Reflective Practice 

About: Reflective Practice is an academic journal published by Taylor & Francis. The journal publishes majorly in the area(s): Reflective practice & Reflection (computer graphics). It has an ISSN identifier of 1462-3943. Over the lifetime, 1163 publications have been published receiving 22679 citations.

Transforming Teaching Practice: Becoming the critically reflective teacher

Abstract: This article proposes a framework for conceptualizing developing as a critically reflective teacher. The author posits that critical reflection is the distinguishing attribute of reflective practitioners. The term critical reflection as developed here merges critical inquiry, the conscious consideration of the ethical implications and consequences of teaching practice, with self-reflection, deep examination of personal beliefs, and assumptions about human potential and learning. Essential practices for developing critical reflection are discussed. This article defines processes fundamental to reflective practice. Teacher beliefs are self-generating, and often unchallenged. Unless teachers develop the practice of critical reflection, they stay trapped in unexamined judgments, interpretations, assumptions, and expectations. Approaching teaching as a reflective practitioner involves infusing personal beliefs and values into a professional identity, resulting in developing a deliberate code of conduct.

Developing critically reflective practice

Abstract: Reflective practice has become an influential concept in various forms of professional education, for example, in nursing and social work. However, there has been a common tendency for it to be oversimplified in practice, and, furthermore, dominant understandings of reflective practice can themselves be criticised for lacking theoretical sophistication in some respects – particularly in relation to the social and political dimensions of learning and professional practice. This paper therefore seeks to clarify the theoretical underpinnings of reflective practice and to propose developments in relation to the missing sociological elements. It briefly reviews current dominant understandings of reflective practice before proposing developments in the theory base to make it more theoretically sophisticated in general and more sociologically informed in particular. In this way, the foundations for a critically reflective practice are sketched out.

Reflective learning journals: From concept to practice

Abstract: Reflective learning journals are recognized as a significant tool in promoting active learning among nursing students. Essentially, nurse educators strive to encourage students to think about past experiences, current situations, and expected outcomes of their actions so that they can explain what they do in the clinical setting and why. In other words, nurse educators seek to promote professional practice that is reflective rather than routine. The purposes in this paper are to discuss the application of two models of reflection to a set of reflective learning journals and to offer some recommendations for educators, researchers, and students. Using a three stage model of reflection (Scanlon & Chernomas, 1997), 52 nursing students explored managerial concepts. The major findings indicated that students may be categorized, according to Kember et al. (1999), as nonreflectors (i.e., lack evidence of deliberate appraisal), reflectors (i.e., demonstrate insight through analysis, discrimination, and evaluation...

Development of a tool to assess teachers’ level of reflective practice

Abstract: This article describes the development, validation process, and construction of an instrument to assess a teacher’s level of reflection. It discusses the need for a commonly shared language to categorize the various levels involved in becoming a critically reflective teacher. The research design for the creation of the Survey of reflective practice: A tool for assessing development as a reflective practitioner initially called for identifying individuals who had conducted research on the development of reflective practice and then soliciting their expert judgment in establishing specific descriptors to define levels of reflective practice utilizing an online interactive format. The aim of this assessment tool is to provide a way to gauge how a prospective or practicing teacher is progressing as a reflective practitioner to serve as a vehicle for facilitating the development of structures to mediate higher order reflection.

Can reflective practice be taught

Abstract: Professional educators often advocate reflective practice; it is less clear that they model it and provide explicit instruction. Working with illustrations from initial teacher education, this paper describes the author’s own reflection‐in‐action that resulted in an explicit strategy for helping new professionals experience the potential benefits of reflective practice through their program of professional preparation. The author concludes that reflective practice can and should be taught. The results of explicit instruction seem far more productive than merely advocating reflective practice and assuming that individuals will understand how reflective practice differs profoundly from our everyday sense of reflection.