CATL Blog: Thoughts and Insights from CATL

Reflective Practice and LENS

By Marjorie Bazluki, CATL Senior Instructional Designer

The American philosopher and educational reformer, John Dewey, considered reflection crucial to learning. He framed reflection as “a systematic, rigorous, disciplined way of thinking” that leads to intellectual growth. One could then argue that one of the most important dimensions of an effective teaching practice is reflection. 

Reflective teaching occurs when an instructor dedicates time to evaluate their own teaching effectiveness. Meaning they deliberately examine their curricular choices, consider student feedback on their instruction, and make revisions to improve not just student conceptual understanding, but student belonging as well. Reflective teaching utilizes a cycle of reflection-action-reflection in a continuous process of self-evaluation.  

Reflective practice might occur individually as a form of introspection or as part of a reflective conversation with students, mentors and/or peers with the aim of continually improving practice as part of the process of life-long learning.  

For example, with each iteration of Online Instructor Training that I facilitate, I keep track of what went well, what did not go so well, and what change can I make that will have a positive impact for the next offering. I do this even though I have facilitated OIT many times over. You probably already do something like this in your courses. This is what we call reflective practice and is the overarching backbone of being an effective teacher and will serve you well when working with your LENS data.

Act On It

One approach to reflection is the What? So What? Now What? approach by Rolfe, Freshwater, & Jasper. It involves asking ‘what’ happened by describing the facts of the lesson; ‘so what’ by analyzing and drawing insights from the lesson; and ‘now what’ by applying your lessons for effective next steps. Consider using the Rolfe, Freshwater, & Jasper ‘What’ Model to guide your reflective practice reviewed in the image above. 

A true self-reflective process is led by a very specific purpose, meaning, and action. Instructors think critically about their teaching and problem-solve for solutions to recurring issues. Reflection is useful and informative in the development and understanding of teaching and learning BUT ONLY IF YOU ACT ON IT. For reflective practice to be effective, it requires three key aspects: problem-solving, critical reflection and action-orientation. We begin as teaching novices – as we become reflective, we transition towards being teaching experts.