The Effect of Metacognitive Instruction on Asynchronous L2 Listening during the Pandemic on EFL Learners

Abstract

Metacognitive Instruction (MI) is an instructional procedure that increases the learners’ awareness of the listening processes by developing their personal knowledge, task knowledge and strategy knowledge and orchestrating available listening strategies for effective listening in independent settings (Vandergrift & Goh, 2012). This study was carried out during the pandemic to determine if there was any relationship between metacognitive instruction and listening comprehension in increasing Bangladeshi EFL undergraduate learners’ L2 listening performance by manipulating metacognitive strategies; planning, monitoring and evaluation in aligning with metacognitive knowledge, task knowledge and strategy use while listening. It also investigated if metacognitive instruction affected high and low achievers’ performance. For this experimental study, one hundred twenty-four Bangladeshi undergraduate EFL learners in the experimental group (n = 62) and control group (n = 62) received asynchronously metacognitive instruction and traditional instruction based on the product approach, respectively, for five weeks using five transactional listening texts. To gauge any possible changes in listening comprehension, pretest, post-test and metacognitive awareness listening questionnaires (MALQ) were administered. The findings showed that metacognitive instruction and listening comprehension had significant positive relation, and low successful achievers’ level of comprehension improved exponentially.