Reflect on your teaching practices

Reflecting on your teaching performance is essential to improving and refining inclusive teaching practices. Think critically about your experiences and explore your behavior, thinking, and emotions, identifying opportunities for improvement. Develop a structured approach to reflective practice, utilising reflective writing, peer learning, and feedback as tools to explore and assess your work analytically.

It is essential to remember that  everyone can make mistakes. What is important, is to deliberately evaluate your teaching to recognise and reflect on these mistakes in order to improve your teaching practices.

Inclusion is core business in education, it's not some add-on social policy … it's what we're always aiming to do – Library staff member


Guidelines

  • Engage in peer observation activities by inviting a colleague to participate in your class and offer constructive feedback.

    Further information
    • Alternatively, observing others allows you to see how techniques you use are experienced by the learner, and develop new ideas or practices for your teaching.

  • Engage in an ongoing reflection about your culture and assumptions.

    Examples
    • Be mindful of your own culture and the basic assumptions and norms that are informed by your background. Your culture and experiences will shape your assumptions about gender, sexuality, cultures and ethnic groups, students with disabilities and low-SES students.
       
    • Take opportunities to reflect on your assumptions, particularly when they are challenged. Be open to learning about other cultures as much as possible, through self education and through participating in Cultural safety training.

  • Use reflective writing as a tool for analysing both your positive and your negative teaching experiences.

    Further information

    You could try keeping a journal in which you record teaching or consulting experiences. Remember that critical reflection involves four stages:

    Description of event

    Personal opinion

    Linking to previous experience or knowledge of pedagogical theory

    Critical understanding of implications for future practice

     

    (Lane, McMaster, Adnum, & Cavanagh, 2014, p.886)
     

    (Further information on practising reflective writing)

  • Collect feedback from students and staff, and use this to guide the design of future classes or resources.

    Examples
    • For classes and workshops, consider using a Google Form to facilitate student feedback. These can be filled in on laptops or devices, or they can be printed and handed out for completion at the end of the class.
       
    • For embedded Library classes, it is also worth following up with the lecturer or tutor after the class for additional feedback.
    • For e-learning resources, make sure there are feedback avenues in place, so users can let you know if they found something unclear.
       
    • Remember to gather feedback during the class or consultation as well as at the end, and adjust your teaching as necessary.