Biology Teachers’ Metacognitive Awareness of Teaching: The Case of Biology Teachers in Postgraduate Diploma in Teaching Program

Abstract

Metacognitive awareness of teachers has been considered as an important focus area of educational research. The objective of this study was to examine metacognitive awareness of biology teachers. The study used a descriptive research method. The study involved 90 biology teachers enrolled in summer I and II postgraduate diploma in teaching program. Data were collected using the 24-item Metacognitive Awareness Inventory for Teachers (MAIT) developed by Balcikanli (2011). The analysis was made using an independent sample t-test and a one- way ANOVA. The results revealed that the biology teachers have a high level of metacognitive awareness of teaching. No significant differences were found in metacognitive awareness in relation to teachers’ gender, bachelor degree program and teaching experience. However, a significant difference was found out between gender, bachelor degree program and teaching experience in the planning sub-component of metacognitive awareness. The finding indicated that female teachers were better aware of planning than males with respect to bachelor degree program and experience. Moreover, there was a significant difference in awareness to the subcomponents of knowledge of cognition. The result indicated that Biology teachers were more aware of declarative knowledge than procedural knowledge. Although there was a variation in some components of metacognition, biology teachers attending postgraduate program had high metacognitive awareness.