Collaborative Group Work and
 Individual Development of 
Metacognition in the Early Years

Shirley Larkin
Centre for the Advancement of Thinking
King’s College, University of London

Address for Correspondence:
Shirley Larkin
53 Bonnington Grove
Exeter, Devon, EX1 2QY

Email: slarkin@175a.freeserve.co.uk
			       Tel:  01392-496-312

Collaborative Group Work and Individual Development of Metacognition in the Early Years

Shirley Larkin
Kings’ College, London

Abstract
This paper tracks the individual development of metacognition in two five year old children over an academic year as they engage in a cognitive acceleration through science education programme (CASE@KS1).

Using qualitative analysis and case study methods it shows how collaborative group work with small children impacts on the development of individual metacognitive processing.  Important variables that facilitate or hinder this development are teased out and relationships between the groups and the individual are analysed.

Difficulties with the concept of metacognition and in particular how to assess and measure it are discussed.  A framework of analysis based on verbal interactions is developed from the early theories of metacognition and this is combined with an in depth grounded analysis.  This approach provides insight into what we mean when we speak of young children being metacognitive.
(Key words: case studies; development of metacognition; early years; group work)

Introduction
Since the 1970s research on metacognition has developed from early definitions of the concept to ways of applying the theories to practice in the classroom.  A useful definition of the concept is that metacognition involves being able to reflect on one’s own thinking and to consciously monitor and control that thinking in pursuit of a goal (Brown, 1987; Flavell, 1979). There is also a consensus that metacognition is important for certain types of learning.  It has been shown to be important in problem solving, (Antonietti, Ignazi, & Perego, 2000; Chi, Glaser, & Rees, 1982; Davidson, Deuser, & Sternberg, 1994; Flavell, 1976; Hayes, 1981; Kontos & Nicholas, 1986; Swanson, 1990) and positive links have been found between metacognitive processing and academic attainment in a number of curriculum areas including reading, (Hacker, 1998; Jacobs & Paris, 1987; Myers & Paris, 1978); maths,(Carr & Biddlecomb, 1998; Schoenfeld, 1992) and science, (Georghiades, 2000; Rickey & Stacy, 2000; Shayer & Adey, 1988). Alongside this there has been a number of thinking skills interventions which incorporate metacognition as an aspect of a larger cognitive programme (Baird & Mitchell, 1986; Feuerstein, Rand, Hoffman, & Miller, 1980; Hennessey, 1999).  McGuinness (1999) provides an overview of many such interventions. 

This paper reports findings from a qualitative study of metacognition in the first year of primary school in England.  The children in this study were engaged in a year long cognitive acceleration through science education programme (CASE@KS1) which involved them working in collaborative groups of six to solve science and maths based problems. This paper aims to show how metacognition is facilitated and developed within the classroom and how working as a group impacts on the individual in terms of metacognitive processing. In addition to viewing metacognition as important for academic attainment in core curriculum areas such as science, maths and literacy, this paper follows Flavell’s early research in suggesting that the development of metacognitive processing is also important in the development of the whole person:
“Perhaps it is stretching the meanings of metacognition too far to include the critical appraisal of message source, quality of appeal, and probable consequences needed to cope with these inputs sensibly, but I do not think so.  It is at least conceivable that the ideas currently brewing in this area could someday be parlayed into a method of teaching children (and adults) to make wise and thoughtful life decisions as well as to comprehend and learn better in formal educational settings” (Flavell, 1979) p.910

Conceptual Framework

One of the problems with work on metacognition has been clarity about definition.  In analysing classroom data this can lead to confusion about what is and what is not metacognition.  In part this problem arises when metacognition is seen as something tangible, something fixed, something we can put our finger on and say that is metacognition.  In some cases this is possible, but it is unlikely to be so in year one classrooms where the children are just five years old.  Metacognition develops with age, (Flavell, 2000) and with practice (Doran & Cameron, 1995). Interactions with others can provide the stimulus needed for the individual to become more aware of their cognitive processing, (Wertsch, 1978). A further line of research on metacognition has emphasised the development of the self-system and its correspondence with the development of self-regulated learning, (Borokowski, Carr, Rellinger, & Pressley, 1990; Kopp, 1982; Schunk, 1989). Furthermore metacognitive beliefs about the nature of intelligence and individual cognition are formed in early childhood through social interactions (Dweck, Hong, & Chiu, 1993). These constructions can then impact on future learning (Thomas, 2000). It is thus important that children have the chance to develop metacognition, to construct and reconstruct these beliefs, and to challenge and be open to challenges to these beliefs. The research presented here employs a phenomenological perspective of the dynamic interaction between the development of the self and the development of metacognition, (McCombs, 1989) and attempts to describe how membership of a group collaborating towards a single goal can impact on this interaction.

