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Author(s) -
Proceedings
Publication year - 1978
Publication title -
journal of the american oil chemists' society
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.512
H-Index - 117
eISSN - 1558-9331
pISSN - 0003-021X
DOI - 10.1007/bf02678965
Subject(s) - citation , computer science , library science , information retrieval , world wide web
The purpose of this presentation is to discuss the results of a research study on the role reflection can play in student learning beyond internalizing textbooks or lecture notes. This study investigated how creative reflection could promote deeper understanding and critical thinking in university students. This PowerPoint presentation will involve the participants in an open discussion regarding the role of reflection in helping students reorganize prior knowledge, integrate concepts, and become critical thinkers in their fields. Proposal: As educators, we strive to create a classroom atmosphere conducive to critical thinking. However, we also struggle with time constraints that force the need to break concepts down into bits of one-class-period teaching, which often is not as effective as it needs to be (Iran-Nejad, McKeachie, & Berliner, 1990). Our attraction to theoretical frameworks provided by psychology has led educators to adopt many teaching methodologies that haven’t been as promising as psychology made them appear. For example, beginning with Thorndike in the 1920s and continuing with Skinners research, instruction relied heavily on behavioral psychology’s view of learning (Bransford & Schwartz, 1999; Dyson, 1999). Incorporating concepts of behaviorism led to the practice of task-analysis described as analyzing and adding specific responses to the learners repertoire (Mayer, 2003); as a result, an assembly-line model of skill acquisition became commonplace (Dole, Duffy, Roehler, & Pearson, 1991, p. 240). However, as psychology became disillusioned with behaviorism, educators also had to reexamine the effectiveness of learning bits and pieces for later assembly. As a result, more encompassing views of education emerged, such as contextualism (see Jenkins, 1974), constructivism (see Fosnot, 1996; Prawat, 1992; Shuell, 1986; von Glasersfeld, 1996), and situated learning (see Clancey, 1997; Lave, 1988; Newell, 1986; Rogoff, 1990). While all these theories have contributed to our current educational practices, often their contributions are treated as separate, if not mutually exclusive, educational territories. This is perhaps because none of them addresses the problem of integration. While behaviorism confines learners to the role of passive participants under sole control of the classroom teacher, many cognitive learning perspectives also confine learners to the strict internalization of teacher-determined knowledge. It is not surprising, then, that teaching by