8 The next step
Reflective practice is not only the domain of ITE, but of career long learning. Being an effective teacher requires you to continue learning throughout your career to adapt to the latest subject requirements, changes in pedagogy or responding to a new educational initiative. Therefore it is important to see developing your understanding of critical reflection, and your reflective practice as establishing learning habits that will support you well beyond the first year of teaching.
As discussed by MacGregor and Cartwright (2010), deep and extended reflection begins to develop into ‘Reflexivity’.
Bordieu and Wacquant (1992), Lawson (1985) and Steier (1991) have derived the meaning of reflexivity from its Latin definition, ‘to turn back on oneself’. Thus, to be reflexive means to think about one’s own concepts, values and what they bring to any situation.
They go on to argue that reflexivity is about self-awareness and how we, as teachers, impact on situations and our pupils. This can in turn lead to experimentation, developing research questions that the teacher wants to explore further and ultimately can lead to them becoming classroom researchers, which is discussed in An introduction to classroom research [Tip: hold Ctrl and click a link to open it in a new tab. (Hide tip)] .