Context
The children in this study are involved in the CASE@KS1 programme which ran in 14 Year one classes in 10 primary schools in one London Borough over one academic year from September 1999 to July 2000.  The 10 schools taking part in the project were matched by 5 control schools in the same borough so that quantitative evaluation of the programme could be carried out (Adey, 2002). The borough is one that is very mixed in terms of social and economic factors, but the schools involved as both experimental and control schools for this intervention are seen as having relatively high levels of social deprivation and generally low academic attainment.  The area is ethnically and culturally diverse and this is reflected in the schools. For example, it is not uncommon to find more than twenty languages being spoken in the same school.  Many classes have specialist English language support workers as well as teaching assistants, volunteer helpers, students, special needs assistants and in this case researchers.  A year one class in one of these schools can at any one time include a number of adults as well as approximately 30 children.

The CASE@KS1 programme is an extension of Shayer and Adey’s work on cognitive acceleration through science education at key stage 3 which had positive results on academic attainment in science in secondary schools (Adey & Shayer, 1994). All CASE interventions are based upon Piagetian stage development theory combined with a broad Vygotskyan framework emphasisng the social construction of knowledge and thinking.  The key stage one programme aims to accelerate the development of children’s thinking from the pre-operational to the concrete operational stage (Piaget & Inhelder, 1969). In order to do this twenty six activities were designed by the research team based upon the schema described by Piaget and Inhelder as characteristic of concrete operations (Inhelder & Piaget, 1958). A schema is conceptualised as a general way of thinking which may be applied to a wide variety of specific contexts. The schema used for the design of the activities in CASE@KS1 are those seen as fundamental to scientific (and to mathematical) thinking.  These are seriation, classification, points of view, causality and concrete modelling.  For instance classification is necessary for many science activities including the fundamental classifying of things as living or non living, points of view is an important basic concept for understanding the planetary system and concrete modelling is used by scientists to describe and understand scientific theories such as magnetism.  Whilst the CASE@KS1 activities can be linked to the science curriculum in this way, the actual activities are often more general for instance: seriating a number of sticks of different lengths, classifying shapes by different variables. Some activities are however more obviously scientific in nature for instance. Some examples are (a) investigating the cause of shadows and (b) deciding whether bottles filled with more or less rice will roll down a slope and using this rule to predict the result of other bottles.  Whilst the activities are many and varied within their schema, each activity also follows a set structure.  This structure is referred to as the “pillars” of CASE.  Each CASE@KS1 task is worked in a group of up to six children with the teacher as facilitator.  The teacher structures the task around the five pillars of CASE as follows:

Concrete Preparation	Introduction to the problem
Context
Introduction to materials and vocabulary	
Cognitive Conflict	Intellectual challenge
Difficulty geared to Vygotskyan theory of ZPD
Support provided by the teacher	
Social Construction	Discussing ideas within the group
Asking for explanations
Describing own ideas	
Metacognition	Becoming conscious of one’s own thinking	
Bridging	Using the schema in other contexts	
(Edited from (Shayer & Adey, 2002)

The teacher’s role is to monitor the children’s thinking skills and to challenge them at an appropriate level whilst acting as a facilitator to give direction to the negotiated solutions.  The teacher encourages social construction of ideas by encouraging the children to verbalise their thinking, to explore different solutions, to co-operate and to develop group working skills. The experimental school teachers had nine days of professional development on CASE@KS1 theory and method and were supported in the classroom by a CASE advisory teacher and member of the research team, who provided feedback on observations of CASE@KS1 activities.

Method
This paper concentrates on the impact of collaborative group work on the individual development of metacognition in two children from one CASE@KS1 group over the intervention year. The data used comes from nine observations of this particular group working on CASE@KS1 activities. The nature of observer of any classroom, but especially a small group of five to six year olds is fraught with complexities. Whilst being a non-participatory observer might be seen as ideal, it is obvious that an adult sitting in close proximity to children of this age is viewed largely as another “helping adult” along with teaching assistants, volunteers and visitors. In addition there is a less transparent effect of a researcher’s presence on the group as Gussow (1964, p.240) pointed out: “When the observers are physically present and physically approachable the concept of the observer as non-participant, though sociologically correct is psychologically misleading.”
The best that can be said in such situations is that the researcher seeks to minimise his/her influence on the group activity by becoming conscious of it.  In addition to field notes all the observations were tape recorded to provide vivid aural pictures of the events.  A case study method is used in this study to isolate and focus on the individual child whilst analysing the group interactions.  These two particular children, one boy and one girl are only typical of the rest of the CASE@KS1 participants in that they engage with their group and the tasks presented.  Any other two children from the project could have been chosen as case studies but of course the descriptions would be expected to be different from the two reported. Their stories may be similar to those of other children in the programme but they will not be the same. These two case studies tell us something about the interactions between a peer group and its effect on an individual’s development of metacognition.  

