Reflection in Student Learning in a Semantics and Academic Writing Module

Abstract

Presumably, reflective teaching is something most or all English language (EL) educators engage in. There are books written on the topic (Barnard and Ryan in Reflective practice: Voices from the Field. Routledge, 2017; Mann and Walsh in Reflective practice in English language teaching: Research-based principles and practices. Routledge, 2017) and EL educators publish papers with reflective components as scholarly works (e.g., Macnaught and Yates in Int J TESOL Stud (Special Issue “ELT in the time of the Coronavirus 2020”, Part 1) 2(2):89–111, 2020). There seems to be consensus that reflective teaching has a role to play in English Language Teaching (ELT). On the other hand, there has been growing emphasis on reflective learning among students too. Books have been written on it (Ryan (ed) in Teaching reflective learning in higher education: A systematic approach using pedagogic patterns, Springer, 2015) and there are modules that require students to write a reflective piece as one of the assignments. However, it would appear that the role of reflection in student learning has not been adequately explored. In this exploratory study, the author investigates the link between student reflections and their grades to see if there is a correlation. The hypothesis is that in an ideal situation, ceteris paribus, the student who engages in more reflection attains a better grade than one who engages in less reflection. The academic writing module in question uses content-based instruction, and specifically the CLIL (‘content and language integrated learning’) approach associated with David Marsh (Encyclopedia of language and education: Knowledge about language, Springer, Boston, 2008). The content is semantics, and students learn how to use a simpler form of English, called ‘Minimal English’ to express complex meanings (Goddard in Ten lectures on natural semantic metalanguage: Exploring language, thought and culture using simple translatable words. Brill, 2018a; Goddard (Ed.) in Minimal English for a global world: Improved communication using fewer words. Springer, 2018b). The major assignment is a term paper of around 2000 words. In this study, the author looks at the reflections, that the students are asked to write on a weekly basis for a semester, of the top five and bottom five students over four semesters to see if there are quantitative and qualitative differences between the two sets of reflections. It must be cautioned that any findings from this preliminary study must remain tentative because the data comes from only four semesters. Nevertheless, it is hoped that it will spark further interest in the area.