Activity 1: My Reflective Practice
When I think about my Reflective practice I tend to think that I have not reflectively ]thought about my practice since my training at teachers college, where it was a requirement. When I read the question for this post it made me nervous as I wasn't sure how to reflect on something I thought I wasn't doing, but in reality I actually am.
To make this clear, I do reflect on my practice. When I think about it I spend a lot of time reflecting through thought on my practice and the effect that this has. However, for me when I think reflection, I think of formal written reflections, such as this or the reflections called "Smyths" that I had to do at University. These were similar to Gibbs Reflective Cycle (cited in Finlay 2008). I don't like writing it down but I do enjoy discussing it with colleagues to gain their insights and advice, I have also become aware that I enjoy discussing it in my quarterly appraisals. As stated in Finlay (2008), there are many different models to use when reflecting on ones practice and this made it difficult, which one do I use? I felt that too many options only made the choice harder to utilise for this blog post.
To make this clear, I do reflect on my practice. When I think about it I spend a lot of time reflecting through thought on my practice and the effect that this has. However, for me when I think reflection, I think of formal written reflections, such as this or the reflections called "Smyths" that I had to do at University. These were similar to Gibbs Reflective Cycle (cited in Finlay 2008). I don't like writing it down but I do enjoy discussing it with colleagues to gain their insights and advice, I have also become aware that I enjoy discussing it in my quarterly appraisals. As stated in Finlay (2008), there are many different models to use when reflecting on ones practice and this made it difficult, which one do I use? I felt that too many options only made the choice harder to utilise for this blog post.
It took me a while to actually realise that by writing down what I was feeling about this made me realise that I am thinking about how I reflect in class and from there I just used bits and pieces from the different models to reflect on how I reflect. I believe that I am a rapid reflector and repairer, which I believe is the norm for many teachers. I am a Beginner Teacher so I am constantly trying things to see if they work and then considering on how they worked and if they can be changed and altered to be better next time. A lot of what I do is a bit of trial and error and constant reflections by thought.
By writing this down I have come to realise that if you have an issue or an event, and then formally write it down, even if it is in a private journal/blog and then write how you feel, and what happened this is in essence reflecting on it and this can help you to understand, accept and or change "fix" what needs to be fixed. At least that is what I hope but in reality this takes time and as a busy, beginner teacher I am not sure how often I will take the time to do this.
I believe personally in reflection that if I had to choose a model to follow, at least loosely, then Boud, Keogh and Walker (1985) and their three stage model of refection is easier for me to follow and understand and is also very similar, in my opinion, to Zeichner and Liston's (cited in Finlay 2008, p.4) five levels of reflection.
In Boud, Keogh and Walker (1985) they state that the first stage is mentally replaying what happened in your head and I am already doing this which is why this model appeals to me. The second stage is the hardest for me but I have to understand my feelings both the positive and the negative feelings, these meed to be addressed, which I believe I do unconsciously anyway when I am reflecting. The third stage is essentially re-evaluation and using new data, research, and advice to be applied next time. Although there is criticism with this model it works best for me as I don't often have the time to sit down and write but now that I am aware of what I am thinking and what it is this has made me feel better about my practice because I am always reflecting but this has given me a framework to use when I do and hopefully come up with solutions and alternatives.
My goal is to write some of these reflections down more often that just for MindLab and see how this aids my future practice.
Cheers!
Refrences:
Boud, D., Keogh, R. and Walker, D. (1985) Promoting Reflection in Learning: A Model. In D. Boud, R. Keogh and D. Walker (eds.) Reflection: turning experience into learning. London: Kogan Page.
Finlay, L. (2009). Reflecting on reflective practice. PBPL. Retrieved from http://www.open.ac.uk/opencetl/files/opencetl/file…
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