Analysis of Data
The nine CASE@KS1 tasks analysed here were as follows:

[insert table 1 here]

In order to examine the verbal interactions of the group for incidences of metacognition a coding system based upon Flavell’s model of cognitive monitoring which includes person, task and strategy variables was devised. Flavell’s model of metacognition relies upon the interactions of four distinct phenomena.  These are metacognitive knowledge, metacognitive experiences, goals (or tasks) and actions (or strategies). [Flavell, 1979 #12]  The metacognitive knowledge element is further broken down into person, task and strategy variables.  These three variables were used as category codes to code the children’s interactions.  The transcribed tape recordings of the group of six children working together on a CASE@KS1 task were searched with these codes in mind.  Examples of the types of statements that were coded under each category can be seen in table 2.  Large amounts of the data were not coded, as they did not relate to these theoretical categories.  Inter-rater reliability of the coding system was undertaken on three different transcripts of children working on CASE@KS1 tasks.  A reliability rating of 97% was achieved.  The coding erred on the side of caution and disputed areas were not included.
[insert table 2 here].
Both case studies are inter-linked, yet both add the unique perspective of the individual child to the analysis of developing metacognitive processing.

The Case Studies – Context
The school is a voluntary aided primary school with 199 children on the roll.  The teacher of class one was young, newly qualified and in her first year of teaching.  Class one consisted of 30 children all aged five to six years old at the start of the school year.  The children come from a variety of ethnic backgrounds and 48% of the school’s population have English as a second language.  The CASE@KS1 focus group consists of six children all of whom have good spoken English and all of who are slightly above average for the class in terms of maths attainment as measured by teacher marked school tests.  The CASE@KS1 tasks involve children collaborating verbally to reach a consensus. The supportive nature of the group and the relaxed pace allowed children with less fluent English Language skills to practice and be part of an elaborated discourse.  In the case of this focus group all the children had good spoken English and this does mean that they are more able to express their thoughts as they already have some of the English vocabulary necessary to do so.  CASE@KS1 groups are mixed to some extent in terms of maths attainment.  In this group the teacher had put together six children with slightly higher than average for the class maths attainment.  This is another variable, which may impact on the group’s problem solving skills. Different CASE@KS1 groups were found to engage in different amounts and a different quality of metacognitive processing. The group reported on here consists of four boys and two girls.  They are aged between five and six years, with a mean age of 5.4 years at the start of the year.  They work together for all CASE@KS1 tasks i.e. for half an hour once a week and they remain as a group for the group work part of the numeracy hour, which usually lasts for 20 minutes and takes place every day.  In this sense the children know each other quite well.  Pseudonyms are used for all the names. The boys are Andre, John, Joseph, Oliver and the girls are Chloe and Fumi. From this one group two children Chloe and Oliver have been isolated as case studies.  The aim is to show how the individual child is developing metacognition through working in a collaborative group.  Excerpts are taken from different CASE@KS1 tasks throughout the year.  Each task involves all six children working together with their teacher acting as facilitator. 
The metacognitive development of Chloe and Oliver was tracked throughout the year.  In each case a particular theme seemed to emerge.  For Chloe this was described as “the need to explain”. Chloe’s metacognitive development can be seen as her developing awareness of and ability to explain thinking processes to other members of the group.  Oliver’s metacognitive development tends more towards a growing understanding of strategies such as planning, evaluating and predicting.  In both cases it is the group interaction which facilitates these developments and enables both children to overtly verbalise and practice their metacognitive processing.

Case Study One
Chloe – “The need to explain”
At the beginning of the year Chloe is five years and 6 months old.  She is articulate and confident.  She can be relied upon to give an opinion on most subjects and she appears to be at ease talking with adults and children alike.  Her speech patterns include adult-type structures such as, “actually, I would say …” or “I wouldn’t think that could be true”.  Chloe appears to be popular with other children and she often takes the lead in group activities.

In common with the rest of her group, at the beginning of the year Chloe’s engagement in the collaborative process of CASE@KS1 tasks is limited.  In the first term’s tasks the majority of the interactions are between teacher and child or children.  The teacher begins trying to facilitate metacognitive thinking of the group by asking “how” questions such as, “How do you know that ?, and “How could we begin this ?” and by expecting evaluation of tasks with questions such as, “Was it easy or difficult to do?” and “Why?” In these early CASE tasks there is little obvious evidence of metacognition from the children. .  More often the children, including Chloe, directly answer the teacher’s questions with short simple answers.
As the term goes on Chloe begins to fill a leadership role, but this does not go uncontested:

Farm Animals Task - Autumn term
In this task the children must work together to sort out and categorise different farm animals.  The task took place early in the school year (October 1999) and the children are still not used to working together. This excerpt took place half way through the task when the children have already made some attempt to sort out the animals, but they have not collaborated fully as a group.  Chloe is trying to direct the group but is unable to explain her thinking to them.  She expects them to know what she means.  Andre disrupts this aspect of her behaviour by verbalising his own lack of understanding.

