Short Student Voices

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EACHERS I\ET\ryORKINGVolume 11, Number 3 Richard C. Owen Publishers, Inc. Spring/Summer 1992

Hearing Students' Yoices:The Role of Reflection in Learningby Kathy G. Short and Gloria Kauffman

Before we did not look back on ourlearning. This year we look back on ourlearning and learn more. Before I got

frustrated when I got something wrong.This year I don't because it isthe learning that counts.

Julie, Grade 3

It seems appropriate that an article onstudent reflection and self-evaluationshould begin with a student's voice.We know of no better way to demonstratehow powerful children's voices becomewhen they are given the opportunity toreflect on their leaming. Of course,students do notjust walk into school ableto reflect and talk about their leaming. Asteachers, we have spent many yearsexploring how to build powerful leamingenvironments with our students that

encourage both action and reflection.Here, we share how we have worked tomake reflection and self-evaluation an

ongoing part of daily classroom life andwe describe a more formal strategy, self-evaluation portfolios, which allowsstudents to periodically step back evenfurther in self-evaluating their leaming.

The Need for ReflectionOur joumey in understanding the role

of reflection began eight years ago. when

we co-taught and co-researched in a firstgrade class (Short, 1986). Since that time,we have taught in different places - an

elementary school and a university -

Gloria Kauffman teaches fourthgrade at Maldonado ElementarySchool in Tucson Unified SchoolDisn'ic't. Kathy G. Short teaches inthe Defoartment of Language,Reading and Culture at theUniversity of Arizona in Tucson.

Kathy G. Short Gloria Kauffman

but have continuedto think togetherabout

curriculum and evaluation. When wefirst began working together, westruggled with moving beyond a

Welc'ome to our room! Some of thethings v,e do are : reading, writing, pub-lishing, having mini lessons, doing re-search, tolking, drawing and math. We'r'alue lots of things about out"room: Mrs.G iard, our books, maki n g choi ce s, mate -

rials, sharing ideas, solving problems,and learningfi'om each other.

During amoming meeting inJanuaryof this school year, one of the girls in myclass shared a frustration she had. "Wehave so many visitors coming to ourroom that it is hard to explain what we'relike to them when they are here for such

traditional curriculum structure based in

textbooks and teacher imposition. While

continued on page 3

a short time. They don't understand ourroom because they are not here longenough to know us. I wondered if somekids wanted to get together to make a

handout for visitors so they would beginto know what we do and what we value."About half the class expressed the same

concem and wanted to be part of theplanning group. They drafted their planand brought it back to the class. Everyonedecided that the group had clearly repre-sented the class as a whole. Sarah, who

continued on page I4

The Power of Thlkby Mary Giard



Hgaring Students' VOiCeS continuedfrompage t

both of us used literature, writing, andthematic units in the classroom, they weresupplementary to the core of the

curriculum, which wasbased

onthe

school's scope and sequence charts. Wewanted to establish a curriculum based

on children and our understandingsabout leaming. We wondered, however,whether it was possible to create a

curriculum in which students activelyengaged in meaningful learningexperiences as an ongoing feature ofthe classroom, rather than an occasionalexperience.

We did not want the curriculum to

become just a set of "neat" activities, andso we searched for a framework withinwhich we could create curriculum withchildren. The Authoring Cycle (Jerome

Harste, Kathy Shon, & Carolyn Burke,1988) became that framework for us.

More importantly, we realized that inorder to determine what would happennext in the classroom, we could no longerrefer to the scope and sequence charts.Out of desperation, we began closelyobserving children as they engaged inclassroom activities and spent hourstalking together about their responses andthe implications for what should happennext.

With the students as our curricularinformants, we moved from "doing"curriculum to reflecting on that "doing."Earlier in our teaching careers, we wouldhave argued that we were too busyteaching to think, but now we realizedwe needed to think in order to teach.Through our observations and reflectionson their leaming, we were able to createan environment characterized by choiceand active engagements in meaningfulleaming.

We felt, however, that something wasstill missing. As we listened to childrentalk about their rough drafts in AuthorsCircles and explore interpretations inLiterature Circles, we realized that wehad underestimated their ability toreflect on their own learning. We hadassumed that reflection was what we

did as teachers, to evaluate and plan,but not what children did. By notencouraging and trusting children's

reflections on their leaming, however,we kept them dependent on us todetermine what was to be valued.

