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VOLUME XII, NUMBER 9

#& INNOVATION ABSTRACTS

PUBLISHED BY THE NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR STAFF AND ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT, THE UNIVERSITY OF US Sard AT AUSTIN

 

WITH SUPPORT FROM THE W. K. KELLOGG FOUNDATION AND THE SID W, RICHARDSON FOUNDATION

Strategic Learning: The Role of Executive Control Processes

There has been a surge of interest in the acquisition
and use of learning strategies in the past decade. In
general, learning strategies are any thoughts or behav-
iors that facilitate studying and learning. Educational
psychologists have learned a great deal about how to
help students acquire these strategies but only now are
instructional models being developed that help stu-
dents to develop a systematic approach to studying and
learning. A systematic approach to studying and
learning gives students the ability to initiate, imple-
ment, and monitor their own learning in a strategic
manner. Strategic learners are able to act as problem
solvers who can custom-tailor their approach to fit with
their own learning goals, the tasks’ demands, the
learning context, their relevant prior knowledge, and
their level of expertise.

Executive Control

Executive control plays a key role in strategic learn-
ing. It involves planning how to approach a learning
task or problem, selecting the strategies and methods
that will be used, implementing the plan of action,
monitoring its progress and success, and, if necessary,
modifying the plan to more closely reach the goal.

The steps involved in executive control are not linear.
Each step results from and feeds back into the other
steps. Consider, for example, a student who monitors
the success of using a method such as underlining key
points as she reads to acquire information from a
technical manual. After trying it for a while, she
realizes that underlining is not the most effective
method to use for information-dense text. This new
awareness might lead her to reevaluate what she needs,
or wants, to learn from reading the manual. She may
realize that the purposes for reading a technical manual
are not the same as for reading an introductory text-
book. At this point, she could begin to explore other
strategies that might help her.

Components of Executive Control

Planning. The planning component involves using
study and learning goals as guides to determining the
overall approach that will be used to achieve the
learning objectives. The planning component also helps

students to determine both the personal and the sup-
porting resources that they may need. Effective plan-
ning requires that students think about a number of
variables, such as: the nature of the learning task, the
level of final performance they want to achieve, their
interest in performing the task, their prior experience
with similar tasks, the learning and study skills that
could help with this type of task, etc.

Selecting. Whereas planning helps students identify
the range of potential activities and resources that they
could use to reach their learning objectives, selecting is
the process by which students identify specific ap-
proaches and methods that will be used. Selection
decisions are constrained by the learner's goals and the
learning context. Selecting often involves making trade-
offs and compromises in an attempt to develop a
realistic solution. How important is this assignment?
How much time is available? How good am | at this
subject? What is an acceptable performance level?

Implementing. Once students develop a plan that
includes specific tactics for reaching the learning goals,
they are ready to implement it. Critical variables for
implementation include: the learner’s knowledge of
studying and learning techniques, the learner's experi-
ence with similar tasks, the learner’s level of interest
and motivation for reaching the learning goals, the
learner's attitude toward the learning task, and the
amount of effort that the learner is willing to expend to
achieve each goal. Implementing fs not simply a matter
of knowing what to do; learners must also want to do it.

Monitoring. Monitoring involves checking the
implementation on an ongoing, as well as a summative,
basis to compare the outcomes of efforts to goals.
Monitoring is the quality-control function in executive
control. When students monitor their implementation
on an ongoing basis, they can determine if the methods
they are using appear to be helping them reach their
goals for a specific learning task. By using benchmarks
along the way, students can identify potential problems
while still implementing their plans. Summative
monitoring at the end of a learning activity helps
students to determine if the appropriate overall level of

 

 

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THE NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR STAFF AND ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT (NISOD) 11
Community College Leadership Program, The University of Texas at Austin