59.	John: 	That will make a nice pattern [he has sorted animals into lines by species] 
60.	Chloe: 	Good idea, ‘cos it will go together a bit more than we’re doing	[EVA]
 [referring to another strategy of sorting animals into adults and babies which some other members of the group have done] [Chloe sets to work arranging the animals with help from John, Fumi and Joseph.  They create lines of animals by species and colour, but there are large sheep and small sheep in the same line and large rabbits and small rabbits in the same line].
67.	Chloe:  This is going all wrong. I think they should be lines of same animals, put sheep over there									[EVA]
 [Andre is not listening, he wants to put pig in the sheep line because it is the same colour, Chloe moves Andre’s pig]
68.	Andre:  I don’t know what she’s doing.					[OTH]
69.	Chloe:  You’re putting baby pigs in order and in order of colour.
70.	Andre:  I didn’t understand any of what she said.			          [SELF]
71.	Teacher [to Chloe] Ask Andre what he doesn’t understand.
72.	John [explains to Andre how he has put the red pigs in order]
76.	Andre:  What’s Fumi going to do. [Andre has noticed that Fumi is not involved]
77.	Chloe:  Someone should tell her.
78	Oliver: [tries to explain to Fumi that they are sorting the animals by species, colour and now size.]
79.	Chloe:  This is a very complicated sort of pattern				 [EVA]

In this excerpt, whilst Chloe begins to evaluate the group’s ideas and drives the task onwards she fails to respond to Andre’s requests for her to explain her actions.  Even when the teacher reinforces the request, it is left to another child to explain.  Chloe attempts to carry on her own sorting strategies whilst delegating the explanation of the strategy to others.  A lack of awareness of the need to explain or an unwillingness to explain is hindering Chloe’s self-goal of completing the task because the task has to be completed by the group and not individually. The need to gain a consensus on how the animals should be sorted means that in order to complete the task Chloe needs to negotiate and explain her strategy to the others. A similar situation occurs during the next task, which is also concerned with classification.  In the buttons task the number of variables by which the buttons could be sorted is increased and the task becomes more complicated as the children must finally use their sorting rule to fill an empty set.  

Buttons Task – Autumn Term

During this task Chloe acknowledges Fumi’s request for an explanation, but she never in fact gives one, instead she gives a new and different way of classifying the buttons.  This excerpt takes place mid way through the task.  Chloe has tended to lead the group suggesting how the buttons should be sorted. Fumi is trying to sort some by shape but the others are working on size and colour.

107.	Fumi:  I don’t know what she’s saying [looking upset and sniffing], all she’s saying is put it there, I don’t understand where to put it.		          [SELF]
108.	Chloe:  OK, well that’s quite easy to explain.
[but Chloe goes off on another idea of how to sort the buttons, using the number of holes as criteria, and doesn’t in fact explain the first strategy]
This excerpt suggests that whilst Chloe is clearly not yet responding fully to the group’s requests for explanations she is beginning to acknowledge the requests.

Rocks Task – Start of Spring Term
The children are using different criteria to determine “biggest”, causing some confusion. During this task Chloe shows some development of understanding the need to explain a strategy to the group, but she is also becoming aware of the difficulties of getting a consensus in order to move forward from discourse to action. This excerpt is quite early on in the task and some of the group have been guessing which is the biggest rock.
40.	Chloe:  You can’t just think, you have to measure them.			[EVA]
41.	Andre:  Unless you can see [their height].
42.	Chloe:  Yes, that’s the tallest [pointing to a rock]
43.	Joseph:  Biggest not tallest.
44.	Andre:  They are saying that this one is bigger than this one, and I say this one is bigger.
45.	Joseph:  What he’s saying is bigger is [really] taller.
46.	Chloe:  I think what we should do is talk together.			         [PLAN]
[the rest of the group carries on measuring rocks but in different ways.]
50.	Chloe:  Well I think we should just talk and decide how we are
 going to do these things.						         [PLAN]
[Chloe suggests a strategy for measuring “bigness”. Oliver and Joseph suggest other equally possible criteria for measuring “bigness”.  Chloe gives up trying to lead the group her way and puts her head down on the table]
76.	Teacher:  Why aren’t you joining in any more, have you done all
  the thinking you can do?
77.	Chloe:  My brain’s hurting						          [SELF]

Chloe has an important metacognitive experience during this task.  She is becoming aware that other people can think differently from oneself, and that there can be more than one useful strategy for solving a problem.  This is a development of metacomprehension in that it requires understanding of how others are understanding the term “bigness.”  Metacognitive experiences are often emotional and Chloe clearly shows what she is experiencing both verbally and non-verbally.

