Category: Reflection

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The Reflective Teacher: A Taxonomy of Reflection (Part 3)

The Reflective teacher

Reflection can be a challenging endeavor. It’s not something that’s fostered in school – typically someone else tells you how you’re doing! Teachers are often so caught up in the meeting the demands of the day, that they rarely have the luxury to muse on how things went. Moreover, teaching can be an isolating profession – one that dictates “custodial” time with students over “collaborative” time with peers. In an effort to help schools become more reflective learning environments, I’ve developed this “Taxonomy of Reflection” – modeled on Bloom’s approach.  It’s posted in four installments:

1.  A Taxonomy of  Reflection
2. The Reflective Student
3. The Reflective Teacher
4. The Reflective Principal

 See my Prezi Tour of the Taxonomy

3. The Reflective Teacher

Each level of reflection is structured to parallel Bloom’s taxonomy. (See installment 1 for more on the model). Assume that a teacher looked back on an lesson (or project, unit, course, etc) they have just taught. What sample questions might they ask themselves as they move from lower to higher order reflection? (Note: I’m not suggesting that all questions are asked after lesson – feel free to pick a few that work for you.) Remember that each level can be used to support mastery of the new Common Core standards.

taxonomy of reflection
taxonomy of reflection

Bloom’s Remembering: What did I do?
Teacher Reflection: What was the lesson? Did it address all the content? Was it completed on time? How did students “score” on the assessment?

Bloom’s Understanding: What was important about what I did? Did I meet my goals?
Teacher Reflection: Can I explain the major components of the lesson?  Do I understand how they connect with the previous / next unit of study? Where does this unit fit into the curriculum? What instructional strategies were used? Did I follow best practices and address the standards?

Bloom’s Application: When did I do this before? Where could I use this again?
Teacher Reflection: Did I build on content, product or process from previous lessons? How does this lesson scaffold the learning for the next lesson? How could I adapt the instructional approach to another lesson? How could this lesson be modified for different learners?

Bloom’s Analysis: Do I see any patterns or relationships in what I did?
Teacher Reflection: What background knowledge and skills did I assume students were bringing to the lesson? Were the instructional strategies I used the right ones for this assignment? Do I see any patterns in how I approached the lesson – such as pacing, grouping? Do I see patterns in my teaching style – for example do I comment after every student reply? What were the results of the approach I used – was it effective, or could I have eliminated or reorganized steps?

Bloom’s Evaluation: How well did I do? What worked? What do I need to improve?
Teacher Reflection: What are we learning and is it important? Were my assumptions about student background knowledge and skills accurate? Were any elements of the lesson more effective than other elements? Did some aspects need improvement? Were the needs of all learners met? What levels of mastery did students reach?  What have I learned about my strengths and my areas in need of improvement?  How am I progressing as a teacher?

Bloom’s Creation: What should I do next? What’s my plan / design?
Teacher Reflection: How would I incorporate the best aspects of this lesson in the future? What changes would I make to correct areas in need of improvement? How can I best use my strengths to improve? What steps should I take or resources should I use to meet my challenges? Is there training or networking that would help me to meet my professional goals? What suggestions do I have for our leadership or my peers to improve our learning environment?

image credit: flickr/duane.schoon

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The Reflective Student: A Taxonomy of Reflection (Part 2)

Reflective Student
reflective student

Reflection can be a challenging endeavor. It’s not something that’s fostered in school – typically someone else tells you how you’re doing! At best, students can narrate what they did, but have trouble thinking abstractly about their learning – patterns, connections and progress.

