Educational Thinking and Reflective Thinking - Essay Example

Educational Thinking and Reflective Thinking Education not only means gathering information from various sources but it also implies that the gathered information will be used as the source of knowledge. The purpose of education is not fulfilled until it will contribute to the course of life. Every individual in the course of his life educates himself not only by gathering knowledge, but also he uses such information in order to make him resourceful. It is knowledge that acts as resource of his life and at the same time it helps him to sharpen his skills in order to make the ways of his survival as much obstacle free as possible. It is said that man is a social animal and the society demands that in order to live properly and harmoniously an individual needs to posses certain qualities, namely, solicitousness, responsibility and creativity. It is very naturally understood that a person, who has all these qualities in him, is of strong ethical and moral principle. He also has deep reflection over other issues, including politics, economic and moreover, aesthetics. The philosophy of education depends over the process of distribution of knowledge from microcosmic to macrocosmic level and vice-versa. Through this natural way a person gradually educates himself. It also helps him to develop an educational thinking, at the same time that in the longer run contributes to the development of his individual reflection over the incidents, happening around him. Once an individual explores this reflective self, it automatically leads him to understand and analyze the learning and teaching process. Students’ failure to understand the learning or teaching process is a very common phenomenon these days at the level of higher education. There are certain factors, which act as obstacles in their process of learning. It is important, at the primary level, to introduce novel ideas that would help the students to explore their reflective self and at the same time, become capable of developing their educational thinking in order to understand properly the learning and teaching process. A person, who is sociable and educated from inside, automatically implies that he is solicitous, creative and responsible. While some people come to the earth by inheriting all these virtues, others acquire it from their acquaintances as well as from their surrounding. A child develops seeds of all these features in his childhood and as he grows mature, these qualities are also nourished accordingly. Hence, it can be said that these virtues are essential ingredients of educational thinking. Living as a social being means that a person will ponder over any aspect both from personal as well as communal perspective. It is important for him to figure out that how he can make his existence smoother but not by harming wishes or desires of others. The sense of empathy leads an individual to feel for others and makes him thoughtful about his duties. More he thinks more he understands that he needs to be sensible, sensitive and responsible about himself as well as for other people. It is not a very easy task to perform all these duties perfectly and every individual faces several obstacles in doing so. Though there are well wishers around him, who advise him to overcome his problems and obstacles but most of the time the person has to judge the situation individually. Out of his judgment he has to find the way out of such situations. This process of inventing methods to overcome hostile situations is greatly dependent upon his enterprising or creative qualities. If a person has deep understanding of a situation he is facing, he finally finds out the loops from which he guides himself away as well as others. Understanding of such situation depends a lot over education or inner enrichment of the person. Again, in this context, relevance of the educational thinking can be realized as the educational thinking helps him to analyze and understand the situations. The role of educational thinking does not end here. Inculcation of educational thinking can said to be the primary level exploration of the philosophical self of a person and due to this a person learns to explore his creative faculty. At the same time he also learns to express his opinion on those matters, which are affecting the very essence of his existence. As an individual starts expressing his opinion, he not only does that in case of external factors but at the same time develops an insight to look inside himself also. This is such a situation, when he attempts to separate his philosophical or analytical self from other external affairs as well as from himself and attempts to gain a neutral standpoint from where he can judge himself. Through such attempt/s and his reflective approach that person tries to understand effects of the learning and teaching process that he has been following all these days. He also goes one step ahead and attempts to analyze the impact of educational thinking and its elements over the learning and teaching process that most of the people generally follow. This is definitely a quite tough and complicated task and in order to find answer to such question, the person casts highest importance over learning through experiences of his own life. Through this process of learning, sometimes he emerges as an expert. It is expected that people, who emerge as experts in the field of experiential learning, work together, so that they can bring certain changes in the conventional ways of educational learning and thinking. Why this point is given so