Time to Take a Good Look in the Mirror: promoting reflective thinking in the classroom

2. Time to Take a Good Look in the Mirror: promoting reflective thinking in the classroom Chris Redmond, PhD

3. PREVIEW: What will we explore today? • What do we mean by reflective thinking? • Why is it important? • What are the factors that either hinder or promote its development in our classrooms? • How can we further develop students’ reflective thinking capacity?

4. Let’s begin with… Your thoughts and questions about reflective thinking and metacognition

5. How did we get to here? “neuronnarrative.”wordpress.com. Web. 18 Nov 2009 “David Baddiel.”comedy.co.uk. Web. 18 Nov 2009

6. “Bus sign at bus stop.” fredrikmedia.Web. 18 Nov 2009 “Tea bag.” pun.org/josh/archives/2005/10. Web. 18 Nov 2009

7. So, what do we mean by reflective thinking? Reflective thinking is, “…active, persistent, and careful consideration of any belief or supposed form of knowledge in the light of the grounds that support it, and the further conclusions to which it tends… it is a conscious and voluntary effort to establish belief upon a firm basis of reasons.” John Dewey quoted in Cam (1999) ACTIVE THOUGHTFUL PERSISTENT CRITICAL EVALUATIVE

8. And, what about metacognition? “Metacognition is the internal managing processes that we use to take charge of and direct our own thinking so that it is no longer determined by impulse and association but by what we should do as skilful thinkers.” (Swartz et al, 1998 in McGregor, 2007) internal managing our own thinking take charge

9. “Metacognitive processes are presumed to take place when we think about our own thinking, for example, when we reflect upon whether we know something, whether we are learning, whether we have made a mistake.” (Smith,1994 in McGregor, 2007) Metacognition reflecting thinking about thinking self regulating

10. WHY IS IT IMPORTANT? • Being a skillful reflective thinker helps towards being: • a more critically thinking citizen; • a self-aware and empowered learner; • able to solve problems in an innovative and flexible way; • a more persistent learning; • being able to retain and recall information more effectively critical self aware empowered innovative flexible persistent effective

11. WHY IS IT IMPORTANT? 1) “If you are hopeless at something you lack the skills to know that you are hopeless at it.” John Cleese 2) “If you really knew how your brain worked it would work much better.” Student quoted in Robert Fisher(2005) ? 1+2=

12. What factors seemed to be hindering reflective thinking? • Time • Pace • Language • Developmental level of students • Own level of understanding and skill

13. Because, meanwhile, back in the REAL WORLD

14. Back to why it’s important to try An example: Self advocacy for learning support students at ISB Learning Objective: for High School Learning Support Students to develop their Individual Learning Plan Identify their learning styles Identify learning strategies that work for them Set SMART learning goals Visualize what success looks like Research suggests that this approach empowers adults with special learning needs to better self advocate for the support they need

15. How does this connect with our broader learning goals?

16. It’s all about learners and learning

17. Where might I begin? A Multiple Intelligences Quiz

19. What factors support reflective thinking? • Infusion time and opportunities • Making thinking visible • A precise vocabulary • Teacher modeling • Scaffolding • Prompted practice • Enskilling learners • Open, supportive and challenging culture of learning • Recognize the affective dimension • Specific thinking routines

20. Infusion • Making reflective thinking part of every lesson: • The Review Preview Connecting to prior learning • WALT board • Big questions What makes you say that? • How did you do that? • Is it my best effort? • Metacognition strategies • Progressive vocabulary development • Participative Review + Record

21. Self-Directed Learning Review Student feedback: • Get to go at your own pace • Mini Lessons help gain better understanding • Get to choose what to focus on (independent access to resources)

22. Infusion Throughout the Curriculum What do we want our students to learn? Global Perspectives How will our students learn? Reflective thinking

23. “Afghan Girl (photo).” Wikipedia. Web. 18 Nov 2009

24. All Learners are Visual Learners “Much of the trouble students have with learning is due to its invisible nature.” • When we can make thinking visible we make learning: • CONCRETE • PUBLIC • ACCESSIBLE • FLEXIBLE (EASIER TO MANIPULATE) Adapted from EyeQue (2002)

25. Harvard’s Making Thinking Visible

26. Reflection Sketches WHAT? WHEN? WHY? HOW? WHO?

27. Reflection Sketches

28. The Power of Conversation For learners to be reflective thinkers “…they need to have internalized the two roles of listener and problem solver to such an extent that they become automatic.” (Lochhead, 2001) listening internalized = reflective thinkers + automatic problem solver

29. Tech Integration for Facilitating Conversation Voice Thread Blogging and e-portfolios

30. Personal Capacity Building Learning About Learning

31. Learning Focused Action Research Action research is essentially an evidence based form of enquiry or problem solving that involves a spiral cycle of reflecting, planning and taking action: Image Source: http://www.det.nt.gov.au/education/special_education

32. But most of the time, most teachers don’t do it… A sustainableapproach to action research needs to: be REALISTIC be RIGOROUS be a LOGICAL EXTENSION of teachers’ everyday practice SIGNIFICANTLY ENHANCE student and teacher LEARNING Engaging teachers in structured, conversations about learning, Data wise, teachers as key resources Make copies of full research approach and copies of learinginstiutes stuff

33. A possible response: the LOOK, THINK, ACTmodel of action research Professional learning that is a natural extension of classroom learning Each stage clearly defined and expressed as a set of essential questions. These get to the essence of the subject, generating deep understanding through reflection, discussion, data collection and action.

34. GOAL! “David Beckham.” usatoday.com/sports/soccer. Web. 23 Nov 2009

35. The Affective “Vygotsky insisted that a human psychology not be concerned with particulars but with unities- the unity of the person; the unity of the person and its social relations… “Rather than isolating one from the other, Vygotsky proposed that “there exists a dynamic meaningful system that constitutes a unity of affective and intellectual process.” (original emphasis) Holzman (2009) UNITY AFFECTIVE INTELLECTUAL PROCESSES

36. A Reminder “Without reflective thinking we remain lost in a mental fog that we cannot see and have no reason to believe exists. Therefore until we can think reflectively, we have no idea what we have been missing.” (Lochhead, 2001) “Theresa Descending.” skicambridge.com. Web. Nov 18 2009

37. SO WOT? Reflective Thinking WIKI http://isbrussels-reflective-thinking.wikispaces.com/

38. CEC CONNECT How are the ideas presented today connected to what I already knew? EXTEND What new ideas did I get that extended or pushed your thinking in new directions? CHALLENGE What is still challenging or confusing for me to get my mind around? What questions, wonderings or puzzles do I now have?

39. www.isb.be The International School of Brussels - Kattenberg 19, 1170 Brussels. Belgium - Tel: 00 32 (2) 661 42 11 - Fax: 00 32 (2) 661 42 00 redmondc@isb.be LinkedIn