Skip Navigation
Button that takes you to the teacher pages. Button that takes you to the modules and activities page. Button that takes you to the main Exploring the Environment page. Image that says Exploring the Environment.

Image that says Teacher Pages.Image of an adult woman hugging a small girl.
Button that takes you to the Introduction page.
Button that takes you to the Entry-Level Modules page.
Button that takes you to the Module Notes page.
Button that takes you to the Problem-Based Learning page.
Button that takes you to the Planning, Facilitating, Assessing page.
Button that takes you to the Teacher-to-Teacher page.
Button that takes you to the Software page.
Button that takes you to the Other Useful Web Sites page.

 

Image that reads Planning, Facilitating, Assessing.

Reflecting
The Reflective Student
Learners do not just receive information only at the time it is given; they absorb information in many different ways, often after the fact, through reflection. Zemelman, Daniels, and Hyde (1993) believe that the most powerful learning happens when students self-monitor, or reflect.

Students may not always be aware of what they are learning and experiencing. Teachers must raise students' consciousness about underlying concepts and about their own reactions to these concepts. The ETE modules offer times for reflecture during and after the research process. Learners review the appropriateness of their actions and attitudes and evaluate what changes might be desirable in a similar problem-solving situation. They formulate concepts and generalizations and convert their individual and collective experience into education.

There are many ways to reflect. Reflection may occur individually, in groups, in teacher-led discussion, or during student-to-student dialogues. Reflection may occur at any time during the learning process; it does not have to wait until the end. Herbert (1995) offers some excellent advice:

To be an effective facilitator of this type of reflection and an analysis, the teacher must be a good observer of what is happening. He or she needs to observe not only the learners' actions and nonactions toward the activity, but also toward each other. Then, at appropriate times, observations could be offered, questions asked, feelings explored.

The teacher must also be able to vary his or her approach in helping the students analyze what has taken place. The methods are dependent on the personalities and situations involved. At times, it might be necessary to be blunt and honest with feedback.

At other times, questions, discussions, or a gentle approach help students discover for themselves what they have done and how they are perceived. Sometimes nothing needs to be said. It is difficult to know the approach to use with each individual in each situation. Experience is a good teacher (p. 206).

Reflection is critical to both learning and transfer! Reflection ends the active learning experience and begins the assessment by providing evaluation opportunities as learners apply concepts and skills to new and different situations (transfer).

The Reflective Teacher
Keeping Records: During time following a class period or after the school day, teachers can assess the interactions that occurred in their classes. Much valuable information is available from teacher-kept records of a pupil's behavior in the classroom. Teachers have always been interested in recording student performance on tests, assignments, homework, and other data from the "instructional domain." However, noticeably absent from most teachers' data gathering are records in the "management domain" other than attendance and tardiness records. Teachers don't trust their memory when it comes to instruction records, teachers would do well to keep records of students' behavior and do more than trust to memory the information dealing with student behavior. Keeping management records is a good habit for all those involved in teaching in the ETE cooperative classroom.

Image that reads Planning.
Button that takes you to the National Science Standards page.Button that takes you to the Transfer of Knowledge page.
Button that takes you to the Learning in Teams page.
Button that takes you to the Student Products page.
Button that takes you to the Preparation Checklist page.
Image that reads Facilitating.
Button that takes you to the Briefing page.
Button that takes you to the Facilitator's Role page.
Button that takes you to the Maintaining Momentum page.
Button that takes you to the Reflecting page.
Button that takes you to the Providing Closure page.
Image that reads Assessing.
Button that takes you to the Assessment in ETE page.
Button that takes you to the Individual Product Ideas page.
Button that takes you to the Team Product Ideas page.
Button that takes you to the Rubrics page.
Button that takes you to the Assessing Behaviors page.

 

References
Zemelman, S., Daniels, H., & Hyde, A. (1993). Best practice: New standards for teaching and learning in America's schools. Portsmouth, NH: Reed Publishing.
Herbert, T. (1995). Experiential learning: A teacher's perspective. In R.J. Kraft and J. Kielsmeier (Eds.), Experiential learning in schools and higher education (pp. 201-211). Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt.

 

Button that takes you to the main teacher page.
Button that takes you to the teacher pages. Button that takes you to the modules and activities page. Button that takes you to the main Exploring the Environment page.
   
 
Last updated April 28, 2005
   

HTML code by Chris Kreger
Maintained by ETE Team

Some images © 2004 www.clipart.com

Privacy Statement and Copyright © 1997-2004 by Wheeling Jesuit University/NASA-supported Classroom of the Future. All rights reserved.

Center for Educational Technologies, Circuit Board/Apple graphic logo, and COTF Classroom of the Future logo are registered trademarks of Wheeling Jesuit University.