Response to "On Being a Reflective Teacher"

Regarding the first question prompted to me, my short answer is yes - this article speaks greatly to me, and I even feel seen as a teacher candidate by this article. Right off the bat, my swirling thoughts were addressed by the reading. This past week, my head felt like it was spinning - not because of any sickness or anything, but because of the sudden shock of so many different perspectives and ideas entering my mind, and my instinct to unpack, assess, and develop new ideas with. I've been fairly vocal during class discussions too, mostly to get everything in my mind verbalized. Reading the article, I found myself understanding that this whole time, I was already thinking like a reflective teacher! Each of my classes covered a different facet of teaching: curriculum, assessment, school as an institution, ELL students, and more. Before, during and after each lesson, I would find myself wondering how I'd implement what I've thought about into a classroom. Perhaps a new activity idea was presented in class, and I would play with the idea of that, come up with a twist, and maybe even make a new activity entirely in my mind. Many such cases of instinctual reflection occurred this past week, so to reiterate: this article speaks to me greatly as a teacher candidate.

Aside from that, there were other parts that stood out to me when reading the article. One part was when the article struggled with points of view opposing reflective thinking. Even before reading the counterarguments that the article stated, I already found myself coming up with reasons and questioning what I deemed as "excuses" against reflective thinking! For example, one argument category brought up was whether it was possible to act off one's reflective thinking. My first thought was asking, "If your school is so restrictive, why wouldn't you reflect on why that is? Even if you can't do anything about it, could you even write it off as pointless?" My answer would've been a "no" long before reading the article. The article didn't counter with these rhetorical questions, but instead made other good points on the "interplay of choice and restraint", which further states a need to reflectively think. There were other cases of me eagerly defending reflective thinking, which goes back to my first thoughts above: as someone who is already thinking along the lines indicated by the article, I can't help but feel that the article speaks to me, loud and clear.

As I continue to go through the teacher education program, there is another reason my head feels like it's spinning: the realization that I am going into the profession. The article also warns of the rigid curricula, school standards, and other things restricting teacher autonomy that makes the points of this article feel slightly moot. However, this is the part that feels dated to me; I appreciate the work being done in the field of research over the past decades, as my observations show that schools, the people working in them, and the people teaching me in the teacher education program are very open to the ideas in this paper, even employing them in their own pedagogies. Though I cannot prove it, it feels like over the years, this article was likely distributed to many teacher candidates like myself and affected their thought processes, and when they were sent into the teaching profession, they changed it further by using the ideas in this article.

To finish this post off, I want to say that I already agreed with basically every point in this article. The article tackled arguments against reflective thinking, but reflecting on myself when I read the article, I found that I was already able to argue for it. The article did evoke a sense of urgency, however. The point on necessity was a stand-out for me. Sure, one could remain a stagnant teacher who is satisfied with the status quo. Necessity is relative to a goal, and such a goal is not what I'd consider ideal. Like the article argues, the world is continuously changing and teachers need to be able to adapt in order to bring out the best in themselves and students. This calls for reflective thinking. Not too overboard (the article also illuminates that possibility which I agree with; too much of anything is bad, and overdoing the reflective thinking can get us carried away from stability), but definitely a considerate amount.