Reflection and Reflective Inquiry: What Future?

Abstract

This chapter briefly examines the findings of recent research with professional practitioners about the future of reflection and reflective practice. Although there is some disagreement, most commentators see no immediate danger of the demise of reflection or reflective practice in such fields as teacher education, where programs require reflective portfolios for assessment and for high stakes certification. However, there is still much uncertainty and debate about reflection, how it is defined and if and how it should be assessed. Some urge caution, as does Lee Shulman, for example, with the uses of reflective portfolio assessments. He counsels that we not be so taken with reflective portfolio assessments that we fail to attend to teaching itself, that is, the teaching of teaching, or the teaching and practice of the law, social work, medicine, nursing or occupational therapy, that is, the content and practice of a profession. This chapter reports on findings from several commentators and from a 2008 survey of 17 chapter authors of this Handbook on the future and the issues likely to affect reflective practice (Lyons 2008). The chapter concludes with recommendations for implementing five principles in support of advancing reflective practice.