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Developmental dynamics of metacognitive knowledge and text comprehension skill in the first primary school years

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Abstract

The aim of this study was, firstly, to explore the development of primary school children’s metacognitive knowledge from preschool to the 2nd grade and the development of their text comprehension skill from the 1st grade to the 3rd grade. Secondly, the developmental dynamics between metacognitive knowledge (MCK) and text comprehension skill (CS) across the first three school years were investigated. The longitudinal sample included 181 children who were tested three times from preschool spring to the spring term of the 3rd grade using an identical set of measurements: the Metacognitive Knowledge Test and Listening and Reading Comprehension Tests. In studying developmental change using Latent Growth Curve modelling (LGC), no uni-construct effect for the development of MCK or for text CS was found. However, a slight multi-construct cumulative development between the children’s MCK and reading CS was identified. Thus, it could be cautiously interpreted that the more the children’s MCK developed from preschool to the end of the 2nd grade, the better reading CS they showed during the first three school years.

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Notes

  1. The means and standard deviations of each measure in each measurement point and sample sizes of the present and the original samples are shown in the Appendix.

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Acknowledgements

The present study is based on a longitudinal study (Decoding, Comprehension, and Motivation) conducted at the Centre for Learning Research, and supported by grant no. 1071265 and grant no. 4131 from the Council for Social Sciences Research, the Academy of Finland, to Marja Vauras and Pekka Niemi. We would like to thank the heads, teachers and students of 14 kindergartens and four primary schools in Turku, who unfortunately must remain anonymous.

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  1. Centre for Learning Research, University of Turku, Turku, Finland

    Tiina Annevirta & Riitta Kinnunen

  2. Department of Teacher Education, University of Turku, Turku, Finland

    Eero Laakkonen & Marja Vauras

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  1. Tiina Annevirta
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  2. Eero Laakkonen
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  4. Marja Vauras
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Correspondence to Tiina Annevirta.

Appendix

Appendix

Table 4 Means (M), standard deviations (SD) and sample sizes (N) of the metacognitive knowledge and text comprehension skill variables
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Annevirta, T., Laakkonen, E., Kinnunen, R. et al. Developmental dynamics of metacognitive knowledge and text comprehension skill in the first primary school years. Metacognition Learning 2, 21–39 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11409-007-9005-x

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