ONL171 Topic 4: Design for blended reflection

Course development and revision seem to be constant processes in higher education, not least so in teacher education, where governmental decrees frequently call for change. This is not in itself a bad notion. Higher education courses need to respond to changing circumstances, but they need to change thoughtfully and with measure. The question, as always, is what exactly is the impetus for change and how it is brought about. In the following I will address one of the most challenging aspects of teacher education: bridging the gap between theory and practice (Beauchamp, 2014).

My focus will be on the potential role played by features of blended learning in an otherwise campus-based program. I understand blended in this context to include digital resources of various kinds that enable above all asynchronous communication and reflection to take place (cf Brindley, Blaschke & Walti, 2009).

Studies in teacher education have repeatedly shown that teacher students’ cognitions about core pedagogical features are very hard to influence and change (Bronkhorst, L. H, et al., 2014). The apprenticeship of observation is strong. But there are also studies that indicate that with appropriate scaffolding a reflective process in the Deweyan sense can be induced (Gelfuso & Dennis, 2014; Bendtsen, 2016). What would be needed is a set of “knowledgeable others” in the form of university tutors and certain clear principles for teaching the subject area in question. These features are most likely in place in all teacher education programs. However, the study in question also points to the usefulness of video recorded lessons that serve both as a memory repository but also, and more importantly, as a lever for the teacher students’ cognitions.

Here is the plan for implementing this.

Students are asked to video record a couple of lessons that they are teaching, and then edit these videos down to one shorter video (no more than 10 minutes long). They pick out instances of dissonance, that is, instances in their own teaching that did not unfold according to plan.

This video forms the basis for

1. a descriptive summary of what is happening in the selected sequences,
2. the explicit formulation of the dissonance, and
3. suggested possible courses of action that the teacher student could have taken to deal with the situation.

The edited video, the verbal description of the identified instances of dissonance, and the suggested courses of action are uploaded to share with the university tutor and eventually the group of peer students.

The teacher student will have a conference with the university tutor. The aim of this conference is to analyse the teacher student’s verbal reports and for the tutor to probe into the reflective process of the teacher student, and discuss the suggested courses of action. This will be done with recourse to teaching theory, and pedagogical content knowledge.

The teacher student then writes a report on the conference, where particular emphasis is placed on how the teacher student perceives the instances of dissonance after the session with the university tutor. After this the whole group assembles and a joint presentation and discussion of the various instances of dissonance are discussed. Similarities and differences in types of dissonance are noted as are the various suggested courses of action.

The teacher student writes a final report where his/her own instances of dissonance are revisited and reanalysed. In addition to this each teacher student also selects one instance of dissonance presented by another student and suggests courses of action to deal with that.

The final product is uploaded on a shared platform for everyone to read and comment. In subsequent practicum periods these documents are revisited and form the basis for further collection of dissonance that are then dealt with in a similar way. By repeating these procedures and adding new material and insights to the previous observations, the teacher student will not only extend his/her previous knowledge but also be able to revisit and reanalyze previous experiences in light of current knowledge and insights.

With this suggested plan several technology features have been worked into the overall pedagogical design. The digital components of the design enables students, school supervisors and tutors to engage in asynchronous reflection. This caters for both individual/cognitive activity and learning in a social context. The video recording, and above all, the editing of the filmed lessons, enable the teacher student to reflect on the lessons in question, extract appropriate sequences and add commentaries to them. Since the videos and commentaries are shared with other participants, a community of practice and inquiry (Wenger, 2010) is gradually built up.

Face-to-face conferences and seminars provide valuable “on-the-spot” comments and sharing of experiences, and in the joint discussions of the experiences of several teacher students, a basis for synthesization of knowledge is made possible. Together with this, the chain of online asynchronous reflective commenting makes it possible for all stakeholders to engage in a learning process that keeps a certain momentum while still opens up for considerations that can be formulated without immediate time pressure.

References:

Bendtsen, M. (2016). Becoming and Being a Language Teacher. Evolving Cognitions in the Transition from Student to Teacher. Diss. ‘Turku: Åbo Akademi University Press.

Brindley, J., Blaschke, L. M., & Walti, C. (2009). Creating effective collaborative learning groups in an online environment. The International Review of Research in Open and distance Learning 10(3).

Bronkhorst, L. H., Koster, B., Meijer, P. C., Woldman, N., & Vermunt, J. D. (2014). Exploring student teachers’ resistance to teacher education pedagogies. Teaching and Teacher Education 40: 73-82.

Gelfuso, A. & Dennis, D. V. (2014). Getting reflection off the page: The challenges of developing support structures for pre-service teacher reflection. Teaching and Teacher Education 38: 1-11.

Wenger, E. (2010). Communities of practice and social learning systems: the career of a concept. In Social learning systems and communities of practice (pp. 179-198). London: Springer.