Shapes Task – Spring Term
During the spring term (the second term of the school year) Chloe is often challenged to explain her thinking to the others.  In the shapes task the children are trying to draw and then describe the shapes they can see from their individual perspective around the table.  Some of the three dimensional shapes are in front of the others and at times only part of a shape is in view.  Joseph has drawn his view of the table showing the circle only by its edge.  This has confused Andre and Fumi:

99	Andre:  What is that ? [pointing at Joseph’s drawing of the edge of the circle]
100	Joseph:  The circle’s not just round, its got edges.
101	Fumi:  What is it [referring to the drawing of the edge of the circle]?
102	 Chloe:  Its like a flat thing and some edge, curved sides, so if you’re
103	this side its actually put so that you can see this side, but if you go like
104	this [leans to one side] you can see this side
105	Andre:  What?
106	Teacher:  Can you have another go Chloe, Andre still doesn’t understand.
107	Chloe:  It’s part of it because the shapes are in the middle and this shape
108	 is on the edge, I think …[tails off]
109	Teacher:  Yes.
110	Chloe:  No, I don’t understand what I’m saying myself.		           [SELF]
111	Fumi:  From the other side you can only see this edge so 
112	he’s drawn the edge of the circle.

There are many instances throughout the spring term where Chloe’s attempts to explain to the others are not understood, but she is becoming more aware of her own lack of understanding through this process.  In the example above, Chloe has had to reflect on her own understanding of the drawing and her own thinking from her first explanation of it to come to the realisation that she doesn’t really understand it herself.  Inadequate though Chloe’s explanation has been in terms of her own thinking, it has helped Fumi to clarify hers, so that she can now explain the drawing in a very clear and concise way.

Crossroads Task – Summer Term
On the table is a coloured plan of a crossroads.  Various models, such as a bus stop, tree, a pond, a duck etc. have been placed on the crossroads plan by the teacher.  Initially the children work in pairs to choose a pre-printed card, which depicts the crossroads from their perspective around the table.  Each card is marked with a coloured dot.  Some features are only visible from one side of the table.  In this excerpt Chloe and Fumi have worked together to choose a card and Chloe has explained how she came to choose the card that represents her view of the crossroads, but Fumi thinks another card is the correct one: 

104.	Chloe:  Fumi, look. That tree is on different sides and the bus stop
105.		          is on different sides.
106.	Oliver:  That’s on the right.
107.	Chloe:  You see this picture, the car is at the bottom and on this picture. 
108.	Andre:  She doesn’t know which picture, you’re just saying and 
109.	this picture and this picture.
110.	Chloe:  But the bus stop and the duck picture…
111.	Teacher:  But they’ve both got the duck and bus stop
112.	 – the picture with the green dot?
113.	Chloe:  Yes the green dot picture has the duck on this side.
114.	Fumi:  I don’t understand which picture.				           [SELF]
115.	Chloe:  Well, what I’m saying is that is at the top and that is at the bottom of the 116.	card, mmm, I can’t really understand it myself.			           [SELF]
117.	Andre:  So you don’t know what you are talking about.			[OTH]

By the end of the summer term explaining her thinking has become a natural response for Chloe and whilst her ideas are not always found to be correct her explanations of her thinking are growing in clarity. Through interactions with the group Chloe is beginning to realise her own failings in terms of explaining her own thinking.  By trying to explain to the others she has become aware of her own lack of comprehension.

Transport Task – Summer Term:
In one of the final tasks of the year, the transport task, Chloe clearly states her reasoning and why she disagrees with other group members, to do this she refers to a rule of the task. For this task there is a model of a town and a series of cards depicting different modes of transport.  The children are asked to place the cards around the town in accordance with a rule.  In this case the rule card says simply “lorries are not allowed in the centre of town”.  In this excerpt the children have placed the cards and have now been asked to move one card each keeping within the rule and explain their reasons.  Chloe has just moved the motorbike card into the centre of the town. 

70.	Chloe:  Moving the motorbike would not break the rule.
71.	 The rule is lorries are not allowed in the middle of town.
72.	 If you move the bike that would not be breaking the rule.

For Chloe to develop this clarity of explanation she has had to develop the ability to reflect upon her own understanding of various aspects of the task and her own thinking process in coming to a solution.  
Summary
For Chloe, who is obviously quite articulate for her age, the collaborative nature of the group has forced her to reflect on her own thinking in order to be able to explain her thoughts to the group.  Chloe may have been able to achieve all the tasks on her own, but the necessity of explaining her thinking has enabled her to develop metacognitively.  She has begun to develop an awareness of her own lack of understanding at times, as well as her awareness of how other people may think differently.

