Reflective Teaching

Reflective Teaching is an inquiry approach that emphasizes an ethic of caring, a constructivist approach to teaching, and creative problem solving (Henderson, 1996).

An ethic of caring respects the wonderful range of multiple talents and capacities of all individuals regardless of cultural, intellectual, or gender differences. A premium is placed on the dignity of all persons. Teachers using a constructivist approach place emphasis on big concepts, student questions, active learning, and cooperative learning, and they interweave assessment with teaching.

A constructivist approach seeks to connect theory to practice and views the student as "thinker, creator, and constructor." Integral to a constructivist theory of learning is creative problem solving. Teachers take responsibility for assessing and solving problems not with mechanistic "cook book" recipes, but by asking "What decisions should I be making?", "On what basis do I make these decisions?", and "What can I do to enhance learning?"

The model of reflection incorporates five categories of knowledge.
The professional knowledge bases are identified on the far right of the diagram. They include knowledge of self as teacher, knowledge of content, knowledge of teaching and learning, knowledge of students, and knowledge of school and societal contexts.
These knowledge bases are viewed as essential for what prospective teachers should know and be able to do.

On the far left of the diagram is the "doing" dimension of teacher behavior. It identifies performance indicators and involves the tasks of planning, implementing, and evaluating.
Incorporated in the conceptual framework are attributes or dispositions deemed critical to professional development. They must be nurtured. These are identified on the outside of the circle and incorporate the affective dimensions of the six principles.

The theory provides a unifying rationale for the activities that the instructor uses in the classroom; classroom observation and reflection enable the instructor to refine the theory and adjust teaching practice. Concepts that the teacher acquires through reading and professional development are absorbed into the theory and tested in the reflective practice cycle.
This cycle of theory building, practice and reflection continues throughout a teacher’s career, as the teacher evaluates new experiences and tests new or adapted theories against them.