypotheses:
2


1. It is hypothesized that metacognitive reading strategy instruction may improve
students’ metacognitive strategy awareness.
2. It is hypothesized that metacognitive reading strategy instruction may improve
students’ reading comprehension ability.
3. It is hypothesized that there is a correlation between students’ metacognitive

strategy awareness and their reading comprehension ability after the treatment.
1.5.

Significance of the study

Metacognitive abilities enable students to be consciously aware of what and how they are
learning. It is supposed that if the students are good metacognitive strategy users, they
could utilize their knowledge about the test, task and themselves (their reading process to



aspects of reading comprehension are presented in the next part as the theoretical base for
measurement of reading comprehension ability and the deployment of the experimental
program. The last part of this chapter is the review of five pieces of research on the
effects of metacognitive reading instruction on reading comprehension.
The third chapter is aimed to present the design, the participants, and the materials of the
study. The description of the instruments for data collection and data analysis are also
included in this chapter.
The fourth chapter offers the results of the study with the aim to answer the three
mentioned research questions.
The last chapter presents the summary and discussions on the findings of the study.
Implications for using metacognitive reading strategy instruction to improve students’
reading comprehension ability as well as the limitations of the study are then covered in
the last part of this chapter.

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CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW
This chapter presents the definitions, components, and classifications of metacognition as well
as the possible relationship between metacognition and comprehension. Besides, it explores the
process of reading comprehension in terms of aspects and levels to form a logical background
for the selection of instruments used in this research. The last part of this chapter will report five
pieces of research into the effects of metacognitive reading strategies instruction on students’
reading comprehension.

2.1.

but teaching students how to explore the texts by themselves.
Reading is generally defined as a process of interaction between texts and readers. If the
texts are accompanied with pictures or illustrated with diagrams, have clear formats, or
convey interesting information, they will be easier for reading. Likewise, when the
readers have good prior knowledge about the texts, set their own goals for reading, know
the nature of the tasks, and decide suitable strategies, they can plan, monitor, and adjust
their reading process for better comprehension. Such activities are known as parts of
metacognitive reading strategies, which are believed to be teachable. That is the reason
why metacognition in reading has recently received substantial attention from educators
and researchers. For a clearer vision to this process, the following would present different
views on metacognition, its components, metacognition in reading comprehension and
the possible relationship among metacognitive strategy instruction, metacognitive
strategy awareness and reading comprehension from the empirical results of five studies
in this field.

5


2.2. Metacognition and its related aspects
2.2.1. Metacognition: definitions and components
The term metacognition coming from cognitive psychology has been widely used in
language learning and teaching. The prefix of this term, “meta” has three different
meanings: behind or after, super, and transition; “meta” in metacognition takes the first
meaning. Cognition means the act or process of knowing or perception. Therefore,
metacognition can generally be defined as understanding what is behind, thinking about
our understanding or thinking about thinking.
According to many educators (e.g., Biehler and Snowman, 1993; Eggen and Kaucbak,
1995) metacognition was one’s knowledge about one’s own cognition. However, Collins
(1994), Maitland (2000) argued that metacognition was not only the knowledge about
one’s cognition but also the regulation of cognition. In line with those educators, Leahey

metacognition by expanding the components of metacognition. To them metacognition
combined the three components separately: having knowledge about one’s understanding,
controlling and using that knowledge appropriately (Tei & Steward, cited in Scales,
1987). This definition is overlapped and wider in comparison with the others. It is
overlapped because the meaning of the term “using appropriately” covers the meaning
of “controlling”. We could not use the knowledge of cognition appropriately without
controlling it successfully. It is wider because it focuses on not only the control of

6


cognition but also the use of cognition. It is assumed that Tei & Steward redefined
metacognition in this way to emphasize on both the process and product of this
phenomenon. For the sake of briefness and clarity, metacognition could be understood as
the understanding about one’s knowledge and the control of that knowledge for the
ultimate goal.
In a similar way, Paris (1987) described metacognition as the combination of self appraisal (awareness) and self-management (control). The former could be recognized as
declarative knowledge, procedural knowledge, and conditional knowledge about
cognition, and the later as strategic planning, evaluation of process, or regulation of
cognition (cited in Yore & Craig, 1992). Yore & Craig (1992) concurred with Paris by
the definition of metacognition as the awareness and executive control of cognition – a
construct revealing insights about the what, how, why and when of cognition. Paris
(1990) herself specified the definition of metacognition as referring it to the knowledge
about cognitive states and abilities to construct “affective and motivational characteristics
of thinking” (cited in Kouider and Carla, 2002) in “Assessing students’ metacognitive
awareness of reading strategies”. She viewed metacognition as the state of cognition and
the ability to control this cognition, and made it more specific to the construction of
Trung
tâm Họcofliệu
ĐH Cần

