Ava Flanagan has received a SSHRC graduate award for her Master of Education research into metacognition (KATE HARGREAVES/University of Windsor)
By Kate Hargreaves
Making the leap from high school to undergraduate studies can be daunting.
Students may face new responsibilities, expectations and learning experiences, putting familiar study strategies to the test.
In this unfamiliar context, reflection on the learning process can be a powerful part of building confidence and independence.
University of Windsor Master of Education student Ava Flanagan (BSc ’23, B.Ed. ’25) was recently awarded a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) Graduate Research Scholarship to investigate the role of this type of reflection — thinking about thinking — in undergraduate student populations.
“My thesis examines the relationship between metacognitive awareness, study strategies, confidence and academic performance among undergraduate students to better understand how students who actively reflect on their learning processes engage with their studies and how this impacts their success,” says Flanagan.
An occasional teacher in the Windsor-Essex Catholic District School Board, Flanagan found herself drawn to the topic through both her own learning experiences and those of her students.
“I have seen how powerful it can be when students begin to think more intentionally about how they learn,” she says. “They often become more confident, more engaged and more independent in their learning.”
A graduate of UWindsor’s undergraduate neuroscience program, Flanagan is no stranger to research, but it was not until her pre-service teaching work that she really started to connect her neuroscience background to the learning process.
“Understanding how students learn, think and develop felt inseparable from how we design and approach education,” she says.
“But I noticed that this is often underemphasized or entirely missing from educational discussions.”
Flanagan’s goal with her research is to examine how reflective and metacognitive practices can both support student success and inform undergraduate teaching and curriculum design.
“I see it as a way to bridge theory and practice with the goal of helping students not only learn content but learn how to learn in a way that is lasting and empowering,” Flanagan says.
Receiving the SSHRC award will not only help Flanagan move her research forward but validates for her the importance of this work.
“More than anything, this award reaffirmed that I am on the right path,” she says.
“It has given me the support and flexibility to continue developing my research and to take an idea I deeply believe in to the next level.”
While in the short-term Flanagan’s focus is on her current research project, she envisions a much longer and broader trajectory for her metacognition work.
“By examining the relationships between students’ awareness of their thinking, their study strategies and their confidence, this research will help inform more intentional, evidence-based approaches to supporting self-regulated learning in higher education,” she says.
Looking ahead at a future doctoral degree, Flanagan hopes to expand her research through teacher perception studies, classroom-based case studies and experimental designs embedding metacognitive strategies into classroom practice.
She also sees potential in developing professional development resources for educators to incorporate metacognition into their work as well as exploring the relationship between this type of reflection and social-emotional learning.
“My goal is to ensure that students are not only learning content but are developing a deeper understanding of how they learn,” she says, “which I believe is one of the most powerful tools we can give them.”
To learn more about graduate studies in education, visit the Faculty of Education website.