The use of metacognitive strategies in L2 reading

Authors

  • Cristián Sanhueza Campos Universidad Santo Tomás, Sede Talca, Av. Carlos Schorr Nº 255, Talca

Abstract

Reading comprehension strategies become relevant as they reveal, not only the way in which the learner organizes and evaluates de completion of a task, but also the way in which he or she interacts with the learning materials, applies specific resources and makes use of social interaction devices. In this small-scale research work, the author has attempted to give an account of the use of metacognitive strategies in reading comprehension by successful and unsuccessful learners of English as a foreign language, establishing possible relations between these two variables. For the accomplishment of such objective, specific models were used. A taxonomy of learning strategies proposed by O’Malley and Chamot (1990) and the concept of ‘good learner’ proposed by Ellis (1994) were used to classify the subjects of this study. Results show that successful learners were more effective in using metacognitive strategies when performing reading comprehension tasks.

Keywords:

Metacognitive strategies, reading comprehension, successful learners