If we truly wanted curriculum to be a

collaborative process in which childrentook control of their own learning, thenwe needed more than choice and activeengagements. Children were makingdecisions about their actions, but wereexcluded from refl ective decision-makingabout the meanings of those actions. Fortheir voices to become part of the

curriculum, we needed to encouragereflection as well as action.

.. . t ve try to makereflection a natural,daily part of thecurriculum.

In order for leaming to occur, leamersneed to pose their own questions. Whenthese questions arise, a cycle of inquiry isput into motion in which learners formideas or hypotheses and then act on thoseideas to observe what happens. JohnDewey argues, however, that this actionis not enough. The leamer needs time toreflect and look back over what hasoccurred, to organize ideas for future use.

Action provides the content for reflection,but reflection is the driving force behind

action. Children need many extensiveengagements with reading, writing,talking, listening, drawing, andexperimenting so they have somethingon which to reflect. This action needs tobe balanced with reflection so they canpull together important meaningsfrom their experiences, which will, inturn, lead them to new questionsand engagements.

When students are involved in makingchoices about their leaming, but not in

reflecting on that leaming, they oftenmake choices which are not productive.Dewey points out that the ability to reflecton leaming allows self-control to develop.Instead of acting on impulse or havingothers determine what will be leamed,learners reflect on the possibleconsequences of their actions. Self-control combines choice with reflectionand so brings freedom to leamers because

they can intellectually formulate theirpurposes and plans of action.

Establishing aReflective LearningEnvironment

Reflection can support students inconnecting with what they already know,considering alternative perspectives.solving problems, and summarizing andorganizing their experiences for futureuse. We searched lor ways to invitestudents to reflect on their leaming. Wedid not want to turn reflection intomechanical, orderly responses to teacher-posed prompts. Students do need supportand strategies for reflection, but not a

workbook approach in which they mustfill out endless forms and checklists. Wealso did not want to force leamers tooverfocus on reflection at the expense ofactively engaging in leaming. Rather thanreflecting on every leaming experience,learners choose those that are mostsignificant to them.

Instead of formal self-evaluationtechniques, we try to make reflection a

natural, daily part of the curriculum. Wehave found that strategies such as

brainstorming, webbing, conferencing,author's circles, literature circles, inquirygroups, class discussions, and varioustypes of journals and learning logsencourage reflection on leaming.

We frequently pull leamers togetherfor short oral reflections on how particular

experiences have affected their learning.

continued on next page

Volume I I, Number 3



Hgafing StUdents' VOiCgS continuedfromprevious page

These discussions occur when studentstry out a new curricular strategy,encounter problems, or engage in aparticularly significant experience. At thebeginning of the year, these sharing timesoccur frequently throughout the day so

that students reflect on and understandthe purposes behind classroomprocedures and activities. As teachers,we participate in these discussions toprovide demonstrations of our reflectivethinking.

When students engage in anexperience such as parmer reading forthe first time, we ask them, "In whatways did you and your partner decide toread? Talk about what you were doingas a reader. What did you notice aboutreading with someone else?" Whenliterature circles begin to meet, the classcomes together for short 5-10 minutereflections at the end of the literaturetime. We begin by asking, "What didyou talk about today in your groups?" so

that the focus is on meaning. We thendiscuss, "How did your group membershelp keep the conversation going? Arethere problems we need to solve?" Laterin the year, these reflection times are

held only when needed by groupmembers.

Reflection is also an important part ofmath, as Jason, a third grader, explained,"I have grown as a mathematician bycoming at the problem from behind anddiscussing what is needed, why it'sneeded and how it's used."

When particularly significantexperiences occur, a short reflection onwhy the experience was powerfulcan help both teachers and students

understand the implications of thatexperience. When we first moved toward .

using student-generated inquiry cyclesrather than teacher-directed units withstudents, we were struckby how eagerlyand deeply students engaged in theinqury. At the end of the inquiry cycle,we asked the students, "Why were yourinquiries on dinosaurs more exciting foryou than the unit we did on the ocean?"

The students' reflections helped them

pull together the content and process oftheir leaming. The insights we gainedhelped us respect them as leamers andwork with them in planning futureinquiry cycles.

