Conceptual Tools for Improving Self-Knowledge: V Diagrams, Concept Maps, and Time Writings

This paper presents three metacognitive tools that enable each of us to monitor and assess our degree of self-knowledge with a given topic. V diagrams, concept maps, and time writings are presented as conceptual tools for improving self-knowledge. Self-knowledge comes about from our own individual experiences and the experiences that we glean from others. Each of these conceptual tools reveal language in one of three ways: the V shows the structure of knowledge; the concept map is a word diagram showing relationship of ideas; and, the time writing spontaneously elicits the extent, accuracy, and relevance of these ideas. In many school experiences students find themselves at risk for failure when information is presented in a way that is artificial and not meaningful. Learning experiences are artificial when information that is presented lacks a situational context for students to link new ideas to existing knowledge. In such instances, the school experience emphasizes facts and abstract ideas in a manner that is rarely related to the students’ life and community. Students often resort to storing this “artificial” information as compartmentalized units to be later accessed in a specific subject area by way of either question answering or examination. Whitehead (1929) addressed this form of knowledge as being “inert.” Inert knowledge is activated when explicitly demanded, but is not spontaneously incorporated into other relevant problem-solving contexts. If information is perceived as being artificial, then no amount of extolling by the teacher will make a student understand its relevance. Even when complex concepts are related to their background of experience, students experiencing failure lack training in interpreting this new knowledge or fail to activate existing knowledge sources to cope with these facts and ideas. Consequently, these students spend their time being told either by their teacher or by textbooks what they need to know for later retrieval. Being told without a context that encourages student analysis and synthesis of ideas can produce students who are unable to apply information in problem-solving situations.