I really enjoyed reading the Kember et al. article on Reflection the other day for class. It was quite fascinating because in my teaching, I constantly stress the importance of reflection to students. However, few people (including myself) actually stop to really think about what that means. I also felt that the article had great bearing on my research project this semester.
Reflecting back on my initital learning experience in reserach methods (taking EDUC F65 in my first master's degree program around 2002/2003), I quickly realized that most of my time was spent in non-reflection. I simply tried to memorize theories, formulas, and terms with little thought towards their application or wider meaning.
However, now that I am older as well as a doctoral student, I have noticed that I am taking more time to reflect on my learning. I am currently reading the book How to Design and Evaluate Research in Education to re-learn introductory research methods and to essentially learn how to learn research methods. As I read the book, I find that it is much easier for me to reach reflection than it was in the past with my EDUC F65 course.
What helps to facilitate this process is that I can apply all of the material I am learning to my future dissertation topic. Thus, it allows me to apply the concepts I am learning in a way that was not possible when I was taking the course as a master's student. I will be interested to see if I can reach critical reflection at some point in this process.
In reading the research methods textbook, I have also noticed that I tend to absorb the material better as I read leisurely as opposed to having the stress of an impending quiz or test hanging over me. I would like to go into the adult learning literature to see if there is any research that deals with this dynamic. As I go into the more complex quantiative material, I will be interested to see if this trend keeps up or if I will not be able to absorb the more difficult material as easily.
Reflecting back on my initital learning experience in reserach methods (taking EDUC F65 in my first master's degree program around 2002/2003), I quickly realized that most of my time was spent in non-reflection. I simply tried to memorize theories, formulas, and terms with little thought towards their application or wider meaning.
However, now that I am older as well as a doctoral student, I have noticed that I am taking more time to reflect on my learning. I am currently reading the book How to Design and Evaluate Research in Education to re-learn introductory research methods and to essentially learn how to learn research methods. As I read the book, I find that it is much easier for me to reach reflection than it was in the past with my EDUC F65 course.
What helps to facilitate this process is that I can apply all of the material I am learning to my future dissertation topic. Thus, it allows me to apply the concepts I am learning in a way that was not possible when I was taking the course as a master's student. I will be interested to see if I can reach critical reflection at some point in this process.
In reading the research methods textbook, I have also noticed that I tend to absorb the material better as I read leisurely as opposed to having the stress of an impending quiz or test hanging over me. I would like to go into the adult learning literature to see if there is any research that deals with this dynamic. As I go into the more complex quantiative material, I will be interested to see if this trend keeps up or if I will not be able to absorb the more difficult material as easily.
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