In an effort to help schools become more reflective learning environments, I’ve developed this “Taxonomy of Reflection” – modeled on Bloom’s approach.  It’s posted in four installments:

1.  A Taxonomy of  Reflection
2. The Reflective Student
3. The Reflective Teacher
4. The Reflective Principal 

See my Prezi tour of the Taxonomy

2. The Reflective Student

Each level of reflection is structured to parallel Bloom’s taxonomy. (See installment 1 for more on the model). Assume that a student looked back on a project or assignment they had completed. What sample questions might they ask themselves as they move from lower to higher order reflection? (Note: I’m not suggesting that all questions are asked after every project – feel free to pick a few that work for you.) Remember that each level can be used to support mastery of the new Common Core standards.

taxonomy of reflection
taxonomy of reflection

Bloom’s Remembering: What did I do?
Student Reflection: What was the assignment? When was it due? Did I get it turned in on time?

Bloom’s Understanding: What was important about what I did? Did I meet my goals?
Student Reflection: Do I understand the parts of the assignment and how they connect? Did my response completely cover all parts of the assignment? Do I see where this fits in with what we are studying?

Bloom’s Application: When did I do this before? Where could I use this again?
Student Reflection: How was this assignment similar to other assignments? (in this course or others). Do I see connections in either content, product or process? Are there ways to adapt it to other assignments? Where could I use this (content, product or process) my life?

Bloom’s Analysis: Do I see any patterns or relationships in what I did?
Student Reflection: Were the strategies, skills and procedures I used effective for this assignment? Do I see any patterns in how I approached my work – such as  following an outline, keeping to deadlines? What were the results of the approach I used – was it efficient, or could I have eliminated or reorganized steps?

Bloom’s Evaluation: How well did I do? What worked? What do I need to improve?
Student Reflection: What are we learning and is it important? Did I do an effective job of communicating my learning to others? What have I learned about my strengths and my areas in need of improvement? How am I progressing as a learner?

Bloom’s Creation: What should I do next? What’s my plan / design?
Student Reflection: How can I best use my strengths to improve? What steps should I take or resources should I use to meet my challenges? What suggestions do I have for my teacher or my peers to improve our learning environment? How can I adapt this content or skill to make a difference in my life?

Image credit: flickr/Daveybot

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A Taxonomy of Reflection: Critical Thinking For Students, Teachers, and Principals (Part 1)

Taxonomy of Reflection by Peter Pappas

My approach to staff development (and teaching) borrows from the thinking of Donald Finkel who believed that teaching should be thought of as “providing experience, provoking reflection.” He goes on to write,

… to reflectively experience is to make connections within the details of the work of the problem, to see it through the lens of abstraction or theory, to generate one’s own questions about it, to take more active and conscious control over understanding. ~ From Teaching With Your Mouth Shut

Over the last few years I’ve led many teachers and administrators on classroom walkthroughs designed to foster a collegial conversation about teaching and learning. The walkthroughs served as roving Socratic seminars and a catalyst for reflection. But reflection can be a challenging endeavor. It’s not something that’s fostered in school – typically someone else tells you how you’re doing! At best, students can narrate what they did, but have trouble thinking abstractly about their learning – patterns, connections and progress. Likewise teachers and principals need encouragement and opportunities to think more reflectively about their craft.

In an effort to help schools become more reflective learning environments, I’ve developed this “Taxonomy of Reflection.” – modeled on Bloom’s approach.  It’s posted in four installments:

1.  A Taxonomy of  Reflection
2. The Reflective Student
3. The Reflective Teacher
4. The Reflective Principal

Taxonomy of Reflection by Peter Pappas

Educator Larry Ferlazzo writes: “I think Peter Pappas’ Taxonomy of Student Reflection is a brilliant way of looking at developing higher-order thinking skills through a new “lens.” It makes Bloom’s Taxonomy much more relevant and engaging to students than so many other Bloom’s strategies that are out there. And it can be an invaluable and simple tool for formative assessment — something that any teacher can regularly use in their classroom that only takes a few minutes. My students and I have used it for the past three years, I’ve strongly recommended it in two books, and prominently highlight Peter’s work in my blog.”

A Taxonomy of Lower to Higher Order Reflection

Assume an individual has just completed a task. What types of questions might they use to reflect on the experience? How might those questions parallel Bloom’s Taxonomy?

