Elementary Students’ Metacognition and Epistemological Beliefs….pdfVIP

Elementary Education Online, 8(3), 676-693, 2009. lkö retim Online, 8(3), 676-693, 2009. [Online]: .tr Elementary Students’ Metacognition and Epistemological Beliefs Considering Science Achievement, Gender and Socioeconomic Status Mustafa Sami TOPÇU1 Özgül YILMAZ-TÜZÜN2 ABSTRACT. There were two focuses in this study. The first one was to investigate the relationship among science achievement, metacognition, and epistemological beliefs for both 4th and 5th grade and 6th through 8th grade students. The second focus was to explore the relationships among gender, socioeconomic status (SES), metacognition, and epistemological beliefs. Altogether 941 elementary students participated in this study. For 4th and 5th grade students, knowledge of cognition, regulation of cognition, and quick learning contributed to science achievement. For 6th through 8th grade students, knowledge of cognition, regulation of cognition, innate ability, and quick learning contributed to science achievement. For both group of students, while metacognition was related both to gender and SES, epistemological beliefs were mostly related to gender. Key Words: science achievement, epistemological beliefs, metacognition, SES, gender INTRODUCTION As components of self-regulated learning, metacognition and epistemological beliefs currently have gained researchers’ attention in an effort to understand better students’ achievement all around the world (Braten Stromso, 2005; Schommer, 1993; Sperling, Howard, Miller, Murphy, 2002). Generally researchers have two research traditions separately to understand development and change in students’ epistemological beliefs (e.g. Conley, Pintrich, Veki