TY - JOUR
T1 - Developing Student Metacognition through Reflective Writing in an Upper Level Undergraduate Anatomy Course
AU - O’Loughlin, Valerie Dean
AU - Griffith, Lauren Miller
N1 - Funding Information:
Preliminary results were presented at the Experimental Biology meetings (O’Loughlin and Griffith, 2011, 2013, O’Loughlin, 2014). Thank you to the Anatomy A480/580 students who participated in this study. Jackie Cullison helped distribute consent forms, de-identified blog entries, and organized blog entries into a common database. Kathryn Propst, formerly of Indiana University Center for Innovative Teaching and Learning (CITL), assisted the authors in utilizing the blog tool in Oncourse (the learning management system). The authors thank the anonymous reviewers and the editors for their feedback on earlier versions of this manuscript.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 American Association of Anatomists
PY - 2020/11/1
Y1 - 2020/11/1
N2 - Incorporating metacognitive strategies in the classroom helps students monitor and adjust their learning strategies throughout the semester, and helps students progress from novice to expert learners in a subject. Journaling (i.e., reflective writing) is one metacognitive task that allows students to contemplate and articulate their skill development as they learn a new subject. The research reported here examines the use of ‘blogs’ (i.e., online journals) in an upper level undergraduate human anatomy course. The blogs both facilitated development of students' metacognitive skills and provided researchers insight into student metacognitive process. Data were examined from 92 students from three successive semesters (spring 2010, 2012 and 2014). Each student reviewed 10 radiology online cases throughout the semester and then reflected on their understanding of anatomy and radiology in an online blog for each case. A total of 927 blogs were examined for this research. The researchers used a grounded theory approach to analyze the blog narratives and develop a codebook based on common themes. The 927 blogs yielded 11,082 statements that were coded with the codebook. As the semester progressed, the blog entries showed that students demonstrated greater self-confidence in their abilities to understand the subject matter, expressed greater enthusiasm for anatomy in general, and they improved their metacognitive skills. This research illustrates that reflective writing in an undergraduate anatomy course not only facilitates improvement in student metacognitive skills, but also provides the instructor with evidence how a student progresses from novice to more experienced learner in anatomy.
AB - Incorporating metacognitive strategies in the classroom helps students monitor and adjust their learning strategies throughout the semester, and helps students progress from novice to expert learners in a subject. Journaling (i.e., reflective writing) is one metacognitive task that allows students to contemplate and articulate their skill development as they learn a new subject. The research reported here examines the use of ‘blogs’ (i.e., online journals) in an upper level undergraduate human anatomy course. The blogs both facilitated development of students' metacognitive skills and provided researchers insight into student metacognitive process. Data were examined from 92 students from three successive semesters (spring 2010, 2012 and 2014). Each student reviewed 10 radiology online cases throughout the semester and then reflected on their understanding of anatomy and radiology in an online blog for each case. A total of 927 blogs were examined for this research. The researchers used a grounded theory approach to analyze the blog narratives and develop a codebook based on common themes. The 927 blogs yielded 11,082 statements that were coded with the codebook. As the semester progressed, the blog entries showed that students demonstrated greater self-confidence in their abilities to understand the subject matter, expressed greater enthusiasm for anatomy in general, and they improved their metacognitive skills. This research illustrates that reflective writing in an undergraduate anatomy course not only facilitates improvement in student metacognitive skills, but also provides the instructor with evidence how a student progresses from novice to more experienced learner in anatomy.
KW - blogs
KW - gross anatomy education
KW - grounded theory
KW - journal writing
KW - medical imaging
KW - metacognition
KW - qualitative research
KW - radiology education
KW - undergraduate education
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85080143085&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1002/ase.1945
DO - 10.1002/ase.1945
M3 - Article
C2 - 31965753
AN - SCOPUS:85080143085
VL - 13
SP - 680
EP - 693
JO - Anatomical Sciences Education
JF - Anatomical Sciences Education
SN - 1935-9772
IS - 6
ER -