Bloom’s Remembering: Retrieving, recognizing, and recalling relevant knowledge from short- or long-term memory.
Reflection: What did I do?

Bloom’s Understanding: Constructing meaning from oral, written, or graphic messages.
Reflection: What was important about what I did? Did I meet my goals?

Bloom’s Applying: Carrying out or using a procedure through executing, or implementing. Extending the procedure to a new setting.
Reflection: When did I do this before? Where could I use this again?

Bloom’s Analyzing: Breaking material into constituent parts, determining how the parts relate to one another and to an overall structure or purpose.
Reflection: Do I see any patterns or relationships in what I did?

Bloom’s Evaluating: Making judgments based on criteria and standards.
Reflection: How well did I do? What worked? What do I need to improve?

Bloom’s Creating: Combining or reorganizing elements into a new pattern or structure.
Reflection: What should I do next? What’s my plan / design?

~~~~~

Note: A thanks to dear friend and colleague Patricia Martin, for sharing her thoughts on this idea.

 Take my Prezi tour of the Taxonomy

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K-12 Walk Throughs Foster Teacher Reflection

Rigor and Relevance Walkthrough
Rigor and Relevance Walkthrough

I recently conducted walk through training (WT) at Hood River County School District in Oregon. I thought the model we used was very effective at engaging teachers and administrators in reflective discussion on instructional practice.

In February, I did half-day presentations on Rigor, Relevance and Literacy to Hood River’s K-5 and 6-12 faculties. In April, I led teams on WTs to give them on opportunity to hone their observational skills. It’s one thing to talk about rigor and relevance in a workshop. It’s another to go into a classroom and try to decide the level of Bloom’s taxonomy being used by the students.

Observers were not in classrooms to evaluate teachers or instructional strategies, but to test their observational skills and have an opportunity to dialogue about their conclusions. We used this simple form to guide our efforts and keep our focus on observation, reflection and discussion. R-R-guide2.pdf  16kb pdf

One day was devoted to K-12 administrative and TOSAs. The next two days were spent with K-12 teacher teams. Each day we began with an orientation session. The team started doing WT’s at an elementary building, then moved to middle and finally, high school. We only visited teachers who had volunteered to host our team. At each building we met periodically to process what we had seen.

The most powerful element of the day, was the K-12 settings of the WTs and the use of K-12 teacher teams. Teachers seldom see other classes in action and it rare that a high school teacher would be given a chance to observe an elementary class or vice versa.  All the participants agreed it was a very valuable experience and they came away with greater respect for the contributions being made all each levels of the program. Most importantly, they became more skillful at assessing the rigor and relevance of a variety of instructional strategies. They were then able to apply those perspectives to their own instructional practice.  The district intends to support teachers in collegial observation and peer reflection.

For an updated guide for how to conduct classroom walkthoughs see my post: Teacher-Led Professional Development: Eleven Reasons Why You Should be Using Classroom Walk Throughs

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Talking About Rigor, Relevance and Reflection

I’ve been doing follow-up workshops with teachers who attended my Rigor and Relevance training. Our goal is to discuss their implementation of the learning strategies I shared in our first training session. Everyone agrees that rigor, relevance, and student-centered learning are good in theory, but how do we get past the challenges? – lack of time, students who can’t (or won’t) do independent work, overcrowded curriculum, state tests, etc. I’ve developed this "Quick Guide to Rigor, Relevance and Reflection" to assist teachers in evaluating instruction in their classrooms.  Download Quickguide-rigor-relevance-reflection (267 KB pdf)

Our goal is connect students with their learning. To enable them to answer questions like:

  • What am I learning today?
  • Why am I learning it?
  • How can I use this knowledge and these skills to make a difference in my life?
  • How can I work with teachers and other students to improve my learning?

Throughout their lives our students will need to be adaptable, self-directed learners. They will need to be able to reflect and:

  • Judge if this information and these skills are appropriate to their goals.
  • Appraise the merits of different strategies and problem solving approaches.
  • Evaluate their progress as a learner.