Cognition and metacognition

Before the definitions and classifications of metacognition in reading are discussed, the
relationship and distinction between the two terms: cognition and metacognition are
presented. As presented earlier in this review, most of the researchers defined
metacognition basing on the term “cognition”. Cognition is the prerequisite condition of
metacognition. Cognition functions as the base of metacognition; and metacognition
improves cognition. Nist and Simpson (1994) agreed that metacognitive strategies
increased readers’ efficacy and improved their cognitive strategies. Both cognition and
metacognition are psychological processes. The former refers to an information
processing view of our psychological functions. The later refers to the knowledge about,
regulation of and experience from cognition (Wikipedia). Cognition and metacognition
are both important in language learning. These two processes are interrelated, and the
distinctions between them are problematic and it will be partially presented in the
following session.
It is important to make distinctions between cognitive and metacognitive strategies
because it helps teachers to decide which strategies are important to determine the
effectiveness
reading
cited@inTài
Anderson,
1987).
making
the
Trung
tâm Họcofliệu
ĐH(Graham,
Cần Thơ
liệu học
tậpHowever,

cognitive resources. Second, the regulation of cognition was the regulation of one’s
reading process, which raised the control of readers’ strategies to overcome difficulties
with text comprehension. El – Koumy (2004) concurred with Brown’s classification that
metacognition was about one’s own cognition and knowledge about self-regulation of
one’s own learning” (p.7). The former involves knowledge about self, task, and cognitive
strategies, and the latter involves knowledge about metacognitive strategies. Of them, the
three strategies self - planning, self - monitoring and self - assessment receive a great deal
of attention in the field of reading. Self - planning denotes “making a comprehensive plan
for dealing with the text” (El – Koumy, 2004:14). This strategy increases students’
interest and motivation in reading. Self - monitoring or comprehension monitoring
indicates
readers’
regulation
their @
comprehension
in the
reading
process (Glazer,
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tâm the
Học
liệu ĐH
CầnofThơ
Tài liệu học
tập
và nghiên
cứu
cited in El – Koumy, 2004). This strategy helps students recognize whether they
comprehend the text or not and modify the strategies when comprehension is lost. In fact,
self - monitoring could be accomplished by self-questioning. Self-assessment could

awareness of his or her cognitive resources in relation to the task. This assumption means
that he or she is aware of his or her own strengths and weaknesses in dealing with the
requirement of the learning situation. The regulation aspect refers to self-regulatory
Trung
tâm Học
liệumonitoring
ĐH Cầnand
Thơ
@ Tài
liệucomprehension
học tập vàbreaks
nghiên
cứu
activities:
planning,
revising
in case
down.
The
reading activities involved in the three self-regulatory functions mentioned in this article
are numerous, clear and essential to second language learning and teaching. For example,
planning entails determining the purpose of reading with the following activities:
previewing, self-questioning, predicting, hypothesizing, and activating prior knowledge.
Monitoring is the act of evaluating if the strategies used are effective or not, and if
comprehension occurs or not. It involves summarizing and self-questioning. That is the
reason why monitoring could be named as self-questioning. In this research, the term
self-questioning is not used for monitoring to distinguish self-questioning in planning and
monitoring process. In fact, self - questioning in those two activities are not the same. In
planning, the readers might ask themselves the purpose of their reading, or predict the
content of the reading text while in self-questioning of monitoring, the readers ask

tập và nghiên
cứu
reading
self-monitoring
and học
self-assessment,
or sometimes
generalized by the term “metacognitive reading strategies” are studied in this research. In
other words, the term “metacognitive reading strategies” is understood as “the strategies
used by the readers in their reading process to regulate cognitive strategies” and three sub
- division strategies mentioned are identified with the features recommended by Maribeth
Cassdy Schmitt in the above section.
2.3. Reading comprehension
2.3.1. Reading and comprehension
Most of the researchers agreed that reading was a process of comprehension. For
instance, McLain (1993) defined reading as an active process of interacting of the readers
with the print clues to construct meaning, and comprehension as a process where the
readers grasped the meaning from the text. Therefore, to McLain reading was the process
of achieving comprehension. In line with McLain, Lenz (2005) stated that reading
comprehension was the process of constructing meaning from text by readers and the
ultimate goal of reading was to comprehend the text. According to Anderson (cited in
McLain, 1993) comprehension was the combined product of knowledge possessed from

11