Reflecting vs Analysing

On Tuesday night I attended the first coffee shop chat hosted by Adesola, this involved not only Module 1 students but Module 3 students.

As there was a large group we each had to state what we wanted to gain more understanding on. As it was the first time with students from other modules 1 I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to ask for their advice on the course, what they learnt, gained and wished they had done more of.
Most of them emphasised to 'KEEP UP WITH THE REFLECTIVE JOURNAL!!'

Adesola also reinforced for me the importance of 'Analysis' during module 1 and stated that analysing helps identify what you are interested in and helps with the process of coming up with lines of inquiry.

I feel I did not input as much as I like to into the conversation and was holding back, I think i was intimidated by large number of people.  Learning from this I need to express ideas no matter what in order to progress. With an idea there is no such thing as right or wrong!

It was interesting to take a step back and listen to what stage module 3 students are at and what I will be working towards and took away some interesting pointers to consider when I am at the interviewing stage of my inquiry.

• Think about location- is the candidate comfortable? is there any distractions (traffic, people walking past etc.) 
• Important to build a repertoire with the candidate so they feel comfortable 
• Take into consideration peoples personality, learning styles, they are human (might have had a bad day and not be responsive or be ill or not have much time)

When constructing my questions- 

• Should questions be leading or not?
• Should you adapt the questions or be strict with times
• semi -structured questions?
• Highlight the important questions and prioritise them 

One question I came away with was is the difference between analysing and reflecting?
I have done some reading into this and below is my idea of the difference-

Descriptive writing: Sets the scene. Descriptions should be organised and detailed and sets the scene. Description is called for when you are asked to state, list or describe.

Analysing: Shows the thought process used to arrive at your conclusions about a topic, situation event. Shouldn't be writing a story of what you did, its analysing what you did. Analysing of module 1 will be to state the significance of my findings from the tasks to my practice.

Reflecting: The thought process that occurs after analysing the evidence of a situation or event. This is when you think deeply about what did and did not occur during the experience described, then make decisions about how you would approach these similar situations in the future. Reflective writing must show how the learning you gained from your teaching experiences was used to inform and improve your future practice.
Amanda's blog from the chat highlighted some good questions that could be used to apply when reflecting. Why did I do it? how did i feel? would i do it again? and if I did would I do it differently?

Source:http://www.waproteach.org/rsc/pdf/WAProTeachWritingGuidlines.pdf

I have started writing my reflective journal and enjoying the process and looking forward to seeing how it will progress. Now time to read reader 2 :-)