An Overview: Metacognition in Education

Abstract

Metacognition refers to “thinking about thinking” or our ability to know what we know, what we don’t know and how to regulate as well as control such thinking. This article seeks to give an overview of some issues related to metacognition, a construct which received a considerable attention on the part of teaching theoreticians and researchers. It starts with a brief introduction of metacognition and then gives an account of its various definitions and components. The differences between cognition and metacognition are also mentioned. It concludes with some ideas and research findings on the teachability of this construct in different fields of study, especially language education.