One of the major challenges most students face in pursuit of academic excellence is comprehension and recall of their course materials; the students endure these difficulties in their academic life regardless of the discipline they pursue within the higher learning institutions. A challenge of comprehension and recall of the course materials negatively impacts students’ performance and ability to excel in classwork. Most researchers have proven that the utilization of metacognition by the students is likely to aid in the comprehension and recall of the course materials as it aids in the transfer of the learned information to a long-term memory that can help the students better their academic performance and the ultimate good grades (Moran & Crook, 2018). Metacognition aids in the student’s performance as it promotes techniques through which memory can be efficiently encoded and facilitates active learning. Metacognition is a reflective process that allows the students to view and internalize their intelligence as learned rather than in born, metacognition can also be defined as “thinking about thinking.”
Metacognition as a study tool enhances the student’s performance and academic excellence because it promotes the process and principles through which human memory is encoded. Block (2019) explains the process of encoding memory as a process through which the information learned is converted into a mental form that can be easily retrieved when needed. Encoding of human memory involves how the information is represented in long-term memory. Encoding memory is one of the suitable techniques vital in academic excellence because it assists many students in understanding and appreciating how their memory works to adjust their learning practices and techniques effectively (Schellenberg et al., 2011). Many students usually experience challenges, especially after the class lectures, when going through the course materials, and they realize that the topics given to them by the instructor do not make sense. Due to this, most students face frustrations with such modules that ultimately result in poor academic performance low marks and could even result in depression that could predispose the students to school dropout (Boyle et al., 2016). To prevent these difficulties in academics, the students should adopt strategies that would help them remember the information from the course materials. Whenever a student has a challenge in deriving sense out of the academic materials, such student is advised to devise ways of improving memory encoding by emphasizing the vital information meant for recall through reading or going through the topic before attending a lecture or a class (Boyle et al., 2016). The student will, therefore, select the ideas relevant to the class having had previous exposure before the lecture when the instructor stresses such points.
Attention deficit is one of the problems students face in their tertiary academic life that hinders memory encoding; most students with attention deficit disorder usually struggle academically. Their challenges are aggravated by underperformance and the intensity of the course. Attention deficit occurs when the students have difficulty containing their sensitivity to competing stimuli. This leads to difficulty in deriving meaningful information from the course materials and the readings assigned to them by their instructors (DuPaul et al., 2017). The management of attention deficit disorders involves the prior reading of the course materials before the class to allow the students to relate and comprehend the lecture whenever a lecturer or instructor mentions such ideas or topics. The students who attempt to encode the information meaningfully learned in class consistently achieve higher grades than those who are metacognitively unaware of such information (DuPaul et al., 2017). Therefore, this illustration shows that the utilization of strategies or measures of improving memory encoding is an effective metacognitive intervention to help students avoid distractions that would ultimately improve their academic performance.
Research has shown that students who disengage in distractions and integrate metacognition in their study approaches are presented with better opportunities to encode and recall the information learned from the course materials than those who do not practice metacognition. Facilitation of learning in students requires triggering the lectures and the learned course materials, this process facilitates encoding of the information from the class which increase access to the information during recall. The application of this trigger can as well trigger active learning and ensure that the students have easy access to information (Cooper et al., 2018). Metacognition also helps students improve encoding efficiency by eliminating competing stimuli. The students who do not practice encoding will be familiarized or have perceptual knowledge about the course materials but will have difficulty recalling the materials during direct tests such as during examination or class quizzes. Following this scenario, most students will always misjudge the amount of time they need to study, ultimately resulting in poor performance and lack of good grades that will lower the student’s motivation to study further (Cooper et al., 2018). The technique of eliminating competing stimuli as a metacognitive measure assists the students in retrieving or recall the learned information more easily and efficiently, The more efficient the encoding of information, the higher the ability for the student to store and recall the course material information when needed during the examination resulting into improvement in performance.
