Applied Practice in Context - Activity 3

My Response to Finlay's (2008) Article

Some questions that I had before I read Finlay's (2008) paper were:

• Are our own reflections limited by what we know and understand?   
• Are our reflections limited by culture, religion and age?  
• Are there different types of reflection?

Source

As Finlay (2008) suggests in her introductory paragraph, reflection can sometimes be used to 'rationalise practice' and 'to mull them over', then analyse our practice critically to look for any loophole and make necessary changes to our practice.   This is how I have thought of reflection.  Now, having read all the article - and reflected on it, I am coming to an understanding that there is more to reflection than meets the eye.

Reflection - Critical Reflection - Reflexivity

Finlay and Gough (2003), mention that these three can be placed on a continuum.  Their belief is that a basic reflection with no critiquing is at the beginning of the continuum, followed by critical reflection (my stance on this is outlined below).   I was interested to read about 'reflexivity' -  personal reflection and social critique.   This is a style of reflection that I will try to employ in future as I believe that any reflection on my practice should include some form of self-awareness of how my own background, beliefs and feelings have impacted on my practice - and have these had a positive impact on the outcomes of the learning taking place?

Reflect or Reflect Critically

I am puzzled by Reynolds' (1998) suggestion that one can just 'reflect' or 'reflect critically'.  How can one reflect (think about an event) without being critical - even just a little?   Even while reflecting on a day-to-day activity such as the drive home from work, there would be some critique, e.g. how I could have avoided driving my car on the uneven surface through the road works, thus avoiding any possible damage to the suspension on my car.

To be involved in critical reflection doesn't mean that one has to think negatively, or pull apart an idea and pick at it.  On the contrary, after a meal at a restaurant I might reflect on how well the meal was cooked, what flavours I tasted and what aromas I smelt.  These, although critical, could still sum up a positive experience.

Mutual Collaboration

This variant of reflection is one that I can accede with.   When working with a team, collaboration in planning follows discussion and reflection on current practice - What went well?  What didn't go well?  Why didn't it go well?  What changes need to be made?   This variant of reflection is also evident within a teacher-student partnership while conferencing and discussing a piece of work, during formative and summative assessment.   

This year I will be mentoring a PRT within my team.   I envisage multiple opportunities to collaborate, discuss and share our practice in order to reflect, critique and develop new ideas to support the learners in our habitat.   As a result of reading Finlay's paper, I also realise that my PRT, due to limited time in the education sector, may not be able to critically reflect to the same extent that I or another educator may be able to.    It will be important that I support my PRT to 'see differently through practical and practice experiences' (Loughran, 2000).

My Reflective Practice

At times, the process of reflection has been just that - a process.   While it has been good to be given a set time to reflect, it has not always been the appropriate time, e.g. little data had been gathered, an observation had to be rescheduled or I had not been given enough time to 'chew' over the lesson in order to reflect deeply.  Sometimes the reflection was on a part of my practice that would not be repeated.  Therefore, the reflection outcome was not useful as I was not able to make any changes and improve my practice.  Therefore, the reflection was not thought of as worthwhile as I knew that I had no opportunity to apply my reflection feedback to a future area of learning.

Source

Rolfe's (2001) model of reflection is one that was widely used by both teachers and students in a school that I was recently working in.   Although this is a simple model to use and follow through the processes of reflection, I feel that another model would be more suitable to bring about a more critical reflection when conducting an inquiry.  For this reason, I will use the 'Sprial of Inquiry' (Timperley, H., Kaser, L., & Halbert, J., 2014), to support the reflection process of a more in-depth inquiry.

Source

I remember when I first started teaching, the thought of regularly reflecting on my practice to identify what went wrong made me feel that I would always be looking for flaws.  I asked myself, "Would I ever get it right?"  I wish I had been reassured by Quinn (1988/2000, as cited by Finlay) in those early days that 'critical' does not have to mean 'negative', but instead a means of helping to gain some form of understanding about what has happened and how to move forward.

References: 

Finlay, L., (2008).  Reflection on 'reflective practice'.  PBPL paper 52.  Retrieved from, 

www.open.ac.uk.pbpl

Finlay, L. and Gough, B. (2003) Reflexivity: a practical guide for researchers in health and social sciences. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.

Loughran, J.J. (2000) Effective Reflective practice, A paper presented at Making a difference through Reflective practices: values and Actions conference. University College of Worcester, July 2000.

Quinn, F.M. (1988/2000) Reflection and reflective practice. In C.Davies, L.Finlay and A. Bullman (eds.) Changing practice in health and social care. London: Sage. (Original work published in 1988 and reproduced in 2000).

Rolfe, G., (2001).  Retrieved from,
http://www.cumbria.ac.uk/Public/LISS/Documents/skillsatcumbria/ReflectiveModelRolfe.pdf

Timperley, H., Kaser, L., & Halbert, J., (2014).  Retrieved from,
http://www.educationalleaders.govt.nz/Pedagogy-and-assessment/Evidence-based-leadership/Data-gathering-and-analysis/The-spiral-of-inquiry