By Janet Price, Regional Director of Community Education and Transition, CLE Rockville

What is metacognition?

How CLE Rockville Students Learn
We recently had a roundtable discussion with students from CLE Rockville about this term, which the dictionary defines as: higher-order thinking that enables understanding, analysis, and control of one’s cognitive processes, especially when engaged in learning. Or put simply, thinking about how you think. Why do we want to do this? Because understanding how you think and how you process information can help lead to effective strategies for learning and studying.

We asked our students, “How do you learn, and how do you study?” This sparked some interesting and insightful conversation.

Evan

There isn’t just one way I learn, it changes based on the situation and what would best fit what is needed. If I’m welding, that’s different than writing something down. It’s listening and being hands-on, versus writing down. When I’m doing a test, I’d say my learning style changes to visual. I don’t think I have a “best” style. I adapt.

Ben

I’m a visual learner. I have to see something in order to comprehend it. To study, I go over my notes.

Zed

I learn best by lecture, maybe a combination of auditory and visual. When I study, I have a good memory for facts, although not events. Lectures are preferred.

Sochi

I am a visual learner. I see something once, monkey see, monkey do, monkey remembers for the rest of his life! When I hear something, I’ll sometimes ask, “Can you repeat that?” I need to see things, and sometimes if someone’s talking too fast I need them to slow down. If they talk too fast and too long, I’ll get lost. With my Asperger’s, we see so much more. Sensory stimulation is different. I think our senses are higher than those of the average person. Something like hearing someone crack their gum on the bus can be so irritating! But while I’m not really good at social skills, I am really good at other things. It’s like I have minuses in social skills, but plus, plus, plus in other areas.

Evan

I know what you mean. Because I have ADHD, I do very well in Tae Kwan Do. I can change focus very quickly.

Sochi

When the universe gave me Asperger’s, it’s like it’s a gamer – like they took all of the charisma points, and put those points in other places.

Zed

Like we’re all Dungeon and Dragon wizards!