Teachers’ written reflections on their work, which reported on a change in their practice, were the object of this study.  We focused on teachers’ articulation of their plans and actions in teacher journals to inform other teachers about their work. The study’s aim is: (1) to describe how teacher reflect, in a non-framed way, on their own practice, and (2) to appraise the quality of such reflections. Articulation of reflection is interpreted in two ways, as: a) complete, that is, whether it includes relevant components of teacher action research, and b) recursive, that is, whether the written account gives evidence of an integrated cyclical process of review - in sufficient detail - to justify a change of practice.

To gain a better perspective on the importance of teacher reflection, we studied how experienced teachers reflect on their practice to understand how they articulate such reflections and how they interconnect it in a process to understand (and change or improve) their practice. We believe that by studying accounts of teacher (action) research (Meyers & Rust, 2003) we could illuminate how teachers frame reflection as representing (mirroring) what they encountered in practice. The study’s aim is twofold: (1) to describe how teachers deal with the task of reporting on innovations in their practice; and (2) to assess the quality of this reflective process considering its degree of articulation as expressed through the following two indicators: (a) the completeness of the process, which should include the core elements of a-r model – problem identification, plan for change, action, and review of the plan –, and (b) its recursiveness: the effectiveness and precision with which the reflective cycle is closed in the review of the plan.

 

 The sample of teachers’ reflective accounts is made up of articles published in a Spanish professional teachers’ journal, Cuadernos de Pedagogía [Accounts of Pedagogy]. A special section carries reports by teachers of their teaching experiences. The forum provides a place for teachers to present their work in an authentic way (no framing way). Forty nine articles written by teachers were selected from 12 issues published in 2001 with an average length of 4-7 pages. 

The content (propositions) of the articles was analyzed in four steps, which act as successive filters, and reliability checks were performed on articles chosen at random by two independent raters:        (1), Selection of extracts; :(2), Identification of propositions; (3), Identification of components:(4), Topical analysis: This procedure made it possible to draw a tree diagram showing different levels of hierarchically ordered topical propositions that represents teachers’ articulation of reflection. The degree of agreement obtained for the topics ranged from 0.71 to 0.97.

 

Findings.

Data were coded according to a teacher action research model of reflection. The reflective cycle (i.e., to be cognizant on) is constituted of 4 steps:

An overview of frequencies found for propositions relating to each of the reflection model components is given in the table below. Of the 553 propositions analyzed, the vast majority were oriented towards plans for change (44.8%) and appraisals (32.73%)

 

(PLEASE INSERT TABLE 1 ABOUT HERE)

 

With regard to the criteria of reflection, the following was found:

 

A. COMPLETENESS.

From a theoretical viewpoint being reflective means to take into account all identified steps (or combinations of them) of reflective process,. We have observed that very few practitioners do explicitly operate with all identified steps in the model (14.3%). Most of the reflective patterns we found  are “incomplete” (85.7%). Our study identified 16 different reflective patterns in teacher written accounts

 

B. RECURSIVENESS.

In reviewing their reflections, teachers written accounts were scrutinized to find instances of appraisals or obstacles which could point out  revisions of plans and evaluations of changes (whether they are accurate and practical). This recursive nature of teacher reflections was found to be scarce, i.e., few teachers  perceive or note negative issues (obstacles) that emerged from practice and few mention positive ones (appraisals) in a precise way.

 

We assumed that degree of awareness (completeness of reflection) also related to quality of evaluating one’s practice (recursiveness). Our results show that complete reflections (having all components) indeed are linked to the two indicators of recursiveness. Nevertheless, these differences were not statistically significant in the case of  appraisals (p=.16, according to the Mann-Whitney U test); nor in the case of obstacles.

 

Theoretical and educational significance.

One of the marked aspects of reflection in doing teacher action research is to be aware of steps taken. By this we mean: full coverage of a reflective cycle or process: (i.e., completeness) and  be precise in appraising one’s findings by evaluating and reviewing one’s work: ( i.e, recursiveness). We expected teacher reflection on their work as communicated to their colleagues would mean that they would be cognizant of the process of changes in practices.

We have appraised these teacher reflections in a, very little studied context, (i.e., public written documents). Journal writing in an open forum that involves teachers to take on the challenge of sharing personal experiences about (innovative) actions with other colleagues in the profession (LaBoskey, 1997; Zeichner, 1995). This medium requires a reflective effort to describe the writer’s actions in a knowledgeable way, reviewing, for instance, what was of concern, what constituted an innovation, and how results were evaluated. The present study highlights a marked distance between what is said about what is done (in teaching as well in conceptualizing teaching). This brings us to conclude that the notion of reflection about practice is reasonable and desirable, but in light of our findings in this study, it is also problematic and far removed from the communications of professional teachers with their colleagues. We did find a considerable amount of consideration to values whose essential function is to justify and legitimize the teacher’s account of the action. This expresses a view of teacher reflection which stresses prospective thinking about what should be achieved in teaching. These values are highly linked to the teacher’s beliefs. Thus, reflection in our view might signify the distance between descriptions of practice and the interpretation of it when professionals examine their own experience.