Reflective practice
Reflective practice is a continuous process where individuals think critically about their actions and the underlying reasons for those actions. This method emphasizes the relationship between thought and action, aiming to enhance professional practice across various fields, particularly in education. Originating from the work of scholars Donald Schon and Chris Argyris, reflective practice encourages ongoing learning and adaptation, turning experiences into opportunities for growth. It involves cycles of self-observation and evaluation, allowing practitioners to understand the impact of their decisions on themselves and their learners.
In education, reflective practice is often supported by frameworks like Gibbs's Model of Reflection, which outlines a structured approach to reflection, encompassing description, feelings, evaluation, analysis, conclusions, and action planning. This cyclical model helps individuals assess their experiences and apply lessons learned to future situations. By fostering a culture of reflection, professionals can enhance their skills, promote positive change, and contribute to the development of learning organizations. Through effective reflective practices, educators and other professionals can create an environment that values continuous improvement and encourages collaboration.
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Reflective practice
Reflective practice is a method of thinking about what you are doing while you are doing it and then considering the relationship between action and thinking. Educational researchers Donald Schon and Chris Argyris identified the theory, which has had implications for changing educators’ framework of teaching and for all professionals concerned with improving their ongoing practice. The emphasis on encouraging continuous learning and developing a learning society is a key component of reflective practitioners who seek to influence education in a multidisciplinary environment. Schon insisted on multiple professional practices in order to ensure the continuation of knowledge by educators: reflection as a practicum; fundamental and tacit knowledge; knowledge in action; reflection in action; reflection on action; a willing suspension of disbelief; operative attention; and the ladder of reflection.
Overview
Professionals constantly think about their actions in a structured or semi-structured way. Many researchers of human development and learning touched on the concepts of reflection, including John Dewey and Carl Jung. However, it was Schon and Argyris who codified the notion of reflection as a theory, with applications across the profession of education. In reflective practice, the correlation between action and thinking shapes people’s future actions and impacts their performance. It is not only educators’ actions that are affected, but also the process they engage in before, during, and after.
There are three definitions of reflective practice that have become most common since the early twentieth century. One views reflective practice as a continuous cycle of self-observation and self-evaluation in order to understand individual actions and the reactions they prompt in themselves and learners. The next postulates that reflective practitioners habitually and judiciously use communication, knowledge, technical skills, reasoning, emotions, values, and reflection in practice for the benefit of the individuals and communities being served. Schon’s original technique required that reflective practitioners frame the problem situation while thinking and acting about what the relationship is between acting and thinking. Finally, reflective action is used in many teacher educator programs and provides the foundation for preparing teachers and educational leaders in the assumption of critical roles as future leaders.
Successful reflective practitioners use reflection as a practicum, constantly reflecting upon their actions in practice. This process requires tacit knowledge regarding the context of practice and their role as a succinct and deliberative inquirer. The numerous iterations of reflection in practice ensures that all actions are the subject of inquiry and reflection with the application of ever evolving solutions practiced and reflected upon as an essential component of the learning process. Learning organizations encourage reflective practice in education and other professional disciplines. In education, researchers further identified reflective practice in action through eight key attributes that skilled teachers think, say, and do. Those attributes are: remembering that authoritative beats authoritarian; apologizing; believing that everyone can grow; understanding that power is not finite; promoting and giving positive messages; maintaining flexibility; setting the right climate; and teaching life lessons. Coupled with reflective practice, practitioners contribute to improved professional practice in all learning organizations.
Gibbs's Model of Reflection
In 1988 researcher Graham Gibbs published his book Learning By Doing: A Guide to Teaching and Learning Methods, in which he developed a structure for reflection based on the concepts of experiential learning. This structure, which became known as Gibbs's model of reflection or Gibbs's reflective cycle, became one of the most widely used tools for guiding reflective practice across a wide range of disciplines. The method's cyclical process begins with the original experience to be reflected upon, and is commonly divided into six steps: description, feelings, evaluation, analysis, conclusions, and action plan. The first step, description, simply involves explaining the experience and establishing context. This leads to a discussion of one's thoughts and feelings at the time of the experience and afterwards, which are in turn incorporated into an evaluation of the experience's outcomes, whether good or bad. Once these steps have been completed, analysis may be performed, drawing in other experiences, outside knowledge, theory, and other sources in order to make sense of the situation on a larger scale. Next come conclusions—sometimes broken down into general and specific (or personal) categories—about the experience and analysis, including what alternatives there may have been or other chances for improvement. Finally, the action plan is a step for summarizing the lessons to be taken away and outlining the best steps for handling and similar experience.
This cycle can be repeated as needed as new events requiring reflection occur. Gibbs's model of reflection is widely used in education and coaching as a method to promote improvement. The details of each step may be customized to fit a certain discipline or goal, such as academic writing or workplace interactions. In its general form, the model may be applied to virtually any situation, whether to evaluate a new experience or to better understand the positive and negative aspects of a highly familiar routine activity.
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