much of importance from philosophical as well as humanitarian perspective? Sociologists and scholars have observed that an individual, due to conventional education process learns a lot about various subjects but at the same time he also learns to express his opinion in conventional ways. He forgets about his autonomous individual self and when he imparts his experiences or knowledge to others, he provides highest importance to conventional methods of realization. It is a continuous process, where that individual develops hubris or pride. This pride often becomes a prejudice that leads him to denounce opinion of other people. If people, who believe in experiential learning and work together, then these types of problems can be overcome. Apart from personal experiences, the written works of great people also help us to know in detail about experiential learning. Simultaneously, those works also reflect in the individual nature of people. The learning journals are considered as good resources for understanding both experiential as well as reflective learning. There are certain instances that are both reflective and experiential at the same time and as in various works of literature they have overlapped each other, it is considered that they are basically same in nature. In this context the experts need to focus over theoretical cultivation so that differences and similarities between reflective and experiential works can be differentiated. Recently we observe that reflective and experiential learning both are given special stress at higher or professional level of studies. It has also been observed that in order to encourage students in this method of learning, demand of written works that are both theoretical and practical in nature, has increased. It is not always possible for an individual to understand the methods of experiential and reflective learning. Thus sometimes a person can be helped to develop such qualities in him and teachers can do this by encouraging him to come up with him original ideas and help him to understand both types of learning methods. Situation can be made easier for him if he is helped to understand difference between these two methods of learning through proper citation. (Robson, 2002, 52) It is a known fact that our reflections are very naturally originated from our learning and experiences. Considering this aspect it can be said that ‘All learning is therefore ‘experiential learning’ in one sense.’ We can ask such a question that if a person is watching a recorded video of a lecture delivered by F.D Roosevelt, how he is experiencing something? Answer in simple. When a person is watching the video and the words of the great leader, he is experiencing the movements made by F.D Roosevelt and at the same time he is also experiencing his words. So, if one claims that all learning is experiential learning, his argument cannot be refuted very easily. However, the process of learning can be divided into two parts, Conscious process and Unconscious process. When a person tries to learn something through his conscious efforts, it is known as conscious process of learning. On the other hand a person, even without any conscious effort on his part comes to know about various things about life, about people and several other deep aspects of life. Process of such learning is known as the unconscious learning. (Robson, 2002, 318) But here our main emphasis is over reflective and experiential kind of learning that happens only due to the process of conscious learning. It is the similarities between these two forms of learning that lead different works of writing overlap with each other. At a very basic level both the experiential and reflective ways of learning are associated with each other. But at the same time there are several impediments that obstruct the process of learning for individual and such obstacles appear before us in terms of words or vocabulary - “Boundaries are sometimes about words to be used. There is much confusion in the terminology of learning and there is a lack of vocabulary that probably confuses us even more. It is not always easy to see ideas are missing if the words are not present. We rely on words and ideas as tools of investigation and if we do not have them, the investigation process in distorted.” (Moon, 2004, 12) When a person is taught or he attempts to learn something of his own, such problems occur very frequently. The teacher tries to lead him to a particular goal but due to such obstacles, he misinterprets the facts or words of instruction and henceforth it leads to a confusing situation. This is one of the primary reasons that people misunderstand or misinterpret the process of learning or teaching. Wrong use of word of vocabulary is most frequently used among children but numerous examples also can be cited that a matured person or a person, who is associated with such instructional jobs, often use such words that make the task of a person, who is trying to learn from his instruction or teaching, a tough one: “In a recent documentation concerning quality assurance issues in education, a statement suggested that teachers should have particular ‘learning intentions’ for their students. A teacher can only hope that a student learns – she cannot do that learning for her. Learning and teaching are separate operations and while learning can be carried out in separate place from teaching (distance learning), and learning can occur without teaching, teaching or instructing without a learner as object of the activity does not make sense.” (Moon, 2004, 12) There is another condition that