Defining Reflection: Another Look at John Dewey and Reflective Thinking

By Carol Rodgers. Teachers College Record, 2002

1,787 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Thinking, particularly reflective thinking or inquiry, is essential to both teachers’ and students’ learning. In the past 10 to 15 years numerous commissions, boards, and foundations as well as states and local school districts have identified reflection/inquiry as a standard toward which all teachers and students must strive. However, although the cry for accomplishment in systematic, reflective thinking is clear, it is more difficult to distinguish what systematic, reflective thinking is. There are four problems associated with this lack of definition that make achievement of such a standard difficult. First, it is unclear how systematic reflection is different from other types of thought. Second, it is difficult to assess a skill that is vaguely defined. Third, without a clear picture of what reflection looks like, it has lost its ability to be seen and therefore has begun to lose its value. And finally, without a clear definition, it is difficult to research the effects of reflective teacher education and professional development on teachers’ practice and students’ learning. It is the purpose of this article to restore some clarity to the concept of reflection and what it means to think, by going back to the roots of reflection in the work of John Dewey. I look at four distinct criteria that characterize Dewey's view and offer the criteria as a starting place for talking about reflection, so that it might be taught, learned, assessed, discussed, and researched, and thereby evolve in definition and practice, rather than disappear.

Subfields: Education

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/0cd92862fab3338b5bf1ab5a2c4d95554822eaaa

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Education

Citations in the corpus

Developing the Leader's Strategic Mindset: Establishing the Measures (2005, background): “ Rodgers (2002) , interpreting Dewey, summed up this relationship with the following points:”
Improving reflective writing in higher education: a social semiotic perspective (2011, background): “While the value of reflective practice is widely accepted in educational circles, a critical issue is that reflection is a ‘complex, rigorous, intellectual, and emotional enterprise that takes time to do well’ (Rodgers 2002 , 845).”
Process reflection during Japanese lesson study experiences by prospective secondary mathematics teachers (2011, background): “Little agreement exists, however, about what reflection actually means and how teachers may consistently engage in it; it has become a diluted educational construct (Convery 1998; Dinkelman 1997; Rodgers 2002; Valli 1997).”
Student teachers’ patterns of reflection in the context of teaching practice (2015, methodology): “The procedure is based on the theoretical ideas of reflection, especially on the Deweyean perspective (Rodgers 2002), including personal intentions, interaction and time as its central elements.”
Multiplying perspectives and improving practice: what can happen when undergraduate students collaborate with college faculty to explore teaching and learning (2014, background): “Integrating students into the “cycle of interpretation and action” (Rodgers, 2002) that constitutes reflective practice provides participants with a unique forum within which to access and revise their assumptions, engage in reflective discourse, and take action in their work (Cook-Sather, 2008;…”
Promoting versatility in mentor teachers’ use of supervisory skills (2008, neutral): “Teacher training institutes and schools nowadays want mentor teachers to be capable also of promoting reflection and personal development in prospective teachers entrusted to their responsibility (Gore & Zeichner, 1991; Rodgers, 2002).”
Guided reflection as a means to demonstrate and develop student teachers’ reflective competencies (2008, background): “According to Rodgers (2002), Dewey gives us the means to look at reflection and reflective practice in a more precise way.”
Principles for literacy assessment (2005, background): “This requires a “sensitive observer” (Clay, 1993) or “kidwatcher” (Goodman, 1978), a teacher who is “present” in the classroom— focused and receptive to noticing the children’s literate behavior (Rodgers, 2002).”
A RECIPE for Meaningful Gamification (2015, background): “Dewey explored the importance of reflection in learning, and argued that without reflection after action, people do not find meaning in what they are doing (Rodgers, 2002).”
Moving Beyond Reflection: Reflexivity and Epistemic Cognition in Teaching and Teacher Education (2017, background): “REFLECTION IN EDUCATION Historically, reflective thinking and action taking have been evident in the field of education since Dewey’s (1909) work in the early 20th century (Rodgers, 2002).”
The growth of reflective practice among three beginning secondary mathematics teachers (2010, background): “Rodgers ( 2002 ) distils four key components of reflective thinking from Dewey's work.”
Understanding and assessing preservice teachers’ reflective thinking (2005, background): “teacher education programs (Rodgers, 2002).”
Theorising a model for teaching and assessing reflective learning in higher education (2013, background): “A critical issue, however, is that reflection is a ‘complex, rigorous, intellectual, and emotional enterprise that takes time to do well’ (Rodgers, 2002, p. 845).”
Pedagogical principles that support the prioritisation of meaningful experiences in physical education: conceptual and practical considerations (2021, background): “According to Rodgers (2002), ‘without continuity learning is random and disconnected, building toward nothing either within the learner or the world’ (847).”
Tracing the Effects of Teacher Inquiry on Classroom Practice. (2010, background): “The origins of teacher inquiry stretch back at least as far as Dewey, 1933 who viewed inquiry as a process of progressive problem solving and believed that nurturing reflective dispositions is an essential ingredient for improving teaching practice over time (Crockett, 2004; Glassman, 2001; Rodgers,”