Investigation On The Correlation Between Metacognitive Knowledge In Planning And Writing Performance Of English-majors

Writing a composition is a complex task that requires a coordinated implementation of a large set of mental activities. These activities can be divided into three interwoven process: planning, writing and revising. Planning the text content constitutes an important writing process.The present study, based on Flavell's framework of metacognitive knowledge, attempts to examine the effects of students'metacognitive knowledge in planning on English writing. Subjects are 60 third-year English-major students in Wuhan University of Science and Technology. To obtain data, the students were asked to respond to metacognitive questionnaire consisting of 30 items on person knowledge, task knowledge and strategy knowledge. One composition test was also administered to measure students'writing proficiency. All the data collected from the study were analyzed by descriptive statistics, Pearson correlation coefficient and independent sample t-test.Data analysis indicated that although the subjects were junior English-majors, their metacognitive knowledge in planning on English writing was relatively insufficient. Besides, strategy knowledge shown by the students was poorer than person-knowledge and task knowledge. The study also found that metacognitive knowledge in planning and writing were significantly correlated, especially between strategy knowledge and the scores of writing test. Furthermore, the study revealed that metacognitive knowledge in planning had a positive relationship to the writing test performance and students with higher level of metacognitive knowledge in planning exerted better achievement in writing.The key findings provide a new orientation for improving students'English writing. In teaching practice, teachers can do some efforts to make students aware of their metacognitive knowledge. Also needed are training studies on the most effective instructional means for teaching writing strategies.