acts as an impediment before people, when it comes to understanding of teaching and learning process. If words are used especially for the purpose of instruction, this kind of confusing situation also arises. Such instance can most explicitly be cited when someone is attending a lecture session or a seminar. In such occasions a lecture is considered generally as a method of learning. In reality, it is actually a procedure by which the lecturer attempts to instruct the proper method of learning to the listeners. It is definitely not possible for the person, who is delivering the lecture, to understand what the persons are interpreting out of his speech. Thus, he needs to be very careful about choosing of words and reflection over the matter that he is conveying. Otherwise there is a high probability that the students will form totally different conception contrary to what he actually attempts to convey. There is also solution to this problem. If an attempt is made to set up proper vocabulary for teaching and learning then such problem can be overcome and it will lead to less misunderstanding in the process of understanding teaching and learning process. While delivering a lecture if the lecturer uses terms in specific place from the set of vocabulary, then students, who follow it, will be able to understand what the lecturer is trying to convey. There is no such guarantee that such procedure will abolish all sorts of confusions from the minds of students and they will be taught just the same thing that the teacher or the instructor intends. One thing can be assured that once such specific set of vocabulary is prepared educational thinking of students will follow a particular line and there will be less scope for students to misunderstand the process of learning and teaching. (Bassey, 2002, 133-137) Proper understanding of learning and teaching process becomes more complicated when it comes to expression of certain things that one has learned. This is another crucial stage, where limitation of vocabulary is again understood. It can be observed on frequent occasions, when someone asks his fellow classmate if he has understood the topic of today’s discussion or not. Most frequently that person answers assertive in a very confident manner but when he is asked to explain that thing to another person, he cannot do that properly. It is not that he lied rather he was really confident during the time of questioning that he has understood the subject and may be he really has. But the problem happens due to lack of vocabulary. Due to this reason may be he has that conception in his mind but he cannot express it. Thus the gap between learning something and expressing that thing always remain. The common human psychology generally gathers all the ideas in his mind from a very simple angle but when he attempts to express that learning, he understands by himself that in the process of learning there is a big gap. Due to this reason recent day assessment test papers focus over the capacities of a candidate in learning something and expressing it also. A person, who lacks the capacity to express something that he has learned, means he also has certain problems in providing his reflection over certain matter if it is required. “…it is important to recognize that the representation of learning is a further source of learning … As a learner puts ideas down on a paper, she is sorting out her understanding of those ideas and is learning more since the organization and clarification of ideas are a process of learning (Moon, 2004, 14).” This is also a common psychology among kids, teens and even adults that if they are asked to explain something, they most of the occasions try to avoid. The kids and teens just simply confess that they cannot do it and adults put forward certain excuses that explain their inability for fulfilling such task. As an individual grows mature it is important for him to inculcate proper level of educational thinking that will help him to confess his inabilities to learn something. Everyone faces certain problems in the process of learning but escaping from the problem will not solve anything. At the starting point of the paper it has been mentioned that the whole philosophy of education in established over the system of distribution of knowledge. Something that an individual has learned, someday or the other he will teach that to another person. But if the base of his understanding remains false, knowledge imparted by him will also be false and the purpose of education will be futile. (Moon, 1999) Expression of something that an individual has learnt has different forms and it varies from person to person. If one person is asked to express something that he has learnt, he may adopt a detailed theoretical approach. Another person may choose to express it through diagrammatic expression. It is generally found that final refection of both these people differs drastically from each other and both of them interpreted the fact in a completely wrong manner. In this context Jennifer A. Moon expresses her opinion, “Different forms of the representation of learning gives rise to more or less learning opportunity and to learning of differing qualities – depending on the type of representation.” (Moon, 2004, 14) It is clear from reflection of the author that that if the mode of representation is correct or simplified then it can give birth to a lot of learning opportunities. On the other hand if it is complex and incorrect then the scope of learning opportunity narrows down. Hence, it can be said that teaching and learning something is a both way