Meta-Reflection--Clifton

In our classes in our teacher education program, we are constantly reminded of the value of reflection. Even when we are skeptical of its value, it is still something that we do, because it is required for our courses. But when do you reflect when you need all of your time to do something else? Time is something that, as Tom points out, we have too little of. When we are trying to focus on everything else that we need to do, it is very easy to lose track of the practice that our professors have been trying to hammer into our brains.

My cooperating teacher (CT) frequently asks me questions that sound rhetorical but are not. Or he will ask me a question that I think I can get out of by answering with a simple yes or no. He doesn't let me get away with a yes or no, and he presses me to elaborate and to give every little detail. "What weren't you happy about in that lesson?" is not a question that he allows me to answer with one or two sentences. I am very thankful that my CT is there to ask those questions. Like so many things, reflecting on your teaching is something that we need to make automatic.

Very soon we will be all but left to our own devices in the classroom. Once we finish our student teaching and have our own classroom, there will rarely be another adult in the classroom to ask us why we did something the way we did. Student teaching isn't the same thing as having your own classroom. It's a chance to hone those skills that we will have too little time to work on once we start teaching in our own classroom next year.