An Exploratory Study on Teachers’ Awareness and Application of Metacognition in a Vocational Education and Training Institution in Malta

Metacognition is an emergent field in educational neuroscience and is cited as one of the key skills for the twenty-first century. Scholars found that metacognition can be taught and leads to students’ higher academic achievement. This exploratory study was conducted with three teachers practising in a vocational education and training (VET) institution. Their accounts were coded using qualitative data analysis software and reflexive thematic analysis was used to analyse the data. The findings indicate that all teachers had prior awareness of metacognition but no specific details on metacognitive processes in their teaching emerged from their accounts. They shared various strategies applied in their teaching; however, these strategies did not evidence the intentional application of metacognition. They expressed various challenges encountered which they felt impacted their teaching. Two out of the three teachers stated that they would benefit from further training on metacognition as part of their continuous professional development (CPD). The findings of this study could leverage further research on teaching strategies and metacognition in Malta. Such research merits developing and expanding further by including more teachers or implementing a longitudinal study with teachers and students focusing on the promotion and application of metacognition in VET.