ERIC Number: ED385493
Record Type: Non-Journal
Publication Date: 1995-Apr
Pages: 22
Abstractor: N/A
ISBN: N/A
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Teaching as an Amalgam of Discourses and the Consequent Need for Appropriate Modes of Reflection.
Coldron, John; Smith, Robin
This paper explores the concept of reflection and reflective practice in teacher education. Teaching is a complex achievement that brings together a number of conceptual, practical, and physical resources in an individual's professional practice. Achievement in teaching is an amalgam of at least four different discourses--science, craft, art, and social/moral activity; success and development in teaching depend on forms of reflection specific to those discourses. To illustrate this conceptual approach, the TENET project, an attempt in preservice training to develop reflection on the promotion of equality of opportunity in the classroom is described. The paper concludes with five principles for teacher education: (1) give students tasks that require them to reflect on important findings of educational research, assess the quality of evidence offered for claims concerning education, and understand how to gain and use evidence about their own and others' practice; (2) let students become apprentices to experienced teachers, and practice their craft with appropriate feedback and reflection built into the experience; (3) facilitate the appreciation of personal style in teaching, provide help to develop a language of critical appreciation, and give students opportunities to compare their approach with that of their peers and experienced teachers; (4) ensure that radical moral reflection is legitimated explicitly and structurally, facilitate peer discussion of moral issues, and provide opportunities for cognitive, experiential, affective, and practical exploration of moral issues; and (5) provide explicit, well informed, strongly argued views of the moral responsibilities of teachers. (Contains 28 references.) (ND)
Descriptors: Discrimination Learning, Elementary Secondary Education, Equal Education, Foreign Countries, Higher Education, Instruction, Moral Issues, Preservice Teacher Education, Reflective Teaching, Teacher Attitudes, Teacher Effectiveness, Teacher Student Relationship, Teaching Models, Teaching (Occupation), Teaching Styles, Theory Practice Relationship
Publication Type: Reports - Descriptive; Speeches/Meeting Papers
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
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Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: United Kingdom (England)
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Author Affiliations: N/A