The Use of Reflective Journal as a Tool for Monitoring of Metacognition Growth in Writing

Abstract

Reflective journals are used as a technique of self-reflection in the learning process. By integrating the process of metacognition, a reflective journal guideline was developed to knowing students' metacognition growth in writing. The reflective journal guidelines are designed in the form of self-questioning to make it easier for students to express their metacognition processes during their writing assignments. The metacognition process consists of three, namely awareness, evaluation, and regulation. The reflective journal guidelines that were compiled was given to 50 students. Before writing a reflective journal, students are asked to work on the task of writing explanatory texts. Students monitor the metacognition growth of while writing the explanatory text using reflective journal guidelines. Research findings show that reflective journal guidelines can be used to monitor the growth of students' metacognition in writing. Both students who are used to writing and who are not accustomed to writing can express their writing experience by answering questions in the reflective journal guidelines. This finding also shows that teachers must always encourage students to always write reflective journals in order to monitor metacognition growth in writing, ranging from raising awareness about knowledge and task completion efforts, monitoring the quality of the results obtained, and fostering the habit of planning, setting goals, and apply certain strategies in completing tasks. Students who are used to writing reflective journals in the learning process will be able to develop their writing skills and will become independent learners.

Students’ Metacognitive Awareness and Its Impact on Writing Skill

“…By reading reflective journals written by students, teachers can find out students' beliefs about assignments and how to do assignments, so that teachers can help students to develop more effective learning strategies in the classroom (Horwitz, 1988). In addition to developing metacognitive awareness, journals writing can also help foster student metacognition in writing, namely awareness of knowledge and task completion efforts, monitoring the process and quality of results obtained, and habits to plan, set goals, and implement certain strategies in completing assignments (Ramadhanti, Ghazali, Hasanah, Harsiati, & Yanda, 2020).…”

How Participation in a Research Experiences for Undergraduate Program Transforms Chemistry and Biochemistry Majors’ Understanding of Research and Scientific Inquiry

“…REU program directors can facilitate students’ development of a more accurate understanding of research and scientific inquiry by incorporating metacognitive activities such as reflective journals . The approach has been used widely in the social sciences and STEM though not in chemistry. − Reflective journaling has been used to assess students’ growth in undergraduate research experiences and promote their metacognitive awareness of their learning and growth as scientists , and their epistemological development . Reflective journaling uses a series of questions called “prompts” to get the journal’s author to evaluate their thoughts, feelings, knowledge, or values on a specific event or activity.…”

Scholarly Text Writing Workshop: The Investigation of Cognitive Processes in Writing Article

“…To get quality writing, writers can use a checklist that can be used as a tool to measure the progress of writing articles. This checklist can also function as a writing journal because through this checklist it can be measured to what extent the development of writing and the author can overcome the weaknesses encountered in the process of developing ideas Ramadhanti, Ghazali, Hasanah, Harsiati, & Yanda, 2020). The checklist is visualized in the form of Table 5 below.…”