After students have engaged in aparticular Qycle of experiences andpresented their learning to others,reflection can play a major role inallowing them to stand back from thoseexperiences. Through reflection, they cansummarize what they have learned,integrate that learning with previousexperiences, and establish questions andgoals for future learning. After wepublished a family story newspaper toconclude a month-long focus on families

and research, we came together as aclass to talk about, "What did you leamabout families? What did you leam aboutnotetaking and other research strategies?Where do we want to go next as a class?"

Oral reflections allow students to heareach other's and the teacher's reasoningand can be done quickly and informally,as an ongoing part ofclassroom activities.Written reflections should also beincluded because they encourageindividual students to think deeply and

support students who feel uncomfortablesharing orally. Written reflections,however, take time and are more formal.When overdone, students reactnegatively and see the reflections as

assignments which take too much timefrom active engagements. Some teachersuse logs to "check up" on students tomake sure they have read their literaturecircle books or to keep sfudents undercontrol. When this occurs, students writeto fulfill the teacher's assignment, ratherthan to explore their own thinking.

We found that it was important forwritten reflections to be given a definiteslot in the classroom schedule. Gloriahas students start each day by writing inreflection journals so they begin tomake a connection between learningexperiences at school and at home. Someteachers have students write in leaminglogs at the end ofeach day to reflect overthat day's experiences. Kathy and herfirst graders ended each day by

discussing what they had leamed anddictating a short paragraph for a weeklyparent newsletter. Other teachers havestudents reflect at the end of a week orbiweekly, rather than on a daily basis.

Teachers make decisions on thefrequency of written reflection based onthe amount of time available orto allowfor more time between reflections.

lncluding Children'sVoices in the FormalEvaluation System

As reflection became a natural partof our classroom life, we valued the waysin which it helped us to know students,

as well as allowing students to takecontrol of their own leaming. When weexamined the formal evaluation system,however, we realized that thestudents' voices were still not being heard.

Their oral and written reflectionsinformed our evaluation but were notheard by parents or other educators.

Gloria experimented with childrenwriting a letter of self-evaluation to sendhome with report cards. While the letterswere effective in letting pareuts heartheirchildren's voices, children had difficultywriting broadly about their processes andgoals as leamers. We began to search forsome other way to support students inmore formal reflections on their progressas leamers.

As we listened to educators talk aboutportfolios, we wondered whether theseportfolios could support self-evaluationwithin the formal evaluation process.Most educators begin the portfolioprocess by suggesting that teachers listthe desired learning outcomes and then

work with students to createportfolios to provide evidence of thoseoutcomes. Because we wanted theportfolios to reflect what students saw as

their leaming outcomes rather than ours,we decided to explore a different kind ofportfolio that would highlight thechildren's perspective. The district reportcard and state standardized tests reportedon whether students were meetingsociety's expectations for leaming. Wewere collecting anecdotal records,

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checklists, leaming logs, and examplesofchildren's work as evidence of studentleaming based on what we valued inlearning. We wanted othersto know what children thought abouttheir leaming and let children knowthat their perspective was valuedby others. The curriculum couldthen grow from all of these perspectives.ratherthan being dominatedby one voice.

The portfolios we develop givestudents the chance to step back and lookat themselves as readers and writers overtime. They are collections of work thatreflect children as readers and writers -their efforts, improvements, processes,strengths, and needs. Gradually theseportfolios have expanded to include therest of the curriculum. While childrenreflect continuously through oral sharingand leaming logs, we see the portfoliosas a chance to step back and look morebroadly and deeply at their leaming. Ifreflection were not an ongoing part ofthe curriculum, however, the portfolioprocess would be difficult andunproductive.

Three times a year (October, February,

and May), students.spend a week to tendays gathering, sharing, and reflectingon their leaming during their regularreading/writing time. They start theprocess by focusing on their writingacross the curriculum because they havemore concrete evidence of their growthas writers. They gather together all theirwork as writers - their joumals, logs,notes, messages, rough drafts,publications, etc. They spend time alonewith theirpiles of papers, reviewing theirwork and getting a feeling for who they

are currently as writers.

The class then meets to brainstormwhat they have discovered aboutthemselves as writers. This brainstormedlist allows them to hear each other's ideasand to think about why they might wantto select particular pieces. Afterbrainstorming, the children choose piecesfrom their piles that reflect who they are

as writers. They can choose any piece ofwriting but are asked to include several

rough drafts from their writing work time.

