Reflection: making sense of learning
Elsewhere, I've argued the case that 'digesting', or making sense of what is being (and has been) learned is a key factor underpinning successful learning. I've also argued that it's an oversimplification to regard learning as occurring in cycles, and that five key processes overlap and interact with each other, like ripples on a pond. For example, 'digesting' or 'making sense' links to reflecting on the experience of having done some learning-by-doing (practice, repetition, trial and error, experience, and so on). Moreover, 'digesting' links to making sense of incoming feedback (other people's reactions, praise, critical comments, seeing the results of one's learning, and so on). In the earlier versions of learning cycles, the term 'reflective observation' was much used, but I would argue that this is just a relatively narrow slice of the broader field of reflection. Deep reflection needs far more than simply observation, and for observation to be at its best it needs more than just a reflective dimension (requiring in addition analytical, extrapolatory, and other aspects as well as just inward-looking aspects).
My work both with staff and students indicates that the digesting stage of learning is often the hardest to get to grips with. This is in no small measure due to the fact that people find it hard (sometimes even quite alien to their nature) to reflect, and to evidence their reflection.
Teaching staff in higher education are not alone in often finding it hard to write about reflection on their professional practice. In the last two years or so, over 10000 staff in higher education have been admitted to membership of the Institute for Learning and Teaching, and many remember that the hardest part of writing their applications was writing around 500 words about 'reflective practice and professional development'. Writing about the latter part was for most quite straightforward, as it boils down to presenting a little factual information about the staff development they have done in the last few years. But writing about 'reflective practice' is much harder for some, not least because the language of academe tends to be remote, formal and scholarly, whereas the language of written reflection needs to be more personal and quite informal.
Reflection could be argued to be the essential stage where learning is integrated within the whole learner, and added to existing frames of reference, and internalised and personalised.