Summarise theoretical perspectives on reflection in relation to professional development
 

Help! I need some feedback....



Hi,

I am currently studying my CACHE Level 3 Early Years Educator course.
I'm on my last assignment and I am required to post my findings on an online forum and receive some feedback/have a discussion. Any comments would be really appreciated!

Which theory do you think would work best for you?

Summarise theoretical perspectives on reflection in relation to professional development

Reflection is an important element of working in early years, ensuring that we are carrying out best practice. Our aim as practitioners is to provide the best possible care for the children that are in our setting. Thinking about our own individual strengths and weaknesses, as well as those of the setting as a whole can help us to review the way are are working. Analysing our findings can provide us the opportunity to think of what we could be doing better, and implement these new ideas. It is our responsibility as early years practitioners to be constantly improving the quality of our practice.

An effective way to view reflective practice is, rather than a one off review, to think of it more as a continuous cycle. We first must reflect on our own practice, then make those changes we have found we may need, then review how these changes have impacted our practice. Many of the theorists on reflection have their theories based around this type of cycle, an ongoing reflection.


David Kolb

Kolb is an American educational theorists. He believed ‘Learning is the process whereby knowledge is created through the transformation of experience’. He is most well known for developing the Experimental Learning Model. This model involved having the base knowledge of different concepts, and being able to interpret them to fit a range of different situations. Kolb represented this method of learning style through a four stage cycle. He believed that learning was what occurred when you passed through all four stages of the cycle. These stages are:

Concrete experience - an experience that you have had and are able to think back to what happened.
Reflective observation - reflecting on this experience. Are there inconsistencies between experience and your understanding? What did you notice?
Abstract conceptualisation - learning from this experience. How would you change it?
Active Experimentation - trying what you have learnt after reflecting on this previous experience.


Donald Schon

Schon was an American philosopher and professor who developed the concept of reflective practice. He also developed an idea on the way that we learn which he called the ‘single and double loop learning’ theory. The single loop of learning goes between the ‘How’ we do something e.g the technique and strategy, and the result that is produced. School believed that this way of learning was not the most effective as it means that we do not look at the ‘Why’ we are doing something. He felt that for practice to be reflective we must also analyse our underlying assumptions, our beliefs.

Christopher Johns

Johns is a professor of Nursing and is most well known for placing an emphasis on the importance of reflective practice in the field of nursing. Although this theory was originally developed with nursing in mind, it could be applied to many other types of work. Simply put this method of reflective practice is based around five questions which, when answering these, allows you to break down your own experiences and reflect on the process and outcomes.

These questions are:

Describe - What are the significant factors of the experience?
Reflect - what was I aiming to achieve? What are the consequences?
Influencing factors - what influences my decision making? Internal/external/knowledge factors.
Improve - What could you have done better? What were the other choices?
Learn - what will I change because of this experience? How do I feel about this?

I feel that all of these theories have their merits and have clearly impacted the way we think about reflective practice. I personally think that Johns method seems most clear and easy to understand. I think it also already written out in a very practical format that you could use straight away without adapting. I think this method of reflection could be useful after leading an activity or dealing with an incident such as behaviour.

Hi, reads nicely. If you've covered the theorists that your Tutor expects this thread may help further - https://www.silkysteps.com/forum/showthread.php?t=21322


Best wishes



Reflective practice for Early Years professionals on amazon.co.uk

Thank you!

Yes there were a few examples so I thought I would look into the ones that appealed to me the most and I felt were most practical to the job of nursery practitoner.

Professional Development Theory
 

Hi everyone I am in my last assignment and I am expecting to discuss professional development in theoretical perspective. If you can make comments below I will be appreciate it. Thank you for your support. :SOS help


David Kolb suggests that learning is an integrated process where each stage becomes mutually supportive of and feeds into the next stage. Kolb believes it is possible to enter the cycle at any stage and follow it through it’s logical sequence. Kolb’s model of learning consists of 4 stage. Stage 1 – Concrete Experience: the first stage of learning is to have a learning experience. Stage 2 - Observing and Reflection: Here learners are encouraged to reflect on what they learnt, how and why they learnt it and whether the experience could have been improved on. Stage 3 – Forming Abstract Concepts: using other experiences as a form of reference, and using other modes and models of thinking to inform your ideas. Stage 4 – Testing the Learning in New Situations: this is the final stage and involves the placement of the learnt material into context within own life. If this doesn’t happen it is likely that the new knowledge will be forgotten quickly. The person should also think about implementing the knowledge and how they can make the next learning experience more beneficial.

I believed that Kolb's theory is simple and applicable. Because we are all exposed to new learning every day. and we have the opportunity to see the effect of this experience on us. At the same time, we have the opportunity to reanalyze this new situation by recalling our old learnings. finally, we can combine (synthesize) our old learnings and new ones and apply them in different situations we encounter. These are all about how much experience we have and our ability to use the knowledge and skills we have acquired affect our professional life.