Investigation of cognitive and metacognitive strategies of preservice science teachers during the technological design process

The aims of this research are to determine the cognitive and metacognitive strategies used by preservice science teachers and define these strategies and also identify the similarities and differences among extreme groups which have different cognitive and metacognitive awareness. In the research, the case study which is one of the qualitative researches was adopted and holistic single-case study was used. Participants were selected by using the method of the criterion sampling which is the one of purposeful sampling. For the pilot scheme, fourth graders (students) from Duzce University Faculty of Education Department of Science Education (located in Turkey) participated in and in the same university; the third graders (students) participated in for the main application. There were 15 participants among 41 students from main application who constitute the higher and lower group. Technological design was applied by these participants in different days. The data of researchers were composed of the diary of thoughts of participants, thinking aloud protocols recorded during making technological design and interview records made after their design to detailing the thinking aloud protocols and also observations of researchers. The data were analyzed via content analyze. Findings of the research were composed of: (i) Cognitive and metacognitive strategies of the participants during the technological design process were defined. (ii) In which stage of the technological design which strategies followed and how these strategies are used by the participants were described. (iii) The same and different aspects of cognitive and metacognitive strategies of participants divided into two groups according to the level of metacognitive awareness and academic success as a higher and lower group were established. (iv) The number of thoughts of participants about designing during the technological design process and the differences between these lower and higher groups in terms of the quality of these thoughts were investigated. At the end of the analyze of the data, findings indicate that participants use both cognitive and metacognitive strategies during design process whichever group they belong to. From this perspective, 23 different strategies aroused from during the technological design process. From these strategies; 9 of them are determined as cognitive strategies, 8 of them are determined as metacognitive strategies and 6 of them are determined as both cognitive and metacognitive strategies. When findings belong to two groups are examined, it has been found that while participants in lower groups have used cognitive strategies mostly, participants in higher groups have used metacognitive strategies mostly. It is concluded that the number of ideas produced by higher group about design are more than the number of ideas produced by lower group about design and also with respect to total strategies, higher group has more cognitive and metacognitive strategies and more diversity of these strategies than lower group used during the technological design process. Additionally, it has been found that strategies used by all participants during the evaluation phase of design process are less than the strategies used during planning and application phase. Keywords: cognitive strategy, metacognitive strategy, technology, design, technological design cycle