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Abstract
This study investigated a structured and critical approach to reflective practice, and how this can support graphic design students in a project-based learning environment to learn from their projects. Graphic design education has traditionally adopted a project-based learning approach where students are introduced to the principles of design through a series of projects. While there are many advantages to project-based learning, research suggests that in this environment, learning can become overly bound to the project with the risk that students have difficulty identifying and articulating what they have learned. Reflection offers a means to support students to connect their learning through a more deliberate engagement with the design process and the learning opportunities this presents. A learning intervention in the form of a structured and critical approach to reflective practice was designed, framed by theories of reflective practice and cognitive psychology. The aim was to prompt students to reflect on their project in ways that supported them to identify their learning and challenge their approach(es) to the project. A case study strategy of inquiry was employed, drawing on a mixed-method research approach. The findings from this study demonstrate that when supported by a structured and critical approach to reflective practice, students reflected in a critical manner and consistent with the principles of reflection-on-action. Whilst in this study not all students critically reflected, nor did students critically reflect all the time, it is concluded that reflective practice applied in a structured and critical manner can play an effective role to guide graphic design students to learn from their project. This article presents a detailed description of the research method and the structured critical reflective practice (SCRP) developed for the study. A summary of the overall findings are presented.
Notes
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2. Dorst, Understanding Design.
3. Lawson, How Designers Think.
4. Dorst and Reymen, “Levels of Expertise”; Lawson, How Designers Think.
5. Blumenfeld et al., “Motivating Project-based Learning,” 369.
6. Barron et al., “Doing with Understanding”; Blumenfeld et al., “Motivating Project-based Learning.”
7. Blumenfeld et al., “Motivating Project-based Learning”; Barron et al. “Doing with Understanding.”
8. Dorst and Reymen, “Levels of Expertise.”
9. Cross, Designerly Ways of Knowing.
10. Dorst and Reymen, “Levels of Expertise”; Kvan, “The Problem”; Lawson, How Designers Think.
11. Kvan, “The Problem”; Lawson, How Designers Think.
12. Dorst and Reymen, “Levels of Expertise.”
13. Bransford and Schwartz, “Rethinking Transfer.”
14. National Research Council, “How People Learn.”
15. National Research Council, “How People Learn.”
16. Valkenburg and Dorst, “The Reflective Practice”; Dorst and Dijkhuis, “Comparing Paradigms” ; Dorst, “The Problem of Design Problems”; Reymen et al., “A Domain-independent Descriptive Design”; Lauche, “Heedful Action,” with Schön’s concept of the reflective practitioner (The Reflective Practitioner and Educating the Reflective Practitioner)
17. Schön, The Reflective Practitioner and Educating the Reflective Practitioner.
18. Reymen et al., “A Domain-independent Descriptive.”
19. Hatton and Smith, “Reflection in Teacher Education”; Kember et al., “A Four-category Scheme”; Mezirow, “How Critical Reflection.”
20. Ellmers, 2014.
21. Creswell, Qualitative Inquiry; Yin, “Case Study Research.”
22. Reigeluth and Frick, “Formative Research.”
23. Tashakkori and Teddlie, “Major Issues.”
24. Tashakkori and Teddlie, “Major Issues,” 212.
25. Creswell, Research Design.
26. Creswell et al., “Advanced Mixed Methods.”
27. Mertens, Research Methods.
28. Mertens, Research Methods, 229.
29. Creswell et al., “Advanced Mixed Methods.”
30. ibid
31. Yin, “Case Study Research.”
32. Creswell, Research Design; Mertens, Research Methods.
33. Yin, “Case Study Research,” 98.
34. Creswell, Qualitative Inquiry; Mertens, Research Methods.
35. Creswell, Qualitative Inquiry.
36. Mertens, Research Methods, 167.
37. Punch, Introduction, 174.
38. Mertens, Research Methods; Punch, Introduction.
39. Mertens, Research Methods.
40. Punch, Introduction,174.
41. Blumenfeld et al., “Motivating Project-based Learning.”
42. Schön, “Problems.”
43. Dorst, Understanding Design.
44. Reymen et al.,”A Domain-independent Descriptive.”
45. Schön, The Reflective Practitioner.
46. Koschmann et al., “Using Technology.”
47. Reymen, “Research on Design Reflection”; Schön and Bennett, “Reflective Conversation.”
48. Dorst, Describing Design.
49. Ghaye and Lillyman, Learning Journals; Tripp, Critical Incidents.
50. Tripp, Critical Incidents.
51. Ghaye and Lillyman, Learning Journals.
52. Reymen et al., “A Domain-independent Descriptive.”
53. Britton, “Shaping at the Point of Utterance”; Klein, “Reopening Inquiry”; Moon, A Handbook and “We Seek it Here…”.
54. Britton, “Shaping at the Point of Utterance.”
55. Bransford and Schwartz, “Rethinking Transfer,” 69.
56. Ehmann, “Futuregradute.”
57. Boud, “Assessment”; Briggs, Teaching for Quality.
58. Schraw, “Promotional General Metacognitive Awareness.”
59. Creswell et al., “Advanced Mixed Methods.”
60. Creswell, Qualitative Inquiry.
61. Bennett, 2002; Hatton and Smith, “Reflection in Teacher Education.”
62. Moon, A Handbook.
63. Mertens, Research Methods.
64. Creswell, Qualitative Inquiry, 165.
65. Herrington and Oliver, “Using Situtated Learning,” 11.
66. Lincoln and Guba, Naturalistic Inquiry.
67. Creswell, Qualitative Inquiry.
68. ibid
69. Ellmers, 2014.
70. Bransford and Schwartz, “Rethinking Transfer.”
71. Tashakkori and Teddlie, “Major Issues.”
72. Johnson and Onwuegbuzie, “Mixed Methods Research.”
73. Creswell, Qualitative Inquiry.
74. Hoover, “Reflective Writing”; Moon, “We Seek it Here…”.
75. Moon, “We Seek it here…”.
76. James, “Reflection Revisited.”