Enhancing Metacognitive Inference Activities Using Eye-movements on One’s Academic Paper

Abstract

Metacognitive thinking skills are essential for learning. Performing writing activities with experts is a great opportunity for learners to construct metacognitive knowledge by inferring experts’ critical reading processes. In this study, we refer to “metacognitive inference activities” as learners’ inferring activities of experts’ metacognitive knowledge in their critical readings. In order to promote such learners’ metacognitive inference activities, we first discuss about learning processes using learners’ own academic paper and eye- movements during their critical reading to find metacognitive knowledge without instructions. Then, we propose a system featuring three types of visualization based on learners’ and experts’ eye-movements information. Experimental results showed that the visualized information of comparative heat map (C-view) and experts’ eye-movement processes (EM- view) promote learners’ metacognitive inference activities. More specifically, EM-view increasingly promotes their reflections toward being aware of metacognitive knowledge without instructions.