Metacognition improves students’ performance because it encourages and incorporates active learning strategies. Active learning processes or activities include note-taking during the course lectures; this allows for active engagement with the course materials and the course content, ultimately retaining the course materials as it encourages comprehension and understanding. Davoudi et al. (2015) suggest that the quality of the notes taken by the students during the class lectures directly translates into their learning performance. Active learning is an excellent strategy for improving performance in students as it promotes the linkage or the connection between different concepts, gives most information meaning, and helps with the consolidation of the information into a long-term memory that would be easily retrieved during examinations or quizzes (Chen et al., 2016). Students through active learning could engage in the learning activities such as discussion among themselves or with tutors; this will help them learn, take notes that connect the important concepts, and improve their understanding of the topic or the subject. However, students who do not take notes during classes will have difficulty processing the information from the course material. This would potentially result in poor compression and poor performance (Svinicki, 2017). The learning process could be affected by certain factors such as anxiety; anxiety is a psychological problem that directly affects the student’s learning process. It has been shown to hinder persistence in learning and academic performance. Anxiety could predispose students to inattention and distractibility while taking notes from the lecture information; the review of such vital information is vital for good academic performance and better grades (DuPaul et al., 2017). The students are advised to use metacognition strategies to overcome anxiety by minimizing the stimuli and practicing coping mechanisms. When engaging in active learning, the students are encouraged to participate in diverse activities and collect information that would be vital in memorizing and completing the academic program. Therefore, note-taking as a metacognitive strategy improves active earning and understanding of the course or lecture materials and retention of the required information on the topic to enhance the student’s academic performance.
Active learning as a metacognitive strategy in education also helps in reducing the cue immediately after a lecture or a class is completed. The organization of cues of coursework is vital in improving students’ academic performance as they are essential in reducing cognitive loads through the provision of the required lecture notes. Reducing cues is crucial as it will increase the approaches and the changes through which the required information is sought from long-term memory (Cooper et al., 2018). The students who practice cue reduction have been shown to remember a large section of the subject matter compared to those who do not; this strategy could also help the students anticipate the possible exam questions that could be a breakthrough to good performance and better grades. When notes are correctly added within the cue columns, it is easy to clarify the meanings; this will also reveal their relationships, establish their continuity and even strengthen the memory (Svinicki, 2017). Note-taking in cue has also been shown to guide the student’s attention to the key points and approaches they are required to remember from the lectures; this way, cue reduction is a metacognitive strategy as it provides the students with the opportunity to have organized notes that will eventually help them with the course comprehension and better their academic performance and better grades.
In summation, metacognition is an essential academic approach that enhances the students’ process and the principles of encoding memory and improves memory encoding efficiency by eliminating the competing stimuli and integrating active learning through cue reduction and active note-taking. Metacognition is also a reflective mechanism through which students may assess the effectiveness of their learning strategies; the assessment could help them in adjusting to anxiety in academics, attention deficit disorders, and other behavioral challenges that could hinder their academic life; this will ultimately help in improving their academic performance and good grades. When properly practiced, metacognition could also help the students overcome the challenges associated with classroom concentration and reading. Metacognition is thus an essential process that, if practiced properly, will ultimately enhance academic performance; however, it has to be practiced within a period and adjusted where possible to foster adaptation.
References
Block, K. (2019). Introduction to university (ARTS 1110 – A06) lecture slide. The processes and principles of human memory. Winnipeg: University of Manitoba.
Boyle, J. R., Rosen, S. M., & Forchelli, G. (2016). Exploring metacognitive strategy use during note-taking for students with learning disabilities. Education 3-13, 44(2), 161-180.
Chen, P. H., Teo, T., & Zhou, M. (2016). Effects of Guided Notes on Enhancing College Students’ Lecture Note-Taking Quality and Learning Performance. Current Psychology, 36(4), 719–732. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-016-9459-6
Cooper, K. M., Downing, V. R., & Brownell, S. E. (2018). The influence of active learning practices on student anxiety in large-enrollment college science classrooms. International Journal of STEM Education, 5(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s40594-018-0123-6
Davoudi, M., Moattarian, N., & Zareian, G. (2015). The Impact of Cornell Note-Taking Method Instruction on Grammar Learning of Iranian EFL Learners. Journal of Studies in Education, 5(2), 252. https://doi.org/10.5296/jse.v5i2.6874
DuPaul, G. J., Dahlstrom-Hakki, I., Gormley, M. J., Fu, Q., Pinho, T. D., & Banerjee, M. (2017). College Students with ADHD and LD: Effects of Support Services on Academic Performance. Learning Disabilities Research & Practice. https://doi.org/10.1111/ldrp.12143
Moran, M. O., & Crook, S. (2018). A guide to undergraduate learning (Pearson Custom Edition ed., p. 3,5,11,12). New York: Pearson.
Schellenberg, S., Negishi, M., & Eggen, P. (2011). The Effects of Metacognition and Concrete Encoding Strategies on Depth of Understanding in Educational Psychology. Teaching Educational Psychology, 7(2), 17-24.
Svinicki, M. (2017). Supporting the Cognitive Skills Behind Note-Taking. The National Teaching & Learning Forum, 26(2), 11–12. https://doi.org/10.1002/ntlf.30104
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