The contribution of cognitive and metacognitive strategy use to seventh grade students' science achievement

---

Tezin Türü: Yüksek Lisans

Tezin Yürütüldüğü Kurum: Orta Doğu Teknik Üniversitesi, Eğitim Fakültesi, Matematik ve Fen Bilimleri Eğitimi Bölümü, Türkiye

Tezin Onay Tarihi: 2009

Öğrenci: GÜLSÜM AKYOL

Eş Danışman: SEMRA SUNGUR, CEREN ÖZTEKİN

Özet:

The purposes of the study were to examine the differences in the level of students’ cognitive and metacognitive strategy use and to investigate the contribution of cognitive and metacognitive strategy use (rehearsal, elaboration, organization, critical thinking, and metacognitive self-regulation) to 7th grade students’ science achievement. This study also interested in exploring the relationships between students’ background characteristics (gender, prior knowledge, socioeconomic status) and the variables including students’ cognitive and metacognitive strategy use and science achievement. The study was carried out during 2007-2008 spring semester at 15 public elementary schools in Keçiören, district of Ankara. A total of 1517 seventh grade students who were volunteers and had permission from their parents involved in the study. Data were collected through Background Characteristics Survey, Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire and Science Achievement Test and analyzed by using a One-Way Repeated ANOVA, Multiple Linear Regression Analyses and a Canonical Correlation Analysis. The analyses revealed that there were significant differences in the level of students’ cognitive and metacognitive strategy use scores. Besides, elaboration and metacognitive self-regulation strategy use made a statistically significant contribution to the prediction of students’ achievement in science (p<.05). Metacognitive self-regulation strategy use was found to be the main predictor of science achievement (beta=.11). The first canonical variate indicated that prior knowledge, mother’s educational level, father’s educational level, number of reading materials at home, frequency of buying a daily newspaper, presence of a separate study room, presence of a computer with internet connection at home are associated with cognitive and metacognitive strategy use and science achievement.