3.3 Donald Schon

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Photo by Sharon McCutcheon is licensed under the Unsplash License.

Schön (1983) based his work on that of Dewey and is most widely known for his theory of reflecting in and reflecting on one’s practice. His theory was grounded in reflection from a professional knowledge and learning perspective (Bolton, 2014.p.6). In simple terms this is described as reflecting as the experience is occurring or reflecting on the experience after it has occurred. Reflecting in action refers to situations such as: thinking on your feet, acting straight away, and thinking about what to do next. Reflecting on action means you are thinking about what you would do differently next time, taking time to process (Bolton, 2014.p.6).

 

Reflection in action is reflection as something happens and reflection on action is reflecting after something happens.
Image by Said Nasser Al-Amrani (2021) used under fair dealing for educational purposes.

 

Video: Reflective Practice

Learn more about reflective practice by watching the video: 3 minute theory by Kayak Essentials [3:32] below.

Sources

Al-Amrani, S. N. (2021). Developing a framework for reviewing and designing courses in higher education: A case study of a post-graduate course at Sohar University. SSRN Electronic Journal. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3811202

Bolton, G. (2014). Reflective Practice: Writing and Professional Development (4th ed.). Los Angeles: SAGE.

Schön, D. A. (1983). The Reflective Practitioner: How Professionals Think in Action. New York: Basic Books.

 

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Reflective Practice in Early Years Education Copyright © 2022 by Sheryl Third is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted.

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