are a prerequisite both of first language acquisition and of early
socialization and acculturation (208)
3.3.2.1 Metacognitive strategies
Metacognitive strategies have been identified in several ways. Wenden uses the term
self-management strategies and Holec refers to skills of self-directed learning. O'Malley and
Chamot defined metacognitive strategies as learning strategies that
are higher order skills (and) may entail planning for, monitoring, or evaluating the
success of a learning activity (and) are applicable to a variety of learning tasks.
(1990,44)
Metacognitive strategies are higher order skills in the sense that they are processes that have
control over other cognitive processes (Crookes; 1989,367), that is to say, they are strategies
to develop strategies. Skehan gives a very straightforward definition of them:
They are cognitive because of the nature of the operations that they involve
and meta since there can be a self-awareness built in their operation.
(1995,93)
Metacognitive strategies, according to Chamot (1987,72) and Wenden (1991,25) are
not specific to particular tasks but they can "be applied to virtually all types of learning
tasks"(ibid). This is the main difference between these and cognitive tasks, which are task-
specific.
Metacognitive strategies have also been divided into three subgroups: planning,
monitoring and evaluating strategies. According to O'Malley and Chamot (1990,44), the
selection of the metacognitive strategy is related to the type of task that the learner is
carrying out. However, I explain the difference between the three types in terms of time. In a
natural way, it is possible to divide the process of carrying out a task into three phases:
before, during and after. These three phases correspond to planning, monitoring and
evaluation. In other words, planning means preparing oneself for a learning task, monitoring
is checking one's own performance while doing a learning task and evaluating consists of
checking performance once the task is over (ibid, 119). As I see it, Wenden's term "self-
regulation" (1991,106) is perfect to label the metacognitive process that implies the use of
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