Impact of collaborative reflection

It has been widely discussed that collaboration allows the development of teachers’ skills and professional growth (e.g. Kuusisaari 2014; Meirink et al. 2007; Grossman et al. 2001; Putnam and Borco 2000; Day 1999). As stated by Kuusisaari (2014:46), collaboration and ‘social support also help teachers to learn from each other, develop distributed expertise and gives teachers access to a far wider range of ideas’; moreover, ‘participants build upon each other’s ideas to jointly construct a new meaning’ (Kuusisaari 2014:49). Schneider and Watkins (1996:157) state that social interaction is essential for learning and development, ‘not only as a source of stimulation and feedback, but as the very means by which individuals psychological functioning [such as problem solving] comes to be.’ This is in agreement with Vygotsky’s (1978, 1987a) sociocultural theory (SCT) and his concept of Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD). He argues that ‘learning is a social process, in which a learner can go beyond her or his present capabilities by using mediation mechanisms’ (Kuusisaari 2014:48), mainly that of language. According to Vygotsky (1978:86), the ZPD ‘is the distance between the actual development level as determined by independent problem solving and the level of potential development as determined through problem solving […] in collaboration with more capable peers.’ Although most research on Vygotsky’s SCT and ZPD often apply to the investigation of facilitated and scaffolded collaboration between teacher and students in a classroom setting, in my view it is possible to use Vygotsky’s concepts as a way of considering the role of teacher training tutors. In other words, SCT provides a way of looking at RP as a supported process in novice teachers’

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development. In the current study SCT is seen as the theoretical basis for the promotion of collaborative and dialogic reflection in a Second Language Teacher Education (SLTE) programme, in which the collaboration is peer-to-peer (PSTs), with the presence of the researcher as a figure that provides guidance and is also involved in group reflections by prompting and questioning. Similar to a research conducted by Kuusisaari, in this study ‘the crucial foci of Vygotsky’s ZPD theory are: (1) collaboration between capable peers, (2) fruitful interconnection [dialogue] of […] everyday experience, […]’ (Kuusisaari 2014:48). According to Walsh (2013:6, citing van Lier 1996), ‘[i]n a teacher education/development context, and from a sociocultural perspective, teachers [or PSTs in the case of the current study] are ‘scaffolded’ through their ‘zones of proximal development’ (ZPD) to a higher plane of understanding through the dialogues they have with other[s] […]’. In this sense, conversations or ‘scaffolded dialogues’ are central to reflective practice since they allow the participants to clarify issues and to achieve new ‘levels of understanding’ (Walsh 2013:6).

Reflective practitioners and researchers have acknowledged the importance of collaboration and dialogue in the development and the process of reflection of teachers. For instance, Stenhouse (1975:156) introduces the term critical friend, Hatton and Smith (1995) suggest dialogic reflection, Edge (2002a) presents

cooperative reflection, Zwozdiak-Myers (2012:14, 24–27) talks about Ghaye and

Ghaye’s (1998) reflective conversations, and Mann and Talandis (2012) promote community practice. Calderhead and Gates (1993) express the view that discussions of reflective teaching frequently dwell upon the teachers’ individual capacity to analyse and evaluate practice and the context in which it occurs. They note that there is some evidence that advocates that reflection requires a supportive environment in which it can be encouraged (e.g. Zeichner and Liston

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1987; Jay and Johnson 2002). ‘It may only be within a culture of collaboration that beginning teachers are encouraged to develop as reflective practitioners’ (Calderhead and Gates 1993:5). Additionally, as Stenhouse (1975:156) states, classroom research is about bettering classroom experiences, while teachers need to communicate and report what they do with other colleagues. When we speak with others, we have the opportunity to express our ideas, exchange information, respond to, and understand our practice. Lieberman and Miller (1984) assert that without authentic dialogue novice teachers might not feel that they are in a supporting environment. As Rogers and Babinski (2002:45) state, ‘it is almost impossible for them to develop and grow’. Furthermore, Walsh (2013:122) states that ‘[t]hrough talk, new realisations and greater insight come about’ and that ‘[i]t is this kind of ‘light bulb moment’ which professional dialogue can create’.