Case Study 2 
Oliver- Planning, Evaluating and Predicting 
At the beginning of the year Oliver is five years and seven months old.  He is also articulate, but a little more reserved than Chloe.  He tends to take time to think about things before speaking.  At the beginning of the year, like Chloe he responds mainly to the teacher’s questions or instructions and looks to her for a lead.  However, he also pays particular attention to the task in hand and suggests strategies for solving problems either verbally or, quite often, by doing something and then explaining when asked to do so.

In the flowers task it is Oliver who first comes up with the strategy of measuring the roses by comparing them to the block in which they will be placed. When Fumi starts measuring at a different level to the others it is Oliver who realises:

91.	Oliver: she needs to measure it here, put its end on the table		[EVA]

This suggests that Oliver is aware of what others in the group are doing.  He has spotted the error in Fumi’s method and called attention to it.

In the first term it is often Oliver who comes up with a useful strategy and more often than not gains positive feedback for this from the group by them adopting his strategy.  In the buttons task Chloe refers to Oliver’s strategy:

61.	Chloe:  He’s got a really good idea that I think everyone will agree with.    [OTH]

By the end of the first term Oliver is beginning to pick up on and comment on how the group is working for instance later in the buttons task:

Buttons Task – Autumn Term
Different shape, size and coloured buttons are on the table.  The group’s task is to sort them into categories that make sense in terms of a shop selling buttons and to explain their choices.  Many of the buttons can be included in more than one category.  In this excerpt, five minutes into the task, the group have just been busy sorting out different little piles of buttons.  Oliver is aware that they are not all working to the same categories.

28.	Oliver: We are sorting them out good, but not talking.			[EVA]
29.	Chloe:  Yeah so nobody knows what we’re doing.

Oliver is monitoring the progress of the group in terms of achieving the goal.  This is an example of a metacognitive process, one, which leads Chloe amongst others to agree that they need to employ the metacognitive strategy of talking about and planning their approach as well as explaining what they are doing. Like Chloe he also begins to use increasingly sophisticated ways of explaining his ideas.

Shapes Task – Spring Term
In this excerpt Oliver is responding to John’s drawing, which in fact shows a view that John cannot possibly see.  John has achieved this by twisting his body and leaning around the side of the table.  The teacher has just asked for comment on John’s drawing.
44.	Oliver:  These are actually to do straight, you can’t turn your
45.	 head, cos your other angles wrong and you have to cross it out
46.	 again, like here, if I was over here [he moves around the table]
47.	 I could see it.
48.	Teacher:  Why can’t you see the little triangle?
49.	Oliver:  Cos this triangle is in the way, it’s just like when you 
50.	go to school, the big children go behind the little children so that	         [COMP]
51.	they can see.  I think Chloe can see them.					[OTH]

Oliver is using his stored knowledge and experience to help his problem solving in this task.  He is also aware that other people have different perceptions of the shapes in relation to their location around the table.  In order to make this connection he has had to think about why different people’s drawings are different.  He has had to move from the concrete evidence to the abstract principle. This growing awareness of different perspectives allows him to suggest a useful plan to the group of how to tackle the crossroads task in the summer term:

24.	Oliver:  If we are looking down we can see everything, pretend
25.	 you are a bird in heaven looking down.				          [PLAN]   

Bottles Task – Summer Term
Small bottles are filled with different amounts of rice.  The group’s task is to predict which bottles will roll down a slope and which will not.  At this point in the task all the children except Oliver have given their opinions and reasons.  This is Oliver’s turn:

32.	Oliver:  I think the lightest can go faster and can go further,
33.	 the heavy can’t go so fast because it’s heavy so it won’t go as far.
34.	Chloe:   Oh, I’ve changed my mind.					           [SELF]
35.	John:  I’ve changed my mind too because I think Oliver’s
36.	 idea is better than my idea.						   [SELF/EVA]
Later
90.	Teacher:  Does everyone agree that lighter ones roll further?
91.	Fumi:  No, cos the lighter one hasn’t got any strength, so the 
92.	lighter one isn’t going so far.
93.	Oliver:  Yeah, but light isn’t strength.
94.	Chloe:  Maybe they will go to the same place, but the lighter one will go faster.

