Reflective Practitioner free essay sample

The literature of reflective practice is widely discussed regardless of different professional fields especially in the aspects of the definition of the term ‘reflective practice’ itself, the methods or means to achieve a stage of becoming a reflective practitioner, and the relations of how reflective practice can be incorporated into particular professional fields. This literature is given such attention because it can bring great advantages to the development of many professional fields. This is not to claim that ‘unreflective practice’ does not have any advantages, instead doing a reflective practice may give more advantages rather than not doing it (Wallace, 1991: 54). Therefore, this essay will discuss in details the reflective practice theory in the teaching profession in comparison with the other professional development models and then the activities that can be carried out in order for teachers to become a reflective practitioner in the next five years time in light of the extended professional roles of the teacher and ethical dimensions of teaching in Malaysian context. We will write a custom essay sample on Reflective Practitioner or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page The reflective models which will be focused in this essay will be Schon, Kolb and Wallace’s. The ‘reflective practice’ model term was proposed or introduced by Schon in 1983. He has divided a reflection process into two different ways which are ‘reflection in-action’ and ‘reflection on-action’ (Finlay, 2008). The difference between these two ways of reflection is the matter of when the reflection process takes place; whether it happens during the events or after the events has taken place. Schon’s ideas about reflective practice has then been expanded and discussed by Kolb, Gibbs, Johns, Rofle, Wallace, Moon and others by using their own interpretations about this concept. Kolb (1984) has established his own reflective model cycle by focusing on the four main processes that will occur continuously in one’s professional development. The process will happen after the ‘reflective observation’ is done on the ‘concrete experience’ and then consequently, the result of the reflection will suggest an ‘abstract concept’ or hypothesis to be put into the ‘active experiment’ in the later stage (Moon,1999:24-25). After that, the result of the experiment will become a ‘concrete experience’ for the next cycle of developing one in his or her profession. Meanwhile, according to Wallace (1991), in order to become a reflective practitioner, one needs to undergo two stages; ‘pre-training stage’ and ‘professional education and development stage’ (p. 49). The first stage that he proposed is actually the schemata or the mental constructs of the trainees on the profession that they are engaged in or will be engaged in (ibid). The second stage is the stage where the trainees will apply their ‘received knowledge’ and their ‘experiential knowledge’ into practice and then reflect upon it reciprocally (ibid). However, it is important to take note that Schon, Kolb and Wallace still share the same principles albeit they describe the reflective model in different ways. The same principles that they share can be concluded as the main characteristics of what we call reflective practice model. From the three views, it can be deduced that a reflective practice is a continuous learning process which will help one to self-develop from time to time. This is because no one will be a perfect reflective practitioner. This explains why Kolb and Wallace have illustrated their beliefs about reflective practice as a cycle that has no ending. Another significant principle of reflective practice that can be inferred by comparing their models or views is that it must have some kind of input (which can be obtained either outside or inside the professional context) before the reflection process can really happen. The reason is because without input, what is there for students to reflect on? In the context of pre-service teacher programme, even the knowledge that the trainees have about teaching by observing how their teachers teach them when they were students itself can be considered as an input (schemata). The input or the information that the trainees have will be changed into knowledge if a reflection process happens. But, more importantly, the input is very crucial in determining the quality of reflection that will happen. This principle can be demonstrated in all the three models. The last characteristic of reflective practice that can be obtained from their views is that it involves experience of doing or practicing something. In Kolb’s model, the process of experiencing events occur after the active experiment of the abstract concept. Wallace also agrees with this view when he includes the ‘experiential knowledge’ that interacts with both schemata and the received knowledge that the trainees have into his reflective practice model. Not only that, Schon’s reflection on-action model also in the same way emphasising the importance of experience in order to do a reflective practice in which the trainees have to go through the events first before doing a reflection. The experience is therefore becomes the input or the sources for trainees to reflect on. Thus, based on the discussion of reflective practice characteristics, it can be pointed out that the model is closely linked with the theories of constructivism and autonomy. Constructivists, in relation to reflective model believe that the knowledge gained from the real experience is crucial and reliable for the learning process to occur where trainees will actually construct their own knowledge from the experience based on the environment that they live in (Hein,1991). This is similar to reflective model which stresses on the importance of experiential knowledge as a source of their reflection. Moreover, reflective model is also related with one of the current theories that emphasises on self-learning through active reflection. So the core similarity between reflective practice and autonomy is that the main factor for the learning process to take place is on the students or the trainees themselves (Holec,1981). They are the one who will be doing the reflection and deciding how the product of the reflection will be used for their own development. In relation to the teaching profession generally, the activities which associated with reflective practice may include the journal writing, collaborative activities between peers and research. Journal writing activities can actually help the teachers to keep their teaching routine recorded on the daily, weekly or monthly basis. By writing a journal, teachers can reflect on their teaching and check their improvements in teachings from time to time. Collaborative activities between peer teachers such as lesson studies, collaborative research or conferences can also be useful in order for teachers to exchange ideas or to obtain new inputs from people in the same profession. The inputs might be the students’ views about certain approaches that teacher uses in classroom or the problems that might arise in the future students context. Consequently, these kinds of input will then be integrated with the teachers’ own views and be interpreted according to their own understanding before being applied into their students’ context (Wallace,1991:50). From the discussion, we know that reflective practice model is an