Alternative assessment of strategy use with self-report instruments: a discussion

Strategy use is a very broad term for controlled and consciously applied procedural knowledge, in contrast with skills that are automated to a more or lesser extent Both terms, however, are used interchangeably when referring to processes that direct and support problem solving and learning. There is a gray area in between controlled strategy use and the automated performance of skills (Veenman 2011). For instance, monitoring processes may be consciously applied during reading, but often run in the background until an error or anomaly is detected. The latter is the case with more experienced readers. In this special issue, many of the strategic processes described operate in this gray area. For instance, confidence judgments or inference processes are neither fully controlled, nor fully automated. Consequently, learners may not be fully aware of ongoing processes, which may affect the verbalization of these processes in self-reports.