Increasing ELLs' Awareness and Use of Metacognitive Strategies

The goal of this study was to examine how reciprocal teaching (RT) (Palincsar & Brown, 1984), could be effectively implemented in two fifth grade classrooms to increase Latino/a students' awareness and use of metacognitive strategies. A formative experiment (Reinking & Bradley, 2008) was selected as the design of this study to achieve a pedagogical goal that had implications for improving outcomes for all stakeholders. According to the Pew Research Center (Passel & Cohn, 2011), the growth in Latino/a population rose more than expected over the last 20 years. Latino/a population directly impacts teachers and the additional instructional requirements they may face in coming years. The reality of public schooling is that the majority of teachers are not bilingual. However, monolingual teachers still need to address the needs of English language learners. Through RT, an instructional strategy that has been around for 26 years, the teachers and students in this study engaged in activities that embedded metacognitive conversation into the social studies lesson.

J. Elizabeth Casey received her undergraduate degree from the University of Texas at Austin, and her MA and PhD degrees from Clemson University, South Carolina. Her research interests include supporting English language learners in the classroom and effective teacher preparation programs. She teaches courses at Huntingdon College in Alabama.