 |
 |
Mid-Atlantic Regional Technology in Education Consortium
1301 Cecil B. Moore Ave.
Ritter Annex 9th Floor
Temple University - CRHDE
Philadelphia, PA 19122
800-892-5550
215-204-5130 (fax)
General Inquires:
Laurence Peters
Judith Stull
Technical Assistance:
Barry Mansfield
Professional Development:
Joan Pasternak
|
|
 |
 |
Temple University Center for Research
in Human Development and Education |
|
|
ReflectionConnection: Emergent ePortfolios of Reflective Practitioners
142
by
Johann Sarmiento and Catherine C. Schifter
Temple University
Reflection Connection (RC) is an online collaboration environment designed to support asynchronous, sustained, and problem-based teacher development. RC can help overcome the barriers of distance and time and support communities of practice committed to improving student achievement. In RC, online collaboration follows the learning trajectories of the participants and their needs through a scaffolded reflection protocol anchored on artifacts that document practice (e.g., samples of student work, lesson plans, instructional materials, and assessment rubrics). At the very heart of RC is the principle of collaboration as an effective mechanism to mediate teacher reflection (Pugach & Johnson, 1990) and enact organizational change. This Techno-Brief presents a recent exploratory implementation of RC as part of preservice teacher training.
|
|
| |
During the fall semester of 2003, one section of a Temple University College of Education Senior Seminar used RC as a vehicle for collaborative reflective practice and the development of ePortfolios. The students involved in this experience were in the process of completing their student teaching requirement for certification and the Senior Performance Assessment (SPA) required by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania for certification. The 22 students were assigned to 6 groups of 3, and 1 group of 4, based on commonalities in the student teaching experiences. RC was selected to supplement the face-to-face weekly classes because of its support for a structured protocol for reflection, the possibility of integrating a diverse range of electronic artifacts into the reflective dialogues, and the ability of students to construct an ePortfolio resulting directly from their practice. Although the students were used to the concept of reflective practice from all core courses in the teacher certification program, they had not had any formal experience reflecting in groups. In addition, while they had taught mini-lessons before, they had not been asked to collect artifacts of their teaching to be used in reviewing their teaching.
Use of RC was divided into three components. During the first 2 weeks of the course, students were asked to consider, every 2 days, an event or activity that occurred in their classrooms and post a public, reflective statement about it. During weeks 3 through 9, the students were asked to focus reflections of their practice on one of the six performance standards of the undergraduate curriculum covered in class. These performance standards are Active Learning, Coherence and Continuity, Critical and Creative Thinking, Real World Connections, Reflective Thinking, and Understanding Content. Students were instructed to reflect on these experiences collaboratively by asking questions and critically analyzing the events within the RC groups. Lastly, students were asked to document their practice by describing the lessons they taught and reflecting upon samples of student work, teaching materials, and other artifacts. This ePortfolio stage was also conducted collaboratively with peers providing feedback to the lessons and reflections in an attempt to enrich the perspectives of reflective practice.
Page
1 2
3
4
Next |