Because Oliver is able to give reasons for his prediction the entire group except Fumi change their positions to agree with him.  In doing so John overtly compares and evaluates his own idea in comparison to Oliver’s.  Rather than guessing the outcome, Oliver has worked out and verbalised a consistent rationale for his thinking. [That light things go faster and therefore further].  Consequently this can only be countered by an equally consistent explanation given by Fumi. [That light things do not have the strength to go further].  The rest of the group needs to then evaluate and compare these two explanations in order to decide which one to go with.  By verbalising his own thinking, Oliver stimulates other members of the group to evaluate their own predictions in comparison to his.  Fumi provides an alternative prediction that complicates the process.  The children are beginning to construct a metacognitive frame around the core cognitive activity of testing whether the bottles will roll or not. For instance whilst the cognitive activity asks for a prediction of which bottles will roll and an explanation of why, the metacognitive framework that supports this problem solving involves the children in more abstract thinking.  They need to become aware of their own thinking in order to explain to each other. They are developing the ability to evaluate their own ideas against those of other group members and are becoming willing to change their thinking in the light of more convincing explanations. 

Clown Task – Summer Term
By the summer term Oliver is offering the group strategies to enable them to plan how to undertake the task.  The ability to plan is a metacognitive ability and important for successful problem solving.
The clown task involves the children dressing one clown each with a variety of coloured and patterned clothing.  The rule is that no two pieces of any of the clowns clothing can be of the same colour (later pattern is added as another variable).  The children have tried this task before and that time it ended in complete confusion with no fully dressed clowns.

38.	Oliver:  I think we should pick the same colour and do different clothings,[PLAN] 39	cos then we will be able to pick all the colours really easily.		             [EVA]

The group evaluate Oliver’s idea along with other plans:

40	Chloe:  I think we should do the same colours because then it 
41	wouldn’t be as tricky as it was before.					 [COMP/EVA]
42	John:  It would be really really easy, we’d be done in a minute.	          [PRED]
43	Andre:  I know some could take same colours and some different 
44	colours then it would work.						  [PLAN/EVA]
45	Oliver:  We could all pick like one different clothing but all green,
46	 then maybe all purple, then maybe all pink.
47	Joseph: That’s a good idea, last time we were taking them out and 
48	it got really tricky at the end because we had to keep swapping over[EVA/COMP]

Oliver’s plan is finally adopted by the group and at the end the teacher asks them to evaluate.

194	Teacher:  How do you know it works
195	Oliver:  Because we did it in the end.						 [EVA]
196	Andre: For once we got it together without muddling up.
197	Oliver: I think if we do this again I’ve got another strategy		           [SELF]
198	 next time we should write down the colours.				          [PLAN]

Oliver has gained confidence through having his plans and ideas evaluated by the group and he is able to fine-tune his strategy ready for next time.  In order to use this refined strategy Oliver will need to use metacognitive processing to compare the structure of a new task with this one in order to evaluate whether the strategy will be successful in another context. Oliver’s individual metacognitive development is constructed from the social interactions of the group.  Through their collaboration the children are developing a collective awareness of metacognitive strategies such as planning and evaluating their own and each other’s approaches to the task.

Discussion
The descriptions of these two young children negotiating and collaborating on CASE@KS1 activities show that as the year goes on and their confidence in a group situation increases so their metacognitive processing begins to become overt.  Both Chloe and Oliver unconsciously use the group situation to test and explain their ideas and to evaluate each other’s ideas.  The collaborative group is an essential element of this growing awareness.  It is within the group situation that Chloe is made to be explicit about her ideas.  She learns that she needs to reflect upon these ideas and to have them clear in her own mind.  She also learns that other people’s comments and reactions to her ideas can enable her to clarify or modify them.  Realising that she doesn’t always understand what she has said is an important aspect of monitoring and controlling her thinking.  Asking questions of oneself can begin by being questioned by others.  Through the collaborative nature of the group these children are not only learning the social group skills of listening, contributing and sharing, the group is also impacting upon their individual ways of thinking. In the early part of the year the teacher was still the driving force of the group, but as the year goes on she is able to take more of a back seat, sometimes gently steering the group rather than driving it.  It is this skillful facilitation of the group that encourages the children to become more aware of their thinking. Both Chloe and Oliver learn something about themselves as cognitive beings.  Chloe admits to herself that she doesn’t always understand, Oliver realises he has some good strategies for solving the problems.  Feedback from the group is encouraging this development.  At this age five to six years, the teacher’s role in this development is particularly important.  This paper has not concentrated on this aspect of the project, but skillful guiding, feedback and facilitation of the group by an adult is a necessary component of metacognitive development.  As Flavell has remarked, it is unlikely that children of this age will spontaneously refer to their own thinking. [Flavell, 1995 #5].  However, with continued practice and encouragement this is more likely to become a feature of their collaborative work. 

