Professionalising teachers in guiding reflection

The contemporary knowledge society of the 21st century requires students, among other things, to have the ability to think analytically and reflectively. Research into the disappearance of technical employees from the technical labor market also shows it is important to guide students in their professional identity development, in which reflection of students is crucial. Various studies show however that educational programs and teachers experience difficulty with the effective use of reflection in education. In the project ‘Strengthening reflection in technical higher education programs’, six technical higher professional education programs of two Dutch higher education institutes are working on the improvement of reflection in their programs. Teachers from these teams are also trained in guiding and assessing reflection activities of students. In this current research, the following research questions will be answered: 1. How do teachers guide students during reflection activities or conversations? 2. How do teachers assess students’ reflection activities? 3. Does the offered training contribute to an increase in skills of teachers with regard to guiding reflection activities of students? A selection of teachers of the participating teams will be interviewed before and after the training. To assess teachers pedagogical and didactical knowledge and skills, video vignette interviews are used. Vignettes were designed to provide teachers with multiple authentic situations that are prototypical in their teaching context and which are depicted in video captions. Interview protocols were used to elicit teaching interventions and teachers’ rationales and thoughts behind these interventions in the depicted situations

Reflection in technical higher education: student perceptions

The project 'Strengthening reflection in technical higher education programs' is a response to the need for well-trained reflective science and engineering professionals and the subsequent question of teachers about how reflection can be designed and embedded in a meaningful way, especially in technical study programs. Within this project, eight technical education teams from two Dutch universities of applied sciences are working on improving the use of reflection in their curriculum. Among other things, teachers are professionalized in their guidance skills, to improve the guidance of reflective activities of their students. One of the research activities within the project involved a questionnaire to gain insight into: 1) the extent to which engineering students have an inclination and need for selfreflection, 2) the reflection level that engineering students reach according to their own judgement, and 3) how engineering students value (guidance of) current reflection activities in their study program. In the short (concept) paper we will address some main findings of this questionnaire based on data of 843 first- to fourth-year students from eight technical study programs. Amongst others, results indicate - contrary to some other research findings - that engineering students acknowledge the importance of being able to reflect as a future professional. However, they seem relatively less satisfied with currently provided guidance regarding reflection in their study programs. Also, most often employed reflection activities (i.e., reflection reports) are generally perceived least useful. Results give further direction to optimize activities and teacher guidance regarding reflection within higher (technical) education programs

Supporting reflection to improve learning from self-generated concept maps

Creating concept maps is considered to be a powerful means for learning. It requires students to systematically organize and integrate their knowledge, which can foster meaningful learning. However, students scarcely spontaneously engage in the (meta)cognitive processes necessary for effective knowledge integration, such as reflection, which can hamper the effectiveness of concept mapping for learning. This study explores the effect of additional support that stimulates reflection by means of expert examples, reflection prompts, and classroom discussion. First-year technical vocational students (N = 144, Mage = 17.5 years) studied electricity-related topics in an online learning environment and created concept maps about their knowledge. Students’ concept maps were supplemented with either (1) no support (control condition), (2) an expert example (a combined concept map, containing their own and an expert example concept map, with differences highlighted), (3) an expert example and reflection prompts students had to process individually, (4) an expert example and reflection prompts students had to process individually after a teacher-guided classroom discussion. Students in the classroom discussion condition showed higher learning gains compared to all other conditions. This can be explained by the quality of their reflection, which proved to be a significant predictor of learning gain

Expert examples and prompted reflection in learning with self-generated concept maps

Background: Creating concept maps can help students overcome challenges of accurate knowledge monitoring and thus foster learning. However, students' knowledge often contains gaps and misconceptions, even after concept map creation. Theoretically, students could benefit from additional support, but it is unclear whether this might also be the case for (more practical-oriented) secondary vocational students. Objectives: This study investigated whether the effectiveness of concept maps for learning could be improved by providing students with expert examples and reflection prompts in addition to their self-generated concept maps. Methods: First-year secondary vocational students (N = 91, Mage = 17.3 years) participated in this study, which utilized a pretest-intervention-posttest design. Regarding the intervention, students worked in two successive online learning environments, in which they had to present their knowledge in concept maps. After creation, students' concept maps were, depending on condition, supplemented with (1) an expert example with comparative feedback (a combined concept map) and related reflection prompts, (2) the combined concept map only, or (3) no combined concept map and no prompts. Results and Conclusions: Analyses based on students' domain knowledge demonstrate that students significantly increased their knowledge in all conditions. Data indicate that there was no significant difference in knowledge gain between conditions. Further analysis showed that students in the experimental conditions demonstrated higher learning gains if they consulted the combined concept map more often than their peers. Implications: Access to an example in addition to students' self-generated concept maps seems promising in fostering their knowledge acquisition. However, secondary vocational students might need additional ways of support to guarantee higher learning gains. Avenues to increase the effectiveness of support are discussed

Comparative feedback and reflection as a factor in student-centered learning in vocational education

With vocational education becoming more and more student-centered, self-regulated learning skills, and therefore knowledge monitoring, are of growing importance. However, students are often unaware of their knowledge and possible misconceptions. Though concept mapping can facilitate students’ knowledge monitoring and stimulate awareness by means of externalization and visualization of knowledge, students might still fail to identify possible misconceptions and gaps in their knowledge. Therefore, in this study it is investigated whether providing an expert example and reflection prompts could further optimize the effectiveness of concept mapping. First year secondary vocational technical students (N=196) worked in an online inquiry learning environment centered around simulations concerning electricity and electric power transmission, in which, on four occasions, they had to present their knowledge in a concept map. Three conditions were compared: students who received 1) an expert example of a concept map and reflection prompts, 2) an expert example, or 3) no expert example and no prompts. Analyses of knowledge tests reveals significant learning gains in all conditions. Although activating the expert concept map significantly predicts learning gains, the results do not favor one condition over the othe