Reflective Teaching Practice

What Is reflective teaching practice?  

Reflective teaching practice involves an intentional process of analyzing one’s teaching practices to improve student learning and professional development as an educator.

John Dewey, a renowned philosopher and psychologist in education, defined reflection as “the active, persistent and careful consideration of any belief or supposed form of knowledge in the light of the grounds that support it and the further conclusions to which it tends” (Dewey, 1933, p. 9).

Dewey saw reflection as a tool for educators to process their teaching by critically examining their experiences and using their insights to more effectively approach future practice.  

Similarly, in another influential text – The Reflective Practitioner – written by Donald Schön (1983), Schön emphasizes that a key competence in educators is reflection and being able to respond during and after each teaching situation. This ability could only be achieved through an active practice of reflection and implementation. Hence, reflection is not simply a one-off activity or moment, but rather an iterative and deliberate process.  

In higher education, beyond reflections as a form of learning activity or assessment for learners, reflective writing is often seen in the context of faculty tenure and promotion evaluations. This unfortunately focuses reflection as an output of assessing an educator’s experiences of teaching, rather than utilizing reflection for genuine professional development. An authentic and personalized reflective teaching practice can help educators grow and develop their teaching skills, ultimately improving student learning experiences. This can look like:   

• Identifying what you do in your teaching (e.g. teaching practices, interactions, decisions) 
• Actively questioning your own teaching assumptions, decisions, and interactions 
• Observing and gathering evidence of your teaching (e.g. from your classroom, your students, or peers) 
• Analyzing what worked, what didn’t work, and why – not only at a superficial level, but probing deeper to issues of assumptions, values, and / or positionality 
• Making changes and experimenting with new approaches 
• Refining teaching practices based on feedback and reflection on action 

Why should you engage in reflective teaching practice?  

Reflective teaching practice at its core is professional development for educators. Without any external support, it is the way that any educator can develop their practices, consider what is and is not working (and why), integrate feedback, etc. This makes engaging in reflective teaching practice imperative to anyone committed to growth as an educator. This practice also aligns well with student-centered learning as it recognizes the role of the educator and how they impact the learning experience. For example, rather than seeing low class attendance as a student issue, a reflective approach may encourage educators to consider different approaches to increase student engagement. 

An additional consideration is the reality that teaching is often situated in a context that is dynamic – not only in the knowledge domain, but also in the student body, the socio-political climate, and larger cultural context. Considering these realities, it is crucial to frame teaching and learning practices as iterative processes that can respond and adapt to changing landscapes. For example, during the COVID-19 pandemic, educators needed to quickly pivot and adapt their practices into the online and virtual space. Engaging in reflective teaching practice facilitates one’s ability to consider with intention what needs to change in the teaching space and evaluate the impact of these sudden shifts.   

Benefits to having a Reflective Teaching Practice

Without a doubt, it is easy to understand that engaging in reflective teaching practice can be extremely valuable to one’s professional development and improve the student learning experience. A different framing by Ash and Clayton (2009) suggests that, by having a reflective teaching practice, one can:  

• Generate learning – articulate questions, confronts bias, examine causality, compare theory to practice, connect to systemic issues  
• Deepen learning – challenge simplistic / superficial conclusions, invite alternative perspectives, ask ‘how’ and ‘why’ questions  
• Document learning – produce tangible evidence of new understanding for evaluation and feedback  

Models and Frameworks for Reflective Teaching Practice  

There are many models of reflection that you can use to build your reflective teaching practice. This is because you may need a different approach to reflection depending on your goal. Just like any good, scaffolded practice, there may be times when you don’t need any model and want to approach reflection in a free-form manner. Consider what your needs are to determine which approach best fits your current context.  

Basic Frameworks

One basic framework for organizing your reflection is based on Borton’s (1970) original model of “What? So what? Now what?” It is commonly used as it is a simple and practical framework to pull out in any context, formal or informal (e.g. after an activity, a teaching session, a course).  

• Another simple and practical framework is Boud’s Triangular Representation: Experience → Reflection → Learning.  
  • This model emphasizes the cyclical relationship between experience (i.e. what happened), reflective thinking (e. what are your thoughts / feelings on the experience), and learning (i.e. what are you taking away from the experience), and focuses on the transformation of experience into learning through reflection. Its simplicity offers educators a less prescriptive model to reflection.

• Lastly, two other similar models, with a few added components are Gibbs’ Reflective Cycle and Kolb’s Experiential Learning Cycle. Both models follow the basic framework of describing, reflecting on and considering the takeaways from the experience, with some minor modifications to encourage the educator to focus on different aspects of the experience.
  • Gibbs’ Reflective Cycle (Experience → Feelings → Evaluation → Analysis → Conclusion → Action Plan)
    • Gibbs approached reflection with more structure, and an emphasis on reflecting on one’s feelings throughout the process. This may be important in contexts where emotions may arise, such as a contentious or difficult teaching topic or in-class activity.  
    • It also orients educators towards defining an action plan, with practical takeaways.  

• • Kolb’s Experiential Learning Cycle (Experience → Reflective Observation → Abstract Conceptualization → Active Experimentation) 
    • Developed with experiential learning in mind, this cyclical model allows educators to explicitly reflect and abstract the practical experience more theoretically, considering how the practical experience relates to larger thematic ideas and considerations. 

All four of these models (Borton, Boud, Gibbs, and Kolb) emphasize the importance of reflection in and on experience and create simple cyclical models to demonstrate how you can easily use these models to structure a reflection.  

Strategies for engaging in reflective teaching practice  

Regardless of the reflection model / framework you choose, it is important that your reflections are of high quality. High quality reflection has been characterized by many different scholars. Eyler et al. (1996) organize high-quality reflections using 4 C’s:  

• Continuous (ongoing practice that occurs regularly) 
• Connected (integrating experience with learning, related to actual assignment and activities)  
• Challenging (clarifying values and expectations, encouraging being critical of your own practices)  
• Contextualized (larger context of the community and world around, responding to changes) 

Some strategies you can use to building reflective teaching practice include:  

• Using structured reflection tools (e.g., frameworks) 
  • Identify moments in teaching that stand out (positive or problematic) and reflect on these explicitly 
  • Set aside time to do it  
  • Write regularly about teaching events, challenges, and insights 
• Integrating reflection into course evaluations, peer evaluations and tenure / promotion portfolios.  
  • Use mid‐course evaluation, classroom assessment techniques, anonymous feedback, etc. 
  • Start small – feedback on an activity could be helpful 
  • Have colleagues observe your class and then reflect together 
• Building a community of reflective practitioners – encourage opportunities to share and engage in discussion on teaching practices.  
  • Faculty development groups, mentorship programs, or peer groups that meet to share and reflect 

In summary

• Reflective teaching is intentional and iterative, meaning it is an ongoing practice of reflection on teaching to improve student learning and develop as an educator.  
• While various models exist to guide reflection, the ultimate approach is determined by your goals and the context. Which model might serve you best?  
• High-quality reflection should be continuous, connected, challenging and contextualized.