Reflective thinking is the ability to look at the past and develop understanding and insights about what happened and using this information to develop a deeper understanding or to choose a course of action. Many may believe that reflective thinking is a natural part of learning.
However, I have always been surprised at how little reflective thinking my students do. They seem to just do things without ever trying to understand how well they did outside of passing the assignment. Without reflective thinking, it is difficult to learn from past mistakes as no thought was made to avoid them.
This post will examine opportunities and aways of reflective thinking.
Opportunities for Reflective Thinking
Generally, reflective thinking can happen when
- When you learn something
- When you do something
These are similar but different concepts. Learning can happen without doing anything such as listening to a lecture or discussion. You hear a lot of great stuff but you never implement it.
Doing something means the application of knowledge in a particular setting. An example would be teaching or working at a company. With the application of knowledge comes consequences the indicate how well you did. For example, teaching kids and then seeing either look of understanding or confusion on their face
Strategies for Reflective THinking
For situations in which the student learns something without a lot of action a common model for encouraging reflective thinking is the Connect, Extend, Challenge model. The model is explained below
- Connect: Link what you have learned to something you already know
- Extend: Determine how this new knowledge extends your learning
- Challenge: Decide what you still do not understanding
Connecting is what makes learning relevant for many students and is also derived from constructivism. Extending is a way for a student to see the benefits of the new knowledge. It goes beyond learning because you were told to learn. Lastly, challenging helps the student to determine what they do not know which is another metacognitive strategy.
When a student does something the reflection process is slightly different below is an extremely common model.
- what went well
- what went wrong
- how to fix what went wrong
In this model, the student identifies what they did right, which requires reflective thinking. The student also identifies the things they did wrong during the experience. Lastly, the student must problem solve and develop strategies to overcome the mistakes they made. Often the solutions in this final part are implemented during the next action sequence to see how well they worked out.
Conclusion
Thinking about the past is one of the strongest ways to prepare for the future. Therefore, teachers must provide their students with opportunities to think reflectively. The strategies included here provide a framework for guiding students in this critical process.