Let's Dump Reflection

I think we do need a new word for reflection, as it is so misused and overused.  Controlled, focused personal investigation or interrogation. The latter sounds like a criminal proceeding, so probably not; it assumes guilt, and what I want to get away from is how we prioritize deficiency and the need for improvement rather than strengths and what the student does know and why—or how what they know is incomplete but a building block for what the “next step” is.  I have not always followed this principle but I see its value now. I have been far too fundamentalistic in my whole life, and I so want to change that, to drop the negativity, the gap-emphasis, and see what’s there rather than what is not there.

 

Reflection—or this focused, intentional, controlled investigation and assessment of experience—should start with the positive. It should have a system and framework.  We should teach this starting in freshman year, and we should teach a form of it that is informed by knowledge rather than just emotion. 

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