The Role of Reflection in the Inquiry Plan

We discussed the “Student Growth” section of the Inquiry Learning Plan (ILP) with a focus on creating activities in the March SLM article; however, this section of the ILP deals not only with creating and completing activities, but also reflection on the process. See Figure 1.

Fig. 1. Student growth.

After each round of three activities, students complete two types of reflections to:

• examine their progress answering their essential question.
• assess their development with each standard skill.

These types of reflections go deeper than simply answering the question, “So, how’d it go?” Our goal is for students to show their thinking at various stages in the learning process. In an Educational Leadership article, Ritchhart and Perkins explain,

…effective thinkers make their thinking visible, meaning they externalize their thoughts through speaking, writing, drawing, or some other method. They can then direct and improve those thoughts. Through the repeated cycle of activities and reflections, teachers have numerous opportunities to meet students where they are and see where students might need “interventions” (2008).

In this case, reflections allow teachers to find a “zone” where a student

Click to Enlarge +The Role of Reflection in the Inquiry Plan

…can do with advice and assistance what he or she cannot do alone or can do only with difficulty. Intervention within this zone enables individuals to progress in the accomplishment of their task. Intervention outside this zone is inefficient and unnecessary, experienced by users as intrusive on the one hand and overwhelming on the other (Kuhlthau 2013).

Without making thinking visible through consistent reflection, students cannot progress in the same way.

WRITING MEANINGFUL REFLECTIONS

While reflections lead to discoveries in content and process, they can also dig even deeper into the realm of students knowing themselves as learners. For example, one 10th grader stated:

I wrote my EQ [essential question] reflection as I was thinking rather than planning first, and it led to writing down these great ideas I didn’t even realize I had. I was informal, to the point, and brutally honest. Any thought I had I wrote, which led to gems.

This reflection goes beyond the content and process of her current project. She learned something about herself that will help her in all learning situations—that too much planning ahead stunts her thinking. One of our co-teachers, Suzanne Vrancken, describes how reflection should contain synthesis by using the image of a pancake. She explains that layering ideas on top of each other like a stack of pancakes is simply not enough. The ideas need to overlap through a synthesis of relationships. Reflections need to contain these kinds of connections, not just a reporting of process or content. See Figure 2.

To help students, we also give them a sample reflection and ask them to pick out the characteristics that make it a meaningful reflection. This provides students not only a model but also specific qualities to include in their reflections.

REFLECTING ON QUESTIONS, STANDARDS, AND DISPOSITIONS

Completing reflections for both their essential question (EQ) and their standards allows students to focus on content and skills, setting goals for the next round of activities, and focusing on the progress they made in the previous round. In the EQ reflection, students explain how their texts and research have helped them to answer their guiding and essential questions. As they respond to their questions, they may also see opportunities to refine their EQ or ask new guiding questions. A junior in British Literature begins by explaining how her texts interacted to help her answer and refine her EQ:

I started out by looking at government, which was a huge part of society and the individual… I read and annotated “A Modest Proposal” (Jonathan Swift), which mocked the heartlessness towards the poor, and the Irish government’s decisions. It showed how little of a voice that young children and the poor had, and emphasized the idleness of the government…This related to my next activity, which focused on Discourse on Inequality, a text that I wanted to look more into. The text had a lot to do with the unfair conditions of society, much like “A Modest Proposal.”…I realized that Discourse on Inequality answered my primary essential question, and actually changed my interpretation of it. People contribute by working tirelessly and never ceasing to be a slave to society. This is not encouraged because society is nothing but a burden. People try so hard to heighten their social status that they don’t enjoy life anymore. Everyone should just be free. That was basically what it said, and it really opened my eyes to how vague my original question was (which, I guess, wasn’t a bad thing). This really got me into learning more about the individual, since it is the majority of my question. In other words, I wanted to learn more about the viewpoint of individuals on society, and whether or not they should bother to contribute [to] it or take part in it.

Pancaking.This student also demonstrates how important synthesis is for reflection—students need to explain how the ideas of the unit combine with personal, historical, or contemporary examples to respond to the question, keeping in mind that they are ultimately working towards exploring why what they are studying matters to others. Reflections help students see what concepts are emerging throughout the plan, and by the end of the unit, they allow students to consider how their activities built on each other to cement their understanding of their texts and subject matter.

