Dialogic reflective e-journaling: providing extra field-based support to special education preservice teachers by enhancing their critical reflection skills and transformative learning

In light of the continual problem of attrition in the field of special education and the need for well-prepared new special education teachers, the purpose of this study was to examine how dialogic reflective e-journaling between the first author and undergraduate preservice teachers impacted the classroom decision-making as well as the transformative learning of these preservice teachers involved in a special education field-based experience in US schools. Performance feedback was given by the first author as part of the teacher preparation supports already in place for the field-based experience. Study findings revealed that dialogic e-journaling enhanced the reflective skills of the study participants when faced with classroom disorienting dilemmas and instigated a positive personal transformation in them as teachers.     

The magic,the life,the others: how can the imaginative dimension in reflective practice be used with student teachers? A learning experience through a self-study

In this article the author reflects upon the place imagination has in education and argues that imagination for adults is an important part of the reflective practice. The article explores the importance of going beyond the traditional way of thinking to capture the essence of understanding teaching and learning practice. The goal of this self-study is to create a way of professional development as a teacher educator which the author could utilise with teacher students. To accomplish that, the author travels to the three (imaginary) lands of reflective practice, and applies this as a way of reflective learning. The author demonstrates how reflective practices can draw together a dialogue between the embodied experience and understandings based on imaginative meanings. The author argues that reflective practice could benefit from a perspective that focuses on imaginative thoughts and more creative discussion in all aspects of education. Furthermore, to enhance students’ reflective learning one must first and foremost be able to grasp the imaginative element within oneself in order to improve students’ learning through reflective practice.     

Reflective journaling: fostering dispositional development in preservice teachers

This study investigated the self-identified dispositions of 183 preservice teachers enrolled in a required philosophy of education course. The researchers coded their reflective journaling for the two essential NCATE (National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education) dispositions of fairness and the belief that all students can learn, as well as for other recurring, self-identified dispositions. These preservice teachers self-identified fairness much more frequently than the belief that all students can learn. The results point to additional recurring dispositional themes for consideration: critical thinking, caring, openness, moral education, and individual freedom. Further examination of the data revealed great variation in the preservice teachers’ interpretation of fairness, categorized as fairness through (1) inclusion of all socioeconomic classes and abilities; (2) culturally responsive teaching; (3) differentiation of instruction; and (4) fostering a safe learning environment.     

Bildung as an essential disposition in becoming a reflective practitioner: practical application of philosophical hermeneutics to second language teacher education

For a few decades, reflective practice has been employed in second language teacher education (SLTE) as ‘a means by which practitioners can develop a greater level of self-awareness about the nature and impact of their performance, an awareness that creates opportunities for professional growth and development’. Dewey, who initiated the concept of reflective thinking in teacher education, emphasized one’s attitudes toward engagement in reflective process. One such disposition is open-mindedness, ‘a willingness to entertain different perspectives… and acknowledgement of the limitations of one’s own perspectives’. Regarding this concept of open-mindedness, Gadamer, who established philosophical hermeneutics, provided profound insights by using the German word Bildung, which is often translated as education, culture, or self-cultivation. Through this concept, Gadamer emphasized not only one’s open and introspective disposition toward new experience but also one’s mode of being. This paper explores this notion of Bildung and examines its possible practical application to SLTE in combination with reflective practice. Referring to Grondin’s notion that education is to raise true questions, I will argue for the importance of nurturing Bildung of preservice second language teachers and of second language teacher educators.     

Private blog reflections connecting course content with field experiences: preservice teachers grapple with teacher identity

A challenge experienced within teacher preparation programs is the ability to help preservice teachers connect educational theory with teaching practice. Guided by Dewey's phases of reflective thinking and Schön’s reflection on action as an ethic for inquiry, we embedded a systematic reflection of written responses, recorded in a private weblog over the course of a 15-week intermediate reading methods course. Inductive thematic analysis of responses revealed the following themes: visceral thought, vulnerability, interpretation of course content, and identity formation toward becoming a classroom teacher. Our findings exemplify how systematic reflection in a private digital space contributed to the development of preservice teachers’ professional identities.     

Changing Minds: Developmental Education for Conceptual Change

The study investigates the impact of a teacher education program on preservice teachers' intellectual development, specifically, their capacity to deal with pedagogical complexity, to recognize agency as internal, and to be critically reflective, together with development of more autonomy-supportive motivating styles. The study combines a repeated-measures design with qualitative analysis of interview data. The sample comprises 175 third-year preservice teachers at an Australian university. The program is inspired by a teaching model, Developmental Education for Conceptual Change (DECC), which combines conceptual change theory with the Developmental Instruction Model based on the Perry scheme of intellectual and ethical development. Findings suggest that, on average, students' participation in the DECC program has made a modest contribution to their intellectual growth and tendency to adopt more autonomy-supportive pedagogical approaches. The model might have wider application in educational settings.     

