Collaborative Learning in an Information Literacy Course: The Impact of Online Versus Face-to-face Instruction on Social Metacognitive Awareness

Metacognition and social metacognition play important roles in information literacy, online learning, and collaborative learning. This study examines how students rated themselves in both metacognitive and social metacognitive awareness after a collaborative project in an information literacy course offered face-to-face and online. Students in the face-to-face version of the course rated themselves as having higher social metacognitive awareness, though metacognitive awareness scores were similar. Because of this finding, this article makes recommendations for improving collaboration online for information literacy instruction.