In the standards reflection, students explain how their activities help them practice their skills, in addition to establishing areas of growth and areas for improvement for the next round. They can start by identifying their goals from the last round—what did they need to improve? If they reached their goal, they can celebrate their success and refer to the standards rubric to see what their next step should be in order to reach advanced proficiency. Using the language of the rubric is important because it forces the students to remain cognizant of what they should be achieving through the activities. Self-assessment, therefore, becomes a part of this reflection because they are identifying where on the rubric their skills lie.

Most students improve from round to round, but if they do not, they must try to discover why their skills remained the same. It may be a poor understanding of the standard itself or a lack of motivation to challenge themselves. Reflecting on their learning habits is as important as reflecting on the questions or skills—students should identify the challenges they face in the ILP in order for the teacher or a peer to step in and provide some help before the next round.

Just as reflections reveal students’ thinking, they can also be a place for students to process their feelings as they learn. Kuhlthau has documented the importance of the affective domain in her Information Search Process, and it is just as important here (2013). If students are unaware of their feelings, teachers remain unaware as well, leading to potential roadblocks to learning. However, if they can use their reflections to explore what frustrates them, it can provide an opportunity for teachers and students to troubleshoot together. For example, the students who are frustrated with growing responsibilities may simply need tools or strategies to make their learning more efficient. Or, they might be feeling insecure because they’re attempting skills they have struggled with in the past, which could require more encouragement from the teacher or specific types of feedback from their peers.

STRATEGIES FOR USING REFLECTION

Reflections offer a great opportunity for both the students and the teacher to make adjustments. Teachers can get a stronger gauge on where students are in the process (affectively and cognitively), reflect on observations of student work habits, and evaluate parameters for upcoming work. Teachers can also intervene after reflections and conferences with students one-on-one. By asking them to explain (with examples) where in their work they are meeting or exceeding goals and where they are falling short, teachers can help them set new goals for the next round of activities. If they aren’t able to accurately or objectively assess their work, the teacher can assist them at this point. Teachers can provide model work to help students understand rubric requirements, and they can also ask the students lots of questions to guide them through thoughtful self-assessment.

Similarly, students can use reflection to connect with other students through peer review. At various stages of the ILP, we have students connect with their classmates to review each other’s reflections. After research conferences with students, we may notice that multiple students are exploring the same themes, works, or standards. By connecting these students, we create opportunities for them to develop a small community of learners. Or, if students are participating in inquiry circles, they may come across familiar elements in their work, simply because they are reading common texts or exploring similar questions.

These peer connections serve multiple purposes. Students articulate their learning to someone other than their teacher and themselves. In turn, they provide feedback to a partner’s work. Through reflection, students become aware of their learning process, and through conversation with another, they develop an understanding of the values and mindset of a peer. This peer becomes part of their authentic audience; the reflective voice that only they had heard has more significance since it now has the potential to influence another. These metacognitive experiences engage students in deep critical thinking, whereby they are analyzing, evaluating, and preparing to apply their own self-knowledge to future studies. Through rounds of scaffolded reflections and conversations, students build empathy towards others’ experiences and can even apply what their peers are learning to their own processes.

As John Dewey contends in How We Think, reflection should be a series of connected, consecutive ideas that “grow out of one another and support one another” (1910, 2). Reflective thought is not an arbitrary association of ideas that float through one’s mind. In pausing to reflect, students are recognizing that each phase “is a step from something to something” (Dewey 1910, 3). As in the case of an 11th grade student, he went through the ILP process last year as a sophomore. By using reflections to examine all parts of his learning, both cognitive and affective, he now has strategies in place to help him progress, even when he hits walls. When asked for his biggest takeaway from the ILP, he wrote:

I handle setbacks by looking at the feedback to see what I missed. There’s really a huge difference between “Oh, I’ll do better next time” and “This is what I’ll do differently next time.”

This is the true benefit of embedded, cyclical reflection. Students not only have the will to improve, but they also gain specific strategies throughout the process. Since the process of the ILP is one that scaffolds learning, reflections become a critical mechanism for students to move from one stage of the ILP to the next.