A primary focus of higher education is cognitive development and epistemological access. Many of the chapters in this publication argue for a balance between cognitive, affective and, in many cases, physical (financial, enabling environments for students with disabilities, etc.) support for the whole student. The metacognitive dimension is usually ignored or assumed to be addressed in the enhancement of the student's cognitive capacity, but this is often not the case. Yet it is one of the most fundamental issues of students becoming lifelong students.

The most basic way of explaining metacognition is that it is ‘thinking about thinking’. Metacognition involves awareness of one's own knowledge, learning processes, cognitive and affective states, and strengths and weaknesses as a student. In addition, understanding the nature of different tasks and their processing demands is as important as a knowledge of strategies, and when and where to use a strategy to ensure that cognitive goals are met. By using these different types of knowledge, students can plan, monitor and evaluate their strategies to ensure more successful learning. As a result, they become less dependent on their lecturers to access and process knowledge.

This chapter discusses the various ways in which lecturers can assist students to manage their workload by helping them to become increasingly autonomous students. Educators should be able to do the following:

• • Design rich environments for active learning (REALs) (Grabinger & Dunlap 1995).

• • Design activities for students that are meant to improve students’ metacognition and help students to learn how to regulate their time (as a key component of REALs and the learning process).

These outcomes relate to the way in which lecturers guide students in the development of their metacognitive abilities so that they are able to regulate their own learning and thus achieve the following critical cross-field outcomes of the South African Qualifications Authority (SAQA 1998):

• • Organise and manage oneself and one's activities responsibly and effectively.

• • Reflect on and explore a variety of strategies that enables one to learn more effectively.

In this chapter, I shall discuss four issues that are related to the way in which lecturers can make students aware of how they process information using a variety of strategies. These issues are

• • self-directed learning

• • workload management

• • factors influencing workload

• • the impact of lecturer planning on student learning.