Central to this collaborative group work is the task itself.  CASE@KS1 tasks are based around schema that are known to be important for later scientific thinking.  A great deal of research on metacognition has used problem solving as a focus. In general good problem solvers tend to understand the structure of the task, are able to compare it to other similar tasks, can break it down into steps, plan how to approach it, monitor progress and evaluate success or failure.  The tasks presented to the children in this programme enable the children to develop, practice and own these metacognitive skills.  Oliver clearly shows an awareness of planning and evaluating a task.  Throughout the year the effect of having the same children working together on different tasks enables Oliver to overcome his early reticence and overtly practice these metacognitive skills.

Working in this way the children are becoming aware of the basic idea that other people are also cognitive beings and that their thinking will be different from ones own.  The children are developing a theory of mind that incorporates an understanding of this difference.  At five years old this is an important development.  Certainly they can all pass the classic theory of mind tests (Perner, Leekam, & Wimmer, 1987; Wimmer & Perner, 1983) (theory of mind tests were carried out as part of the larger project) before they embark on the CASE@KS1 programme, but development of theory of mind does not stop with this simple understanding of others as cognitive beings.  Through collaborative group work the children are able to experience the emotional aspects of collaborative and productive thinking, they not only learn from each other, but also learn about each other.  The tasks provide metacognitive experiences for the children that engage them on an emotional as well as a cognitive level.  In contrast the usual classroom work of this age group tends to be rather more unemotional in comparison.  But practice at controlling these contextual factors is an important aspect of self-awareness and one, which will eventually enable the child to cope with contextual obstacles in a constructive way.

Conclusion
In a classroom, when compared to a laboratory, metacognition is not so much a “fuzzy concept” (Wellman, 1983) as a slippery one.  It is often impossible to know how our students are progressing metacognitively because most academic assessment is designed to assess cognitive rather than metacognitive processing.  In the UK children in primary school classrooms are not often given the opportunity to work collaboratively.  The emphasis is on individual achievement and individual progress.  Yet since the 1970’s when the term metacognition was first used, a great number of studies have shown that metacognition is important for academic achievement and for motivation.  Flavell’s concept of metacognition though goes further than this claiming an importance for metacognition in the development of responsible, socially functioning adults. Social psychologists have teased out some of these important aspects of metacognition; suggesting that development of metacognition enables people to know how they ought to think, on what level, directed by and for what purpose.  Metacognition is influenced by and can be changed by social persuasion.  Thus metacognition can be maladaptive as well as adaptive (Jost, Kruglanski, & Nelson, 1998). The individual student working towards their own science grade may be developing maladaptive metacognition or metacognition that hinders their progress.  Unless students are given the opportunities to interact with others at a substantive cognitive level it is very difficult for them to either practice metacognitive skills or gain feedback about their own cognitive processing.  Collaborative group work is not just about learning the social skills of working together, or learning the language of explanation and negotiation. It is about provoking the need to reflect on one’s thinking, it is about constructing new thought, letting go of unhelpful cognition and collaborating to understand and affect the cognitive and motivational states of oneself and others.  As researchers and teachers we need to seek ways to provide metacognitive experiences for students and to describe and make overt metacognitive processing in the classroom.  This study has shown young children displaying the beginnings of metacognitive processing.  The seeds of metacognition can be found in children as young as five years old if they are given the opportunity to display and practice them. 

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Table 1
TASK	SCHEMA	AIM	
Flowers	Seriation	To have students place a series of flowers of different lengths in order from tallest to shortest	
Farm Animals	Classification	To have students classify model animals using two variables in a grid pattern	
Buttons	Classification	To have students classify buttons in different ways according to their variables and to work out the buttons that should be placed in an empty set	
Rocks	Seriation	To have students place a series of stones in order from biggest to smallest, establishing rules for creating the series	
Shapes	Points of View	To enable the students to see and identify different perspectives	
Crossroads	Points of View	To have students identify correct plan of the crossroads and build the crossroads using a plan	
Bottles	Classification	To have students classify bottles into two groups depending on whether they roll or don’t roll down a slope and to use this information to predict the behaviour of other bottles	
Transport	Rules	To have students arrange transport in a model town according to a rule and to judge which card will tell them if the rule has been broken	
Clowns	Classification	To have students dress a clown so that none of his clothes are the same colour or the same pattern	

Table 2
CODE	VARIABLE	DESCRIPTION	EXAMPLE	
Self	Person	Shows knowledge of own thinking	“I’m good at maths, so I should be able to do this”	
Oth	Person	Refers to what others may think or desire	“she doesn’t understand this”	
Und	Task	Questions task information and/or seeks clarification	“we can’t work it out because something is missing”	
Pred	Task	Predicts success/failure	“we’ll be able to do this quickly”	
Comp	Task	Compares with other task	“this is like sorting the sticks out”	
Eva	Strategy	Evaluates usefulness of strategy and/or monitors progress	“this isn’t working out, we need to do something else”	
Plan	Strategy	Refers to planning and/or organising the task	“we need to decide which way to go round the table”