Teachers benefit from the practice of reflection, the conscious act of thinking deeply about and carefully examining the interactions and events within their own classrooms. Wildman and Niles describe a scheme for developing reflective practice in experienced teachers. This was justified by the view that reflective practice could help teachers to feel more intellectually involved in their role and work in teaching and enable them to cope with the paucity of scientific fact and the uncertainty of knowledge in the discipline of teaching.They were particularly interested in investigating the conditions under which reflection might flourish-a subject on which there is little guidance in the literature.
They designed an experimental strategy for a group of teachers in Virginia and worked with 40 practicing teachers over several years. They were concerned that many would be "drawn to these new, refreshing conceptions of teaching only to find that the void between the abstractions and the realities of teacher reflection is too great to bridge. Reflection on a complex task such as teaching is not easy." The teachers were taken through a program of talking about teaching events, moving on to reflecting about specific issues in a supported, and later an independent, manner.
It involved having teachers record in writing their reflections about teaching
教師たちは、教える上での出来事について話し合い、助言を受けながら、後には助言なしで、具体的な論点について内省することに進むというプログラムを受けた。教師が教育に対する内省を書面に記録することも含まれていた。
この過程では教師に教育についての反省を文章で残させることも含んでいる。
