The Role of Metacognition in the Development of EFL Learners’ Listening Skill

Abstract

This study investigated the impact of metacognitive instruction on the listening skill, and metacognitive knowledge of a group of male students (N = 30) who were learning English as a Foreign Language (EFL) in Iran. The study participants spoke Persian as a first language and were high-intermediate EFL learners. The participants received a guided lesson plan in metacognition (planning, monitoring, and evaluation) through a pedagogical cycle approach over a semester (eight weeks). International English Language Testing System listening tests (practice) were used to track the participants' listening performance. Participants also completed a Metacognitive Awareness Listening Questionnaire, which examined their use of metacognitive awareness when engaged in listening tasks. Results indicated that the students improved their listening skill after being taught about metacognition; however, no significant use of metacognitive awareness was reported. This study concludes with a discussion of some potential implications, and provides scope for future research. INTRODUCTIONListening plays a basic role in communication, but in pedagogy and research on second and foreign language (L2/FL) learning, it has received less attention than other conventional skills. The reasons for this inadequate attention are the dearth of research and the complexity of the process of learning listening skill (Lynch, 2011). However, in the last decade, some studies (Cross, 2011;Goh, 2008;Vandergrift, 2007) have focused on developing listening skill through metacognitive instruction. Using metacognitive instruction not only helps listeners to improve their listening performance, but it also helps teachers to rethink how they teach listening skill in the classroom. Metacognitive instruction requires teachers to prepare a lesson plan, which highlights listening process more than listening product. This notion of sequential learning tasks in a lesson plan assists listeners to control listening input strategically.To help L2/FL listeners to enhance their listening performance, language teachers should pay considerable attention to the listening pedagogy and emphasize the process of listening skill instruction. In some language classrooms, listening products are the core of listening instruction, and lesson plans in listening instruction are of no use due to time constraints. This lack of BOZORGIAN substantial trend towards lesson plans in listening instruction leads L2/FL students to think that listening skill is the most difficult skill to improve in language learning. Attaining a high level of listening performance is an important purpose for many language learners and is a central pedagogical objective of some language teaching courses. Listening skill plays a pivotal role in L2/FL learning; however, it is not easy for listeners to develop, particularly in a foreign language learning context. Thus, teachers should help listeners to develop a pedagogical understanding of metacognition.

The Impact of Listening Strategy Training on the Meta-Cognitive Listening Strategies Awareness of Different Learner Types

“…Thus, the null-hypothesis is rejected. It is worth mentioning that other studies (e.g., Coskun, 2010;Kummin & Rahman, 2010;Movahed, 2014;Bozorgian, 2014) prove the outcome of the current research in regards to the www.ccsenet.org/elt English Language Teaching Vol. 9, No.…”

“…In addition, Vandergrift (2007) identified a causal relationship between significant improvement in listening comprehension and metacognitive instruction. Furthermore, a great deal of research studies in the EFL context, have revealed the relationship between metacognitive listening strategies awareness and second language listeners (Vandergrift et al, 2006;Goh, 2008;Bozorgian, 2014), motivation orientation and proficiency in L2 listening (Vandergrift, 2005), learning style (Bidabadi & Yamat, 2011), gender (Rahimi & Katal, 2011), EFL learners' listening sub-skills (Dousti & Abolfathiasl, 2013), and motivation (Rahimirad & Shams, 2014).…”

Less-skilled learners benefit more from metacognitive instruction to develop listening comprehension

“…Therefore, using a strategy-based instruction in listening comprehension requires learners to have enough time to apply the strategies already instructed the sequential tasks. Thus, learners in this study went through metacognitive instruction for an eight week interval, which is sufficient for using the same test without inducing systematic variance in the data (see Bozorgian, 2014 One reason for students' agonizing feeling over their listening comprehension is the low profile of attention paid to the cognitive nature of listening comprehension tasks in comparison with other three language skills in the classroom. This is because the process, instruction and assessment of second language listening comprehension is less perceived and researched than other three skills.…”

“…To reduce the complexity of listening comprehension for less-skilled learners, 'metacognitive instruction' is used to control the process of listening comprehension. Managing the process of listening comprehension through metacognitive instruction using a strategy promotes the outcome of listening comprehension (Bozorgian, 2014;Vandergrift & Tafaghodtari, 2010). Thus, the focus of this study is to examine whether metacognitive instruction benefits less-skilled and more-skilled learners' listening comprehension.…”

Examining the relation between metacognitive understanding of what is listened to and metacognitive awareness levels of secondary school students

“…Individuals whose understanding what is listened levels are high may comprehend the purpose of the classes better than others. When the literature is examined, it is observed that, as Ozbay and Dasoz (2014) reported in their studies, the majority of the studies on metacognitive strategies focused on understanding what is listened to and on the listening in the process of acquiring a second language (Bozorgian, 2014;Rahimirad and Shams, 2014;Rahimi and Katal, 2013;Vandergrift, Goh and Mareschal, 2006;Vandergrift, 2005;Serri et al, 2012;Goh and Hu, 2013;Dabbagh and Noshadi, 2014). In this study, the influence of metacognitive awareness on listening in the mother tongue has been dealt with.…”