“By three methods we may learn wisdom: First, by reflection, which is noblest; Second, by imitation, which is easiest; and third by experience, which is the bitterest.” – Confucius
It is easy for teachers to spend so much time and energy focused on their students’ progress that they forget to consider their own performance. Self reflection can be a valuable tool that helps make you aware of how you are teaching is something which I learnt while reading this book, which in turn made me a better teacher during the whole process. Teaching without reflection was teaching like blind – without any knowledge of effectiveness.
It was difficult and time consuming for me as a teacher to scrutinise my performance before I started reading this book, but like any other occupation it is essential for improvement is what i knew. But then while reading this book I realised that self-reflection differentiates decent teachers from great teachers. Before I started reading this book, I used to self-reflect but then for me self-reflection as a teacher was more like asking deliberate questions, reflecting on the answers, then implementing changes on how I approached my teaching based on my reflection but once I have started reading this book and completed reading the chapter – ‘Self-Reflection’ , I have realised that for teachers, self-reflection involves the following 5 behaviours related to the reflective cycle apart from the doing-thinking gap:
- Growing awareness of the instructional core (knowledge of every student’s individual learning style and needs, the content, & pedagogy);
- Deliberate planning and intentional action (precision in the selection of learning goals, instructional strategies, and student groupings);
- Assessing of the impact of pedagogical moves;
- Making adjustments based on feedback from assessments; and,
- Engaging in iterative reflective cycles.
An other thing i learnt to observe during my teaching apart from the behaviours mentioned above is doing-thinking gap which occurs when teaching strategies are used in classroom situations without sufficient thought regarding the particular context. This gap could be eliminated by identifying and pursuing a specific purpose.
Since the next chapter was all about Self-Assessment and finding out on which stage I am currently operating at, I decided to find out which stage I was at. It consisted of 10 scenarios – each with four possible responses. Each response is assigned a score. (from 1 to 4) The higher the score a teacher receives on the self-assessment, the further along the Continuum of Self-Reflection he/she is placed. The continuum consists of 4 stages: Unaware Stage, Conscious Stage, Action Stage, and Refinement Stage.
Using this tool I realised I was currently operating on the Action Stage which made me skip directly to Chapter 7 which is all about the Action Stage. Teachers at this stage have plenty of technical competence “in the science of teaching but need to connect it with the art of making necessary alterations.” (As per Chapter 7 of the Book). I, as a teacher knew and could apply many effective instructional practices but lack the observational capacity and analytical skills to know when exactly to apply these practices is what i felt after reading about this stage and thought to implement some strategies which would help me get across this stage and reach the refinement stage eventually.
After some research, I decided to take up a 4 Week Challenge by implementing a different strategy every week to observe and reflect on it so that i could improve myself.
Week 1: Started my own reflective Journal
In this Journal, I used to keep a track of my day-to-day activities as a teacher especially on how I am putting instructional practices to use and where I am failing at it so that I can work on it in the coming days.
Week 2: I selected Aariz from my class who did not master an activity from the most recent things I taught the kids in the school. I spent time analysing his work and talking to him about the activity so that i could analyse what is his thinking process is like as these are still kids of age group 6 year olds.
Week 3: I asked my Ex-colleague if I could visit her classroom to observe how she responds in the moment to address specific needs that arise during the lesson. I decided to do this since she was my lead last year and I felt that she was good at dealing with some specific moments which I realised that I am week with during my reflection in the last two weeks. I asked the same colleague to teach a lesson in my class so that I could watch for opportunities to provide in the moment interventions. Apart from that I was recording my own classroom videos for me to analyse later in the day to see the moves that I made that led to student learning and on actions that blocked their learning so that i can stop repeating it.
Week 4: Invited my head to “share the pen” in my collective Journal. Having a spot where I could share thoughts, questions, ideas, and wanderings was a very powerful learning mechanism.
End of Week 4: Had a Thoughtful walk through my reflective Journal to see where I was right and where I could improve to reach the Refinement stage.
According to me the effective strategies I applied during this 6 weeks were:
Analysing video of my own teaching and focusing on specific moves that I made that led to student learning and on actions that blocked learning; and,
Observing other teachers’ classrooms to note how they respond to specific learning needs of students.
After this whole process of Self-reflecting, I have been implementing the effective instructional practises whenever needed and at the right moments, so I realised i pushed myself into the refinement stage through this 4 weeks challenge which I created for myself. This 4 weeks challenge has inspired me to build an other 4 weeks stage so that i even ace my improvement in the refinement stage. I have built a tentative plan for the 4 weeks which is being followed by me now.
As per the “Chapter 8 : Refinement Stage”, Teachers at the refinement stage think critically throughout their day, continuously reflect on their practice, and dial in to the learning. Apart from that teachers in this stage even make immediate, fluid adjustments to a lesson, responding directly to student questions, struggles, thinking, and actions. When I analysed myself through self-reflecting after the 4 weeks challenge I felt that i have been exactly the teacher which is described in this stage so now I am finding opportunities at a leadership position and built a 4 week challenge which involves offering to open up my classroom for a colleague’s visit to learn, etc; The tentative 4 week challenge I planned for this stage before i start aiming for a leadership position is as follows:
Week 1:
Start my own reflective Journal.
Week 2:
Engaging my grade-level team in a data-driven dialogue. Record my thinking about the process so that I can refine it the next time.
Week 3:
Join or make a colleagues book study or investigation into a particular teaching strategy which I am not refined at or which is something new in our school. If Colleagues are not able to make it then I consider to ask my instructional coach to be a part of it.
Week 4:
I would offer in to join a committee, school improvement team, or other leadership venture in the school as I am expecting to be refined by this week and be eligible for it.
End of Week 4:
Thoughtful walk through the 4 weeks challenges to see where I was right and where i was wrong to refine myself as needed.
Something I learnt while implementing this book in my real life journey as a teacher is that effective reflection requires a teacher or in general any person to dedicate themselves wholly to the process and that reflection involves working collaboratively with peers, administrators, mentors, and coaches.
This book is not some a “read-it-and-now-I’m-good” endeavour but is something where you need to do everything the book talks about intentionally, wholeheartedly and optimistically to dig into the process of reflection and observe the results by improving the way you implement the effective instructional practises in use at the right moments and pave a way for yourself into the leadership body in the future.