Once they have made their choices,they share these with a partner, explaining

how these choices reflect who they are aswriters. From this sharing, they makedecisions about which pieces to selectfor their portfolios and write a reflectionfor each item which explains why theyselected it and what it shows about themas writers. They write these reflections

Student self-evaluation portfolios

donot preclude

otherkinds of portfolios

on half sheets of paper and staple them tothe pieces of writing.

When all of the pieces are chosen andtagged, the children share them with a

partner and give a broad description ofwho they are as writers. The class thencomes back together to share their

descriptions of themselves and tobrainstorm possible goals. After this classdiscussion, students write a one-pagereflection describing themselves as

writers and establishing their goals.Because reflection has been an ongoingpart of the classroom, they are able tothink deeply about their leaming.

The children then shift their focus toreading. They begin by choosing and re-reading favorite books and then meetingwith a partner to discuss what they werethinking while reading these books.Following this sharing, the classbrainstorms on who they are as readersand students gatherliterature logs, readinglists, projects, webs, charts, and any otherevidence of their reading. Because actualsamples of significant readingexperiences do not always exist, theyoften web favorite literature circles, writeabout favorite books, or illustrate part ofa literature presentation. Then they repeatthe same process of choosing examples,

sharing with others, selecting for theirportfolios, writing and sharingreflections, discussing as a class, andwriting a one-page reflection with goals.

Once the children have finished, theysit alone and read through the entireportfolio. Then they meet in smallgroups to celebrate with each other.Sometimes students conference withthe teacher or share the portfolio in ajoint child/parent/teacher conference.Afteran initial joint conference, childrenmay take the portfolio home to share

with parents. The one-page reflectionsare included in the report card toencourage parents to focus on their

child's perspective, not just the schoolperspective.

At the end of the year, the childrenwrite letters to their parents and theirnext year's teacher telling who they areas leamers and how they have changedand grown over the year. This letterbecomes part of the child's cumulativefolder, which stays in the school. Theportfolio itself goes home with the child,giving the child ownership over whathappens to the portfolio and who has

access to it. Because a portfolio reflectsa child's voice, we do not feelcomfortable taking it from them andpassing it on to the next year's teacher.Children do willingly accept invitationsfrom teachers to bring their portfoliosback to school to share.

Some educators have criticizedstudent self-evaluation portfoliosbecause children's choices do notalways reflect the school or teacherobjectives. When teachers determine

what goes into the portfolio, students'perspectives are again devalued.Teachers may want to keep their ownportfolios with their records, checklists,and selected pieces of children's work.These teacher portfolios should be keptalongside the child's portfolio in theclassroom so that teachers and studentshave access to both, rather thancombining the material into one

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Volumell, Number3



Hearing Students' Voices

portfolio. If the school wants a portfoliopassed on to the next teacher, thatportfolio can be a combination of teacherand student choice. Student self-evaluation portfolios do not precludeother kinds of portfolios, but theirfunction for the individual leamer is oftenlost when one portfolio has to serve allaudiences.

Reflection and LearningThrough reflection and self-

evaluation, students leam to think abouttheir leaming. They reflect on what theyare leaming (content), how they arelearning (process), why they are leaming(purpose) and where they want to gonext in their leaming (goals). When theyare able to evaluate their own and others'assumptions about the world,they are able to act on thoseassumptions and make their ownmeaning about the world. If we expectstudents to integrate their learningexperiences into a focused whole, weneed to provide time and opportunitiesfor reflection upon those experiences.

We want to end, as we began, with astudent's voice. Mardell wrote this self-evaluation letter to her parents and teacherat the end ofthe year. As she reflects, shebrings alive her past experiences in waysthat bring new meanings to the presentand new potentials for the future.

ReferencesDewey, John. Erperienc'e and Education.New York: Collier Books. 1938.

Harste, Jerome, Short, Kathy, & Burke,Carolyn. Creating Classrooms for Au-/ftors. Portsmouth. NH: HeinemannEducational Books, 1988.

Short, Kathy. Literacy as a Collabora-tive Experience. Unpublished doctoraldissertation. Bloomington, IN: IndianaUniversiry, 1986.

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