Reflective teaching: theory within classroom practices

Abstract

The core of the Senate Bill 2042 (1998) was designed to provide the guidelines needed to prepare teachers who can meet the needs of a diverse K-12 student population in California. Following the guidelines marked by this bill, faculty working in Teacher Credential Programs across California are designing activities to prepare candidates with a deep understanding of effective pedagogies applicable to a full range of students. A key component in this preparation is to provide teacher candidates with opportunities to critically read and reflect on theory and research. Understanding the importance of this component, I designed an assignment, Quadruple Entry Journals (QEJ), which asks teacher candidates to first, critically read texts on theory; secondly, to reflect and analyze those texts; thirdly, to reflect on the reflections of their classmates; and, finally, to connect these theoretical reflections with practice. In this article, I explain the pedagogy followed when implementing QEJ with teacher candidates. Their feedback showed that when theory and research are cooperatively analyzed by teacher candidates, they better understand the connection between theory and practice, thus creating a deep understanding of what to teach and how to teach.

Keywords:

• critical reading
• reflection
• theory
• classroom practices

Notes

1. All people’s names in this article are pseudonyms.