The Future of Education

The use of metacognitive strategies in learning contexts has been shown to be highly effective for school success. The present study focuses on the self-reflections made by students after the explicit teaching of the Mental Contrast with Implementation Intentions (MCII) strategy, theoretically framed in Self-Regulated Learning. The MCII strategy combines the benefits of two metacognitive procedures: mental contrast, with the aim of mentally confronting positive aspects of the future (goals to be achieved) and negative aspects of the present (reality factors considered obstacles to achieving these goals), and implementation intentions, which guide behaviours towards goals through "if/then" plans (e.g., if X comes up then I do Y). The MCII strategy was explicitly taught and implemented in a systemic context of Natural Sciences (28 7th grade students) and Biology and Geology (28 10th grade students) in the context of Portuguese public education.  The thematic analysis was based on the "Onion Model" (Korthagen & Vasalos, 2005) which conceptualizes different levels of teacher reflection in their educational practice—of increasing depth—similar to the layers of an onion. With the application of this model to the students' reflections, five axes or dimensions of reflection emerged: findings, justification considerations, intentions, implementations, and missions, which allowed grouping, in increasing order of reflexive sophistication, the descriptors produced by the participating students. Results and implications for research and intervention in educational contexts are discussed.