important element or methods that should be applied by people who want to be professionally developed. However, one has to know that reflective model is not the only way to achieve the aim of professional development, instead there are other models of professional development that can be applied by people regardless of their profession fields. One of the models is the Craft model. This model is contrasted with the reflective model in terms of the core belief of the model which can also explain the theories related to it, activities associated in order to achieve the stage of a professional competence and drawbacks of the models. The Craft model holds the belief that knowledge is transferred like a jug and mug theory (Malone,2003). From its perspective, professional competence can be achieved when a trainee has successfully copied or followed the experts of their professional fields through activities like observation and imitation (Wallace,1991:6). During the observation process, the teacher trainees will take notes on how their teachers or lecturers teach them in the classroom and then in the future they will use the same methods that their teacher have used to their students. However, reflective model believes that professional competence can be achieved by incorporating all the knowledge that learners have (either received or experiential or schemata) into a continuous practice and active reflection process. This is to demonstrate that the power of knowledge in learning is not only on the teachers’ hand alone, rather on the learners as well. In relation to the theory of learning, obviously, as imitation is the major concern of this model, it can be linked with the behaviourism theory. In contrast, the reflective model is intertwined with the constructivism theory as it has a two ways relationship between practice and reflection that is reciprocal in nature. It can be said that the main difference between these two models is the ways of practice that both models highlighted on where the practice for Craft model is unreflective practice and the practice for reflective model is vice versa. The unreflective practice in Craft model has the advantages in terms of confidence building and the consolidation of the professional context (Wallace,1991:54). However, if the Craft model is compared to the reflective model, the latter have more advantages because the traditional concept like an ‘apprentice-expert model’ (Day,1992) can no longer be considered suitable for all aspects of learning in the current situation as society is dynamic and always changes. In my opinion, because the reflective model is continuous and flexible in nature, it will be the best model for my professional development especially in the context of teaching. As a novice English teacher, it is significant for me to become a reflective practitioner because the Malaysian Teacher Standard (Standard Guru Malaysia) requires all teachers to achieve certain levels of professional competence in order to offer and ensure the high quality education for Malaysian students at the present and in the future. In addition, by being a reflective practitioner, teachers can carry a role of a researcher in which it is one of the extended roles of teachers as described by Joginder Singh (2005). According to her, a role of a researcher here means that teachers are responsible to do research on their teaching practice and their students’ learning frequently in order to ‘enhance the quality’ of teaching and learning in their classroom (ibid:292). Not only that, by being a reflective practitioner, teacher’s role as a manager of learning can also be carried in which teachers have to ensure that their teaching practice can help to achieve the learning outcomes by using well-planned lessons that are suitable for different context of students (ibid). Hence, to fulfill the Malaysian Teacher Standard requirement and to carry the roles of teachers as a researcher and a manager, I have to start carrying out activities which will facilitate me in becoming a reflective practitioner in the next five years of my career. One of the activities is producing an electronics portfolio (e-portfolio). This activity incorporates technology into the process of teachers’ learning. E-portfolio can be presented or collected in many formats such as audio, video, graphic and text either online or vice versa (Barnett, 2000). In my case as an English teacher novice, the content of the e-portfolio that I will produce may include the video recordings of my teaching in the classroom, the images of the important moments captured during the teaching activities, the documents of tasks or texts used by teachers for students in the classroom or any other documents such as the feedbacks which are obtained from the students after or before the teaching process. This kind of activity is actually useful for me in order to keep my teaching data recorded and it will be easy for me to refer to it in the future. Furthermore, an e-portfolio is livelier and can show more concrete evidence to be used as a source of reflection as compared to journal writing or written portfolio. Besides that, another advantage of using e-portfolio is that it is easy to be updated since the process of collecting data can save a lot of time. As lied out by Danielson and Abrutyn (1997, in Barnett, 2000), there are four processes in developing an e-portfolio; collection, selection, reflection, and projection. By doing this four processes, I will produce not only an updated e-portfolio, but also will be successful in achieving the teachers’ role as a manager since the four processes are actually developing my professional skills in managing my teaching practice in the classroom context. Another useful activity is by carrying out a number of action researches that which will help me to be a reflective practitioner in order to carry the roles of a teacher as a researcher. The action researches are the small scales researches that use methods like ‘case studies, questionnaires, observation, interviews’ and etc which are usually done on the teachers’ own classroom context (Joginder Singh,2005:292). It is easy to be done since it does not require permission from authorities, or in the least permissible to carried out. The research done should aim to find out the most effective methods of teaching to be applied by the teachers in the classroom or anything related to the creation of an effective classroom learning (Wallace,1999). Hopefully, the results of this activity will not only achieve this aim, but at the same time it will help in the development of the teachers’ professionalism. It is actually ‘an extension of the normal reflective practice of many teachers, but it is slightly more rigorous [since it involves the students whom they themselves are teaching] and [this] might conceivably lead to more effective outcomes’ (ibid:56). Thus, by carrying out numerous action researches, I will be engaged in and will be familiarised with reflecting activity as part of the learning process. Therefore, I believe that I will become a good reflective practitioner to achieve certain aims as an English teacher novice in Malaysia context. In conclusion, using a reflective model as the main reference to enhance one’s professional development seems to be appropriate and effective in the Malaysian context provided that the three principles that can facilitate reflective practice lined out by Wildman and Niles (1987) in Moon (1999) are satisfied.