Feedback on reflection: comparing rating-scale and forced-choice formats for measuring and facilitating teacher team reflective practice

This study focused on elements of measurement and feedback for teacher reflective practice. The measurement component examined the use of the Survey of Reflective Practice: A Tool for Assessing Development as a Reflective Practitioner to measure reflective practice and promote reflection, and compared educator responses using rating-scale and forced-choice item formats. The feedback component observed teachers and mentors collaborating to set goals that facilitate growth as a reflective practitioner. Results suggest the instrument can be used to measure and facilitate a teacher team’s level of reflection with one important caveat: our results indicate that there may be a threshold level of reflection necessary before teachers can benefit from the examined collaborative process. In addition, results suggest that the forced-choice item format might help mentors move away from a judging and evaluating mindset to a mindset of thoughtful analysis of the conditions and qualities that most accurately describe the team’s reflective behavior.     

A failure of dialogue? a critical reflection on a discussion between a teacher trainer and a pre-service second-language teacher

Reflective practice in teacher education often involves dialogic communication between teacher educators and teachers. This essay asks what constitutes authentic dialogic engagement in discussions between a pre-service second-language (SL) teacher and her university supervisor. Written as a self-critical reflection, the paper first describes the author’s thoughts and feelings about a post-teaching session he conducted with one of his supervisees and identifies possible disconnections existing between them. Drawing on Mikhail Bakhtin’s concept of dialogism and Hans-Georg Gadamer’s of genuine dialogue, this paper reflects on the dispositions that foster a dialogic relationship between teacher educators and pre-service and in-service teachers.     

Is reflective practice an essential component of becoming a professional teacher?

This paper explores the concept of reflective practice and its role in the professionalisation of student teachers. There is an examination of the requirements to become a qualified teacher and how these requirements have determined practice. After looking at the recent evolution of state requirements for initial teacher education, in England, it investigates the place of reflective practice within that process and to what extent reflective practice is still needed to become a teacher. It presents the different interpretations of reflective practice and the role of professionalism in the journey to qualified teaching status (QTS).     

Reflections of the student teacher

This paper explores the concept of reflection and its changing role in the journey of the student teacher. It presents part of the findings of a year-long investigation into the reflective practice of student teachers during their training year. Specifically, it investigates the reflections of the student teachers’ lessons during the PGCE (Post/Professional Graduate Certificate of Education) year at a higher education institution (HEI) in England. The strengths and weaknesses of the student teachers’ lessons are analysed and how these reflections change as they reach Newly Qualified Teachers (NQT) status.     

Implicated reading: a method for reflecting on practice

This paper evaluates an attempt by the author to operationalise the theory of reflective practice within the context of initial teacher education. Whilst an integral element of many teacher education programmes, the problematic of ‘how’ to reflect on practice remains a concern. In response, and taking inspiration from the work of Deleuze and Guattari, specifically their critique of representational thought and common understandings of text, the author experiments with a method for reflecting called implicated reading. The method involves the reading of students’ lived experiences as beginning teachers (recorded in written form), against a variety of other texts. The author draws on interview data to analyse and discuss the merits of the approach. The paper concludes that the method of implicated reading has the potential to unsettle the common tendency to focus on meaning and interpretation when reflecting on events and experiences. It is argued that the student teachers involved in the project instead begin to experience reflection as a process of connectivity, rethinking pedagogy as a result.     

Development of the reflective practice questionnaire: preliminary findings

This study introduces a new reflective practice questionnaire (RPQ) that can be used to assess self-reported measures for investigating the experiences, benefits, and potential pitfalls of reflective practice and reflective supervision. This questionnaire sets itself apart from previous self-report measures of reflective practice by the ability to administer to individuals working in any service industry (e.g. psychology, nursing, education, and others). This will allow for future investigations that can compare and contrast across different contexts and professions. This will further the understanding of how reflective practice impacts those engaged with the process. The present study provides preliminary evaluation of the questionnaire with samples from the general public (Study 1), and mental health practitioners (Study 2). The questionnaire includes a number of short four-item sub-scales for evaluating reflective practice including: reflective-inaction; reflective-on-action; reflective with others self-appraisal; desire for improvement; confidence (general); confidence (communication); uncertainty; stress interacting with clients; and job satisfaction. A six-item attitude towards reflective supervision scale is also included in the research. Results suggest that reflective practice can foster confidence and further a desire for self-improvement. However, results also indicate how reflective practice might increase uncertainty and stress in some individuals. Study 2 reveals that a more positive appraisal of reflective supervision is associated with greater selfreported reflection, desire for improvement, and confidence.     

