ReflectionReflection

What is reflection?What is reflection?

Is it important? Why?Is it important? Why?

When & how was the last When & how was the last time you reflected on time you reflected on

something?something?

The reflective processThe reflective process

What do you think the reflective What do you think the reflective process involves?process involves?

Can you pinpoint any stages within Can you pinpoint any stages within the process?the process?

Kolb's Learning Cycle (1984)

Models of reflection:Models of reflection:

Seem to be based around the one idea Seem to be based around the one idea ofof

looking at something, looking at something, thinking about why it is as it is, and thinking about why it is as it is, and deciding what to do next time.  deciding what to do next time. 

The models often The models often Have a cyclical approachHave a cyclical approach Ask questionsAsk questions

Schön (1987) distinguished between two types Schön (1987) distinguished between two types of reflection:of reflection:

Reflection-on-action Reflection-on-action is the process of is the process of looking back at an event and analysing it looking back at an event and analysing it to make explicit the knowledge which to make explicit the knowledge which guided action.guided action.

Reflection-in-action Reflection-in-action is the process of is the process of thinking about and altering action during thinking about and altering action during an episode. This process is usually an episode. This process is usually employed when faced with an unexpected employed when faced with an unexpected event.event.

Meichenbaum (1995, cited in Kinsella, 2006, p279), Meichenbaum (1995, cited in Kinsella, 2006, p279),

describes the constructivist perspective as:describes the constructivist perspective as:

‘founded on the idea that humans actively construct their personal realities and create their own representational models of the world’

So what does this mean for teachers?

Schön (1987, cited in Kinsella, 2006, p284) writes of professional practitioners:

Through countless acts of attention and inattention, naming,

sensemaking, boundary setting, and control, they make and

maintain the worlds matched to their professional knowledge and know-how. They are in transaction with their practice worlds, framing the problems that arise in practice situations and shaping the situations to fit the frames, framing their roles and constructing practice situations to make their role-frames operational.They have, in short, particular, professional ways of seeing their

world and a way of constructing and maintaining the world as they see it. When practitioners respond to the indeterminate zones of practice by holding a reflective conversation with the materials

of their situations, they remake a part of their practice world and

thereby reveal the usually tacit processes of worldmaking that underlie all of their practice. (Schön, 1987, p. 36)

Schön notes that debates in professional practice often involve conflicting frames in which practitioners pay attention to different facts and make different sense of the facts they notice.

Through acts of naming and framing, the practitioner selects things for attention and organizes them, guided by an appreciation of the situation that gives it coherence and sets a direction for action

In this way the worlds of professional practice are made and remade.

(Kinsella, 2006)

Because the unique case falls outside the categories of existing theory or technique, the practitioner cannot treat it as an instrumental problem to be solved by applying one of the rules in her store of professional knowledge. The case is not ‘in the book’. If she is to deal with it competently, she must do so by a kind of improvisation, inventing and testing in the situation strategies of her own devising. (Schön, 1987, cited in Kinsella, 2006)

Individual practitioners are seen as constructing viable worlds of their own making.

ModelsModels

Gibbs, 1998Gibbs, 1998 RaceRace Reflection continuumReflection continuum John’s model, 1992John’s model, 1992 Carper’s model, 1992Carper’s model, 1992 The Johari Window (Luft and Ingham, The Johari Window (Luft and Ingham,

1955)1955) Driscoll’s model of reflection, 1994Driscoll’s model of reflection, 1994 Atkins and Murphy, 1994Atkins and Murphy, 1994

Kolb's Learning Cycle (1984)

                                                                                                                                                                                       

(Kolb 1984)

Race’s model

ActiveExperimentation

ConcreteExperience

ReflectiveObservation

AbstractConceptualisatio

n

Feelings?

Emotions?

People?Communication?

Judgments? Desire?

Engagement?

Gibbs’ Reflective Cycle:

Action planIf it arose again whatwould you do?

Description What happened?

FeelingsWhat were you thinking and feeling?

EvaluationWhat was good andbad about the experience?

AnalysisWhat sense canyou make?

ConclusionWhat else could youhave done?

Carper’s model for reflecting on Carper’s model for reflecting on being a mentor:being a mentor:

Empirical knowledge Empirical knowledge – – scientific, ‘concrete’

Aesthetic knowledge Aesthetic knowledge - - the art of what we do, our own experiences

Personal Knowledge Personal Knowledge - - self awareness

Ethical knowledge Ethical knowledge - - moral knowledge

The Johari window:

Having anexperience inclinical practice

Purposefully reflecting

on selected aspects of that

experience occurring in

clinical practice

So What?

An analysis

of the event

Discovering whatlearning arises fromthe process ofreflection

NOW WHAT?

Proposed actions

following the event

Actioning

the new learningfrom that experiencein clinical practice

WHAT?

A description of

the event

Driscoll’s model of reflection (1994)

Atkins and Murphy's model of reflection (1994) 

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             

                                                                                                                  

Further reading

•Bolton, G. (2005) Reflective Practice Writing and Professional Development, 2nd edn, London: Sage Publications.•Ghaye, A. and Ghaye, K. (1998) Teaching and Learning through Critical Reflective Practice, London: David Fulton Publishers Ltd.•Moon, J. (2004) A Handbook of Reflective and Experiential Learning: Theory and Practice, London: Routledge Falmer •Robson, J. (2006) Teacher Professionalism in Further and Higher Education, London: Routledge