When Edge (2002a:25–30) talks about his proposal of engaging in cooperative development, he explains it as a method for teachers to work together with equals in order to develop as persons who teach on their own terms for a determined period of time, according to rules established and understood by both sides with respect, empathy, and sincerity. Working with others who understand what they mean when talking about teaching could provide good opportunities to create a dialogue and receive feedback, get ideas for improvement, and learn by sharing with others. With regard to the latter, Edge (2002a:21) says there are three ways of learning: through our intellect, our experience, and through articulation. ‘We learn by speaking, by working to put our own thoughts together so that someone else can understand them’ (Edge 2002a:19). To support this process of articulating our thoughts, Edge cites Taylor (1985:36) as follows:

Articulations are not simple descriptions. On the contrary, articulations are attempts to formulate what is initially inchoate, or confused, or badly formulated. But this kind of formulation, or

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reformulation does not leave its object unchanged. To give a certain articulation is to shape our sense of what we desire or what we hold important in a certain way.

(Edge 2002a:20)

As Greene (1986:73) says, ‘it is difficult to imagine students discovering what they think and what they do not yet know if there is no space of conversation, no space of engagement in diversity’. Other benefits of cooperative development that Edge (2002a) highlights are that teachers increase:

 Awareness of their own strengths and skills  Appreciation of the strengths and skills of others

 Willingness to listen carefully to others [I add: and to be listened]  Ability to interact positively with changes in their teaching

environment

 Capacity to identify directions for their own continuing development  Potential to facilitate the self-development of others.

(Edge 2002a:13)

Underhill (1992), as with Edge, recognises that benefits of working in groups can be favourable for everyone involved. He states that working collaboratively provides one with the opportunity to increase self-awareness of performance, of potential, and of development:

The whole process of asking high-yield questions in relation to my performance and my potential is fraught with an equal high risk of destabilizing my view of myself through bringing my unaware beliefs, attitudes and behaviours into awareness.

(Underhill 1992:76)

This is in accordance with Vygotsky’s (1987b:56–57) principle of internalisations which states that ‘[a]n operation that initially represents an external activity is reconstructed and begins to occur internally’. Walsh (2013:7) states that ‘teachers first gain new knowledge, new ideas or new understandings through interactions with colleagues […]. This ‘publicly derived’ new knowledge is then privately internalised as the same teachers take ownership and apply new practices to their own context.’ The process, Wash says, ‘is both dialectic and dialogic: it entails

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dialogue with other[s] […] which then becomes a personal or individual practice.’ Additionally, according to Underhill, through interaction with peers we can create a supporting climate that helps participants feel safe enough and be more sincere with themselves and others. In this way, ‘teachers have less need to pretend or play games in their responses’ (Underhill 1992:77). Knill and Samuels (2011, citing Brookfield 1995) state that, without challenge and confrontation from others’ perspectives, reflection may not lead to new ways of thinking and acting. Both Underhill (1992) and Edge (2002a) emphasise the significance of reflecting in an honest and adequate environment; otherwise, the reflection would not be effective. An example of this kind of negative situation was reported by Day (1993:85, citing Handal 1990), who identified in Norway, as in England, ‘a “triple pressure” on schools and teachers to develop a more collective strategy of work through: the establishment of collective tasks; the provision of collective time to solve them; and the ideological pressure on teachers to work together’. Day (1993:85) reports that the dissatisfaction experienced was because participants were obliged to work together ‘often in “contrived” collegiality’. Zeichner and Liston (1996:74–76) state that the way in which RP has come to be used in many situations and by some institutions has done little to foster genuine teacher development. This situation reinforces the necessity of what Edge (2002a) proposes: agreement between the people to work together, respect, empathy, and sincerity. To this, Bassot (2013:46) adds that a critical friend (as the person you reflect on with) should be someone who you know and can trust, who asks questions and challenges your thinking, who is positive, constructive, and encouraging, and who is a good listener. The work done in cooperative development (Edge 2002a) values opening up a space for reflection which is supported by others (e.g. colleagues), for the purposes of allowing the individual to get further in their own reflection. Here the individual ‘speaker’evaluates elements of their own practice (Edge 2002a). A critical friend is

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different in emphasis and perhaps allows more scope for the evaluation to come from the peer (rather than the individual reflecting teacher).