Symposium: A Tripartite Model of Collaborative Professional Learning to Build Metacognitive Learner Strategies in the Teaching and Learning of Reading - A Case Study

This Symposium comprises three papers tracing a case study of how teachers’ and learners’ needs in English Language Reading classrooms in a Singapore secondary school have been addressed through a tripartite model of collaborative professional learning.  The tripartite collaboration involves a researcher, a pedagogical expert and six practitioners who seek to build metacognitive learner strategies for reading in students while also applying these strategies in their respective areas of practice.
 
Paper 1
Title:  Facilitating Collaborative Professional Learning towards a Theory-informed Practice of Building Metacognitive Learner Strategies in the Teaching and Learning of Reading in a Secondary English Language Classroom
Authors: Leong, C., Lee, N.H., Ahmad, A., & Tan, G.J.
Metacognition has been recognised as a key to successful, self-directed learning (Garrison, 1997; Israel, Block, Bauserman, & Kinnucan-Welsch, 2005; Schraw & Gutierrez, 2015).  This paper examines the process by which a master teacher of English Language facilitated the collaborative professional learning of a core group of six English Language teachers to build metacognitive learner strategies for the teaching and learning of reading in a secondary school.  The paper also examines the important role of metacognition in the teachers’ pedagogical practice and in the students’ developing practice of close and critical reading.  Finally, it discusses the contribution of a researcher and expert in metacognition to this process of the teachers’ learning and application of metacognition in their professional and pedagogical practices.
 
Paper 2
Title: Towards an Operationalisation of Metacognition for the Teaching and Learning of Reading in the English Language Classroom 
Authors: Lee, N.H., & Leong, C.
Flavell (1976)’s idea of metacognition involved knowledge about and of cognition as well as the processes of monitoring and regulation of cognitive actions.  Flavell (1979 and 1987) subsequently developed other related constructs, such as metacognitive knowledge and metacognitive experience.  In 1992, Schoenfeld observed that there was no agreement among researchers on a single definition of the term, metacognition.  Lee (2015, Jul; 2016, Apr) argued that, as in the case for content instruction, it is necessary in the teaching of metacognition that the constructs of metacognition be broken down and rendered learnable in the classroom.  This paper examines the literature on metacognition in an attempt to operationalise metacognition for teaching and learning in the subject areas.  It also discusses the implications of such an operationalisation for teacher professional learning, and the impact on classroom instruction that supports the development of metacognition.
 
Paper 3
Title: Developing a Theory-informed Programmatic Approach to Building Metacognitive Learner Strategies in the Teaching and Learning of Reading in the English Language Classroom
Authors:Ahmad, A., Leong, C., & Lee, N.H.
This paper examines how a Head of Department for English Language in a secondary school collaborated with a master teacher of English Language and a researcher and expert in metacognition to build a culture of metacognitive practice among the English Language teachers and their students in the school.  The paper also examines the process by which the collaborative professional learning of a core group of six teachers was extended to the rest of the teachers in the English Language department.  Finally, it assesses the impact of this developing culture of metacognitive practice – in both the staff room and the classrooms – on students’ practice and performance in reading.