2025 Theses Doctoral

Metacognition in Play: Investigating Young Children with “Metacognitive Expertise” through Participatory Child-Centered Research

Tian, Yulu

This study reconceptualizes giftedness as early metacognitive expertise, a developmental, relational, and culturally situated process rather than a fixed trait. Grounded in Gagné’s Differentiated Model of Giftedness and Talent (DMGT) and Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory, this research explores how young Chinese children, identified as demonstrating early metacognitive strengths, engage in and reflect on their thinking during play-based, participatory activities.

Using a Participatory Child-Centered Research (PCCR) approach, the study centers children as co-constructors of knowledge, employing multimodal tools such as treasure hunt challenges, drawings, storytelling, and focus group discussions.Thematic analysis addressed two research questions. For the first question, how children engage in and express metacognitive thinking, three themes emerged: Children Utilize a Range of Cognitive Strategies for Encoding and Retrieval, Metacognitive Expertise Is Context-Dependent and Requires Scaffolding, and Social and Emotional Factors Influence Metacognitive Engagement. These findings reveal that metacognitive performance is highly responsive to task demands, social context, and the availability of support.

The second research question, how children perceive and make meaning of their learning processes, yielded three additional themes: Perceptual Precision, Supportive Scaffolding, and Deliberate Practice. Children attributed their cognitive strengths not to innate ability, but to focused observation, consistent support from adults and peers, and sustained effort in everyday routines. Their narratives pushed back against fixed-trait views of giftedness, instead portraying expertise as emergent and co-constructed.

This study contributes to a growing body of scholarship that critiques outcome-driven and adult-centric models in gifted education. It demonstrates how metacognition can be observed, supported, and meaningfully articulated by young children when developmentally appropriate and culturally resonant methods are used. By reframing giftedness as metacognitive expertise, this research offers broader implications for inclusive, equity-driven educational practices.