When reflecting on my own practise within my work place I try to observe the facts of the event or new experience and then by using a mini note pad I now can jot down some of my thinking at the time and that helps me later critically write up what I was thinking, helps me look at the experience in more than one way, what went well and even better next time if (A critical reflection).
Tools that help us reflect on our practise.
Using reflective tools at work is the key way for me and my organisation to understand and review our current practises and learn from what we already do (our experiences) within our work place and this helps us to improve on our practises.
1. Pre-brief- plan on how session will run (aims and objectives) and the actives on offer.
2. Debrief- W.W.W, E.B.I, the outcome of the session, what was positive, response from YP, how many YP attended.
3. Parent and young person evaluation questionnaires- for us to use to reflect and evaluate on our current practises and ideas and comment on how we can improve on our service’s we offer to YP.
4. Regular staff meetings- We attend staff meetings regularly for us to have an overall look on how we are doing as an organisation, go through previous pre/debriefs to see what we can change and improve on and sum up our feedback forms from parents and YP to see what else we can offer to YP, what we already do well on and what we could be doing well on.
5. Training events- to establish what my weaknesses and strengths are and ways in which I can improve and develop as a practitioner.
Ways in which I learn.
David, Kolb’s learning cycle helped me find ways in which I could see at what point I entered learning during new experiences and what where I learnt the most within an experience.
Looking back over the cycle from time to time now helps me to reflect on my own learning within my professional life.
My Blog is a good example of when reflecting on a new experience. I feel when I first started up my Blog, I just got on with it and rather than checking out anyone else’s Blog to maybe see how theirs was laid out etc, I jumped straight into the deep end and tried out new things. (Concrete Experience- David, Kolb).
By remembering how I had previously had built up similar social networking sites such as Facebook, using my Blog became a much easier, fun new experience to use the more I used and played around with things such as the settings, adding pictures etc. (Active Experimentation-David, Kolb).
Even though I had just jumped straight into developing my Blog at the beginning of the BAPP course, I feel that maybe I rushed this experience and could have made a reflection about my Blog, reviewed the way in which I use my Blog and how I could have used my Blogging to the best of my advantage. (Reflective observation-David, Kolb)
Reflecting now on my Blog experience as a whole, I need to accept that this experience was a trial and error experience and that there is no right and wrong way in which to use my Blog but reviewing, making positive changes and improving the way in which I Blog and also learning from this experience has been this best lesson learnt. (Abstract conceptualisation-David, Kolb).
Like Kolb, I agree that we all have the highlighted experiences above but the learning and experiencing differences between us is the point in which we start to learn something new or notice we have something missing from our current understanding and knowledge set.
Reflecting on my practise has become easier since discovering this cycle.
Reflecting on my studies.
Over the last few years I have realised that I am a kinaesthetic learner (Howard, Gardener) and I agree with Gardener 1983 that people engage differently with understanding and learning and his idea that people are intelligent in different ways makes good sense to me. I would say that I am intelligent- Bodily- kinaesthetic.
Conclusion
Turning new experiences into learning new things will be something I will now be so much more aware of, especially within my professional life. Using some of the different theories on reflection and learning methods is now something that will help me reflect easier on my profession practise and the points of when I learn from my experiences. I am now aware of the different ways in which I tend to engage in whilst ‘turning experiences into learning’.
1 comment:
Thank you Tanisha for your graphically enhanced blog. It would be interesting to now apply Kolb to you professional practice with YP in your work location - how does his theory apply there as well as in doing the professional practice course.
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