Reflective practice & my reflections!

As with much of my reading for these blog posts, I got rather fixated on one aspect - in this case, reflective practice. As educators, we all consider ourselves to be lifelong learners. Think about that, though; it’s become a real cliché. Do we all really know how we learn best? How do we know that our own learning has been effective? What we think of as learning, as practitioners, may not necessarily be real, embedded learning.

Reflection is greatly emphasised in teacher education. However, reflection and reflective practice are different entities. Moon (1999) says that reflective practice is an active dynamic, action-based & ethical set of skills, placed in real time and dealing with real, complex & difficult situations. It’s quite common to hear teachers argue that they already “do” reflective practice, simply by thinking over a timeline of events. It is more than just self-awareness. To me, reflective practice is purposeful thinking about actions and their outcomes; intent versus evidence, with analysis of direction. Moss & Barnes (2008) agree that reflection and practice nurture each other.

MindLab, for me, is part of my journey toward my Masters in Education, which I took on due to my constant need for improvement and growth - and for my love of learning. This has been about me demonstrating my status as “lifelong learner” as well as my continuing participation in teachers “professional teaching criteria” (PTCs) #4: “Demonstrate commitment to ongoing professional learning and development of professional personal practice”.

Each paper, topic or issue has encouraged and enabled me to undertake action research, where reflection is transformed into investigation, accompanied by evidence & analysis. This is a truly effective form of reflective practice, rather than just being encouragement to reflect - amusingly stated by Loughran (2002) as being about as meaningful as a lecture on co-operative group work! In particular, thinking about and planning for ways to teach 21st Century skills such as critical thinking & collaboration have been powerful for my teaching practice. These are such essential skills for scientists! The science faculty at my school have been trying to change how we teach to have a skills focus rather than a focus on content. Although it can be difficult to get everyone to agree on a specific system or direction, my inquiry and action research into incorporating these skills into my teaching (& consequently into the learning of my students) has positively contributed to the pedagogical understanding needed to make this change.

There are effectively 3 PTCs that my learning during MindLab has most influenced. Firstly, #6 & #12, which to me are inextricably linked:

Criteria 6: Conceptualise, plan, and implement an appropriate learning programme.

Criteria 12:  Use critical inquiry and problem-solving effectively in their professional practice.

Each task, or assignment, has required me to critically engage with literature in order to examine my own beliefs and views of my practice; to effectively envisage, plan, implement, rather & analyse evidence of an initiative that will ultimately improve my teaching, enhance pedagogy of my professional community, and strengthen the learning of my students. All of these are key indicators of these professional criteria, and all require, or embody, effective reflective practice.

The third PTC which this course has particularly influenced is #5:

Criteria 5: Show leadership that contributes to effective teaching and learning.

Each course & task has improved confidence in my own pedagogical ability and made me realise that the professional views and opinions I hold are valid, relevant & valuable. In this respect, I have felt more able to contribute effectively to the change our science faculty is undertaking. I feel comfortable in the knowledge that I have further value to add to schoolwide & nationwide change. My intent is to use this blog to further evidence my PTCs, and to document my own personal learning journey. Once my MEd is completed, I can’t say I’ll be quick to undertake another qualification! However, the learning involved in this process has been priceless in so many ways.

While I see that MindLab has contributed massively to my pedagogical development, I do feel that development of my scientific specialty has been somewhat neglected. What I can take away from this experience, is that the two don’t necessarily need to be separate. There are many teaching and science related connections that I can tap into in order to foster real world contexts for our students. This has already begun, with the establishment of a collaboration between the Ministry of Education (Education Infrastructure Service) and Primary/Secondary schools nationwide, who are working together utilising real time scientific data. Looking at my “interdisciplinary connections” graphic in my previous blog, there is much more potential in this area. Utilising these connections may be the action research-based professional development that I need in order to further develop knowledge of how to incorporate 21st Century skills into New Zealand education.

References

Loughran, J. J. (2002). Effective Reflective Practice: In Search of Meaning in Learning about Teaching. Journal of Teacher Education, 53(1), 33–43. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022487102053001004

Ministry of Education (nd). Practising teacher Criteria and e-learning . Retrieved from http://elearning.tki.org.nz/Professional-learning/ 

Moon, J (1999) Learning Journals: a handbook for academics, students and professional development. London: Kogan Page

Moss, D., & Barnes, R. (2008). Reflective Practice. Reflective Practice, (790329634). https://doi.org/10.1080/14623940701816626