Metacognition is thinking about thinking, involving taking control of the learning process—awareness, planning, self-monitoring, and reflection.

• A. Metacognition
• B. Metacognitive skills
• C. Graphic organizers
• D. Adjective

Answer: (A)

Metacognition is the ability to think about and regulate your own thinking as you learn. It means being aware of what you know and what you don’t know, planning how to approach a task, monitoring your understanding while you work, and reflecting on your learning afterward. This term fits the description because it names the overall process of controlling and guiding our thinking to improve learning, not just a single step or a tool. Metacognitive skills are the specific abilities within that bigger idea—like planning, monitoring, and evaluating—which are the parts that help you act on that awareness. Graphic organizers are useful for organizing ideas visually, but they don’t define or describe thinking about thinking. An adjective is a word class describing nouns, unrelated to metacognitive processes.