process. If the students have learnt something wrong, the entire blame cannot be thrust over them by claiming that their process of interpretation was wrong or due to lack of vocabulary they have failed to understand it. Rather, the person who is teaching can be entirely responsible for misrepresentation of the facts. Thus, it is an onus both for lecturer and learners that they must introduce clarified educational thinking in their way of analysis and introduce the same in their understanding of learning as well as teaching process. If there is real effort then this type of problem can be overcome but it cannot happen without mutual effort between the student and the teacher. Earlier it has been already discussed that educational thinking of a person mainly depends on three virtues and those three virtues are also results of different types of understanding of a person. Speaking from the moral perspective, these three virtues are supreme and all of them are germinated from very childhood of an individual. As the individual becomes more mature with the society, his mind gradually becomes replete with various other issues that are integrally related with the society and each of them contains an individual subjective value. Once the person starts being involved in all these issues, the process of educational thinking also receives nourishment. If a person wishes then developing interest in all these subjects is not such a tough matter. All those issues are very much related to lives of human beings and they, at the same time, provoke different thoughts in an individual’s mind. It makes an individual more reflective and at the same time his process of educational thinking also gets sharpened up. (Moon, 2002, 5-7) In the modern day’ context, though the rate of participating in higher education has increased to a massive rate than that of the past but spontaneous desire to ponder over a matter has gradually declined. This is one of the main reasons that capacity to interpret any subject from various angles has lessened among students and rate of communication between students and a teacher has declined sharply. If the whole situation is observed from a sensitive angle, it will be found that most of the students now believe in a stereotypical approach to any subject and try to solve the problems related to it from same approach also. Teachers are also human beings and they desperately seek for those students, who will be analytical and have real love for the subject. But number of such students has become so less that they also have stopped being bothered about communicating properly with students and this gap is increasing everyday. Students as well as teachers also are much less interested in exercising their attempt to understand the process of learning and teaching. It is not that the teachers do not know that the incidence misrepresentation is increasing now days at a frequent rate but in this aspect most of them have become indifferent and they have adopted a stoical approach. There is no denial that various impediments exist in the way of understanding the learning and teaching process and at the same time proper polish is also not been provided to the key elements of educational thinking. These factors result dullness in reflective thinking process of an individual. But receiving an upper hand over all these issues is not that tough. If both teacher- students become sensitive to each other as well as to the subject and society, more than half of the total problem will be solved. Interpretation or communication both are big problems but that also can be overcome easily if their mutual understanding is reinstated. The factor, lack of vocabulary is quite serious and it demands devotion from the student to solve this problem. At the same if teacher’s assistance is asked there must be complete support from his side. It is most important for teachers that they enhance their level of sensitization for students and it is essential that they must avoid all sorts of misrepresentation before students. Their passivity or stoic approach is not going to do any good to students. Moreover it needs to be realized that by doing so at the social level they are derogating the image as well as image of the noble profession. It is also required that teachers should come up with innovative ideas that would help the students to explore their reflective self. Consequently, such exploration will also lead to the development of educational thinking among students. These are the main areas of concern in case of students of higher studies and if these areas are adequately cultivated over, then there will not be much problem for people to understand the process of learning and teaching. The key elements of educational thinking will receive sufficient nourishment, resulting in the development of reflective self of an individual. Ultimately students will be benefited due to such effort and their proper realization of learning or teaching process will also motivate teachers or instructors to come up with newer ideas that can be introduced in the current process of learning or teaching. References 1. Bassey, M. 2002. ‘Case Study Research’, in Research Methods in Educational Leadership and Management, SAGE 2. Moon, J.A. 2004, A Handbook of Reflective and Experiential Learning: Theory and Practice, New York: Rutledge 3. Moon, J. A. 1999. Learning Journals, NY: Rutledge 4. Moon, J.A. 2002, The Module and Programme Development, Rutledge 5. Robson, C. 2002. Real World Research: A Resource for Social Scientists and Practitioner-researchers, Blackwell Publishing Read More