Why Should Teachers Reflect?

Cue the famous Maya Angelou quote: “When you know better, you do better”. By looking in the figurative rearview mirror, we’re able to learn and make adjustments for the future. This goes for both good and bad experiences. It may be tempting to focus mostly on our accomplishments, but we need to let our mistakes have a proper place in our memory as well. Following an embarrassing loss, NBA player Manu Ginobili once famously acknowledged how important it was to lose. “Winning feels good” he said, “but you don’t learn anything from it. You only learn when you lose.” As teachers we should always be learning and growing, and having simple reflections at the end of the school year are excellent for this.

How Do You Reflect?

Reflection doesn’t have to be scary! There are all kinds of ways to do it. Here are a few ideas:

• Reflection Journal: Keep a reflection journal. At the end of each day or week you can take a few moments to reflect and write down a few experiences that stood out to you.
• Video Recording: Record yourself teaching and watch it later to reflect on your teaching practices.
• Peer Review: Teachers can make a schedule and observe one another in each other’s rooms and provide feedback that way.
• Classroom Observation: Ask an administrator to observe a specific lesson and provide you with feedback.
• Student feedback: Create a form for students to complete where they rate specific criteria created by the teacher. They also should have the opportunity to provide general feedback. Make sure they know that their feedback will be anonymous.
• Positively Critique Yourself: After a lesson or unit, review with yourself how things went. Think about what engaged the students and what didn’t. Put yourself in your students’ position and ask: How would I have wanted to learn this? This can also be done (of course!) before a lesson or unit.

Simple Teacher Reflections for the End of the School Year

Sometimes when we reflect we get overwhelmed because we don’t know what to focus on. There are so many areas that need attention but we don’t know where to start. Here are identified three specific areas that will make reflecting less daunting. To find out what these areas are, keep reading below.

• Wins: Focus on the positive experiences you had this school year. Think about what went well and things you plan to continue next school year. What are most proud of?
• Challenges: Were there any difficulties that you faced this year? How did you overcome them? If you did not overcome them, how would you approach them next time?
• Growth: Most importantly: How did you grow this school year? What were your greatest areas of improvement? In what ways do you feel you made progress?

Teacher Reflections for the End of the School Year FREEBIE!

We’ve created a simple resource to guide you in your reflection. This 4-page reflection form includes a 1-page guide with questions to aid you in your reflection and two blank reflection forms. These reflection forms can be completed independently or as a group with your grade level team. On the last page of the resource when discussing wins, challenges, and growth, you can focus on yourself as a teacher, or you can focus on a specific area such a classroom management or parent communication. Click on the link below to download yours for free!

We hope the burden of reflection has been made lighter for you!! After reading this post take some time to reflect either alone or with some colleagues. Leave a comment below and let us know in which area you plan do do some reflecting!

The post Simple Teacher Reflections for the End of the School Year first appeared on Smells Like Teach Spirit.