You would not have taken the moment to have asked, did this really work?
Or, maybe more specifically, did my learners learn?
What did they learn?
And what could I do better
that learning could be even more effective?
So, the question is,
does reflective thinking enable us to move away from reproducing something
to recreating, to reinventing an excitement about learning?
That's what we all want to work for, is how do we inspire learning?
How do we motivate?
And that teaching and learning happens in a way
that is powerful for you as a teacher, but also for those who are learning.
Now, tacit knowledge, and here I want to
talk about the tacit knowledge that's implicit.
Now, many teachers, for instance, could move on into
teaching and think "Okay, I have all this knowledge.
I know all the information and my learners are there sitting in front of me
and they're all empty vessels. And my job is to open their heads,
and to pour this knowledge into each one of their heads."
Have you that about the tacit knowledge that's implicit in that classroom?
That's there, that's somebody in that classroom
knows a little bit more about that topic than you would have assumed.
So, somebody in that classroom knows a little bit more.
And if you asked, "How many of you have
had an experience about this or know something about
this?" - perhaps, and this is going back to that basketball
game, rather than you just giving, but getting a conversation
going in this classroom.
And perhaps if one person in that class
started, "Oh yes, I know a little about this.
My mother and father did this."
And somebody else would say, "Oh yes, but we
also did this, and we know a little bit more."
So you can move from what is implicit in the classroom to making it very explicit.
You can even open your class to a dynamic that you may not have thought about.
For instance, you could seriously think about inviting that learner's
mother and father to come in as
a guest teacher the following day to talk
about their experience with whatever you were teaching.
And perhaps, it would take that classroom to a whole new level of learning.
So, the possibilities that are there, are far more
if we allow ourselves to reflect, and make reflection
that is critical on how and what we're doing.
Now, I like this quotation that's there -
"Unless teachers develop the practice of critical
reflection, they stay trapped in unexamined judgements,
interpretations, assumptions and expectations."
And that's what it is:
you leave all those knowledges locked in a box,
but you can open those up and
the possibilities for you would be endless.
I want to draw your attention to this slide on values, beliefs, and hypotheses.
Now, the values are the deep convictions:
they are unlikely to change or to change easily.
Sometimes these values are shared, but they're also your beliefs.
And what are your beliefs?
Perhaps your beliefs might be that you don't think that girls
education beyond grade ten is something that's necessary.
Perhaps your beliefs is that girls at sixteen should leave
school and marry and not to continue with further education.
Now, that belief is something that might have been learned and because it's
something you've seen done around you, you accept that as the way it just should be.
But, perhaps you may choose to question that and to reflect on that.
And one of the questions you may ask "What if that changed?
What would happen?
What if girls went beyond grade ten? What if girls went on to university?
How does that community benefit? How does that society benefit?
How do the learners in your school, assuming that
girl went through school, went to university, became a teacher,
how would she model to other girls and
boys, the treatment of women, the treatment of girls,
and understanding the roles and rethinking the roles
of responsibility of girls and boys in our societies?"
So, your hypothesis then, or your
ideal strategies that need to be put to the test would be, what if
girls continue beyond grade ten? How could I support this?
What is some of the things I could do?
So, you'd be having to rethink around your beliefs, and you may put your
hypothesis into action. So, testing the hypothesis let's look at that.
What would happen then?
Let's use the same example right, girls moving beyond grade ten,
which is a belief you have that shouldn't happen.
If girls move beyond grade ten, what would happen?
What's the worst that could happen? Oh, and there would be consequences.
People of the community may disagree with you.
Why are you suggesting that?
That's not the way things are done around here.
You're creating trouble.
You're doing things that are different.
Teachers in your school may believe differently.
Your learners, boys in the class, and perhaps even some of
the girls may think differently from you. And they challenge you.
How you would you respond? What are some of the things you could see?
You could look at what's the best that could happen.
And the best that could happen
is your society would change.
The role of girls and women in that
society in terms of the positioning may change.
In terms of women and girls may be seen as contributing to teaching and learning.
That there is a role that girls and women can have by continuing beyond grade ten,
to going and getting a university education,
by playing a role that is far more critical
in the society. But also in transforming sexism and gender stereotypes
that you have been bold enough to challenge and to change.
So, that new reflection on an issue and that belief you may have had,
by shifting it, you could be a change agent in your very school or society.
Now, the reflective practitioner,
there are two types of reflection.
The reflection-on-action, after-the-event thinking; and the reflection-in-action.
We'll talk about reflection-on-action first.
And that could be in multiple ways.
It could be immediately after the lesson, or you can
give yourself 15 minutes and ask yourself a couple of questions -
which I'm going to tease out just now -
it could be after a whole section has been completed.
And, you may ask yourself, right, I've completed the
section, I'm going to develop a couple of questions.
It could be after a whole semester,
when you've gone through a whole semester process, and you could ask questions then.
So, the reflection-on-action, after-the-event thinking could happen, not
necessarily only, but it could be done after the day.
It can be after the section.
It can be after the term, as well - and including all three.
But there's also reflection-in-action, so whilst you're teaching,
you may ask yourself a number of questions.
For instance, there could be great excitement in the class,
with multiple hands going up, learners talking about themselves,
some of the learners asking you questions that you just never expected.
You could pause that class right there.
And you could say to the class, because there's great excitement,
and you could ask yourself, what is going on here?
What stimulated this excitement?
How can I get this excitement every day, maybe?
So, that would be "in-action".
So, reflection-on-action, after-the-event thinking.
Some of the questions you could be asking are: what went well today?
But more critically, why? What did not go so well today?
Critical - why? What did I do differently?
What happened in the class? What will I do differently the next time?
Now, notice how useful this is because you're not going to reproduce,
but here you're reinventing a new classroom - an exciting space.
The Three Rs, something we're going to talk about, are Retrospection,
Review, and Reorientation. Now, think about retrospection.
It's thinking back about a situation or experience.
Just thinking back about it.
What just happened?
Review would be something a little bit more different.
Critically analyzing and evaluating the actions and feelings associated
with the experience using theoretical perspectives.
Now, in my previous session, I introduced Bernstein
and talked about restricted codes and elaborated codes.
Now, think about the language you would have used,
how could you use a theoretical perspective?
So, one of the things you could have looked at is,
how have I used language today?
What are the ways in which language has confused?
What are the ways in which language maybe restricted learning?
What are the ways I use language that
created accessibility of the content I was teaching?
So, even in that you can be bringing a theoretical lens
to look at how and what I've done in my classroom.
Reorientation, using the results of reflection
to influence future approaches to similar situations or experiences.
And one of the things you could to do to
test that would be let me see how I've used language today.
You could have given a five question quiz to your learners,
just to establish did they really understand the concept.
That could be useful to you because if the learners did not do so
well on that quiz, you know the answer, right?
They didn't learn.
But if they did really well,
one of the things you could be asking is what went really well because all my learners
understood those concepts so clearly. Now, reflection-in-action,
these are useful things,
what you're reflecting while you're teaching.
What is happening here?
What are the students doing?
I used the example: the students are excited,
they're asking questions.
What are the differences among them?
Maybe there is just a corner of learners that are asking all the questions.
Or maybe, it's just girls that are asking the questions,
and not the boys, because maybe the girls were a little bit more triggered
than the boys on what you just taught.
So, you're paying attention.
Maybe what you had said had offended a group in the class.
So, this is also part of your reflection,
is "Woah, I need not to do that again."
What have I done? And what am I doing?
And what am I going to do next that is different,
so perhaps, if you have said something that had offended a group in that class,
maybe, you'll know the next time - I will need to do things differently.