AVReading

  For me, the idea of a reflective teacher used to conjure up images of a wizened-- yet pretentious-- English teacher, sipping tea, alone in a classroom with some classical musical playing in the background.  In part, I think this is due to the fact that we consider reflection and contemplation as something elitist.  The truth is, we don’t really have a lot of good role models for reflection.  For most of us, we likely never saw behind the curtains of our favorite teachers.  In fact, chances are we made most of our judgments about what makes a good teacher through the process of “apprenticeship through observation” or the process of constructing mental models of good and bad teaching simply by what we observed as we sat through years of schooling (Lortie, 1975).  The logic is that since we have not seen teachers reflect and think, we do not think it is important.  And since we do not think it is important. . . we don’t do it.  An...