Promoting teachers’ agency: reflective practice as transformative disposition

Reflective practice has been criticised for having become a standardised method in teacher education and on-the-job training, oftentimes following routines that more likely turn out to be self-affirming than to actually foster change. Also, reflective practice is still widely understood as an individual process. Both aspects are considered problematic and are addressed by employing an activity-theoretical approach that is suggested to be essentially compatible with an existentialist perspective on reflective practice as offered by Thompson and Pascal. Utilising the theory of expansive learning, formative interventionist methodology is proposed to provide a robust framework for developing collaborative and critical reflective practice, which in turn reveals the transformative potential of teachers’ agency, as illustrated by a study accompanying and supporting the development of an Austrian secondary school.     

Gaining insight into a novice teacher’s initial journey through reflective practice

This small-scale case study conducted in Trabzon, Turkey, aimed at uncovering the attitude of a tertiary-level novice teacher towards reflective practice in English as a foreign-language setting. The data were derived from the pre- and post-study interviews with the novice teacher, her reflective papers on her audio-recorded lessons, her classroom observation notes about the experienced teacher and the informal researcher observations. The researchers’ role was to design the process, familiarise the teacher with the focus of reflection, conduct the interviews, analyse and interpret the reflective papers of the teacher. The results show that reflective practice may be challenging in terms of emotions for a novice teacher as it may be hard to confront an outsider’s view. The results point to beneficial impact of the self-initiated reflection on the way to teachers’ continuous professional development.     

Introducing dental students to reflective practice: a dental educator’s reflections

There is growing consensus that being reflective and developing reflective practice is an important part of becoming a healthcare professional, adding to and enhancing our everyday professional values, knowledge and skills. For dentists, reflective practice is an essential part of dental training and professional development with dental undergraduate curricula creating and scaffolding opportunities for students to be reflective and develop reflective writing skills. This article describes the introduction of a reflective portfolio to the undergraduate Bachelor of Dental Science (BDS) programme at the University of Bristol. This will be followed by the author sharing some personal reflections, as the faculty member overseeing the assessment of these reflective portfolios, on the first year of this initiative. Lessons learned from the exercise as well as areas for future work and improvement will also be mentioned.     

CONFRONTING ASSUMPTIONS: PRESERVICE TEACHERS' BELIEFS ABOUT READING AND LITERATURE

This article describes one group of preservice teachers' beliefs about reading and literature. What teachers think of these subjects affects how they implement literature-based reading instruction and influences their students' views of reading and literature. During one part of a language arts education course, 39 students read about and discussed major assumptions of reader response, engaged in self-selected novel studies, and designed literature-based learning units. Students reflected on what they learned at the end of these activities. Through qualitative analysis of students' reflective writings, I identified eight beliefs students had formulated. More than three-quarters of the class gained insights into the reading process, the interpretative nature of reading, and pleasure reading. Half the students came to view writing as a means of identifying, shaping, and enriching readers' responses to literature. Finally, more than half the class described features of quality literature and one-third wrote about using literature outside the language arts. This study documents ways teacher educators can help preservice teachers examine assumptions about reading and literature that will influence how they deliver instruction.     

Moving beyond reflection in a hall of mirrors: developing critical reflective capacity in teachers and teacher educators

Using reflection to merely affirm existing beliefs rather than engaging in confrontation and examination of beliefs is like reflecting in a hall of mirrors. This study explores the process of critical reflective development of practicing teachers through program reflections written to prompts during master’s-level coursework, seeking to understand: How does critical reflective capacity develop and change in practicing teachers enrolled in advanced coursework in an M.Ed. program? Researchers used a three-level reflective practice pyramid as a frame for examining teachers’ reflective writings. Specifically, 103 reflections from 26 PK-12 teachers were available for analysis. Where finding a clear trajectory in teacher’s reflective development was an anticipated outcome in which teachers would progress from the technical to contextual to dialectical levels of reflection, findings did not indicate such linear development for most teachers. As faculty analyzed the data, they engaged in critical reflection, also questioning purposes and program outcomes. This paper reports on both our study’s findings in response to the research question and on the results of faculty reflective engagement. Results reinforce the understanding that reflection is an individual journey for teachers and faculty alike; results also highlight the importance for engagement in critical reflection for both teachers and teacher educators.     

Letter writing as a reflective practice: understanding the shuffling,shifting, and shaping of a researcher identity

This article presents letter writing as a form of arts-based inquiry and reflective practice. The author argues that letter writing can be employed to develop a reflective space for autobiographical reflection. The letter featured here captures and demonstrates the shuffling, shifting, and shaping processes of the author’s researcher identity through letter writing, and is informed by the theoretical underpinnings of reflective practice. It records and investigates the experiences that the author underwent during a compulsory course in the first year of a doctoral program at a North American university. Three interrelated themes are identified in the letter: the researcher identity in crisis, the nature of research, and future researcher identity. It is concluded that letter writing can facilitate the self-evolution, self-introspection, self-awareness, and identity change that emerges with, and through, reflection. Letter writing as a reflective practice offers the benefits of developing self-knowledge, independent thought, critical thinking, and deconstructive understanding of one’s experiences.