Sound Education: A Brookfield Definition

Abstract

This article explores the concept of sound education through the lens of Stephen Brookfield's critically reflective teaching model. We examine how Brookfield's framework, which emphasizes identifying and scrutinizing assumptions through four lenses - students' eyes, colleagues' perspectives, theory, and personal experience - can be applied to educational development. We consider the role of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) as a potential signature pedagogy for educational development, enacting and revealing the practices, values, and assumptions that underpin the diverse work in this field.

Keywords: faculty development, SoTL, values, organizational development, signature pedagogy

Introduction

The field of educational development is constantly evolving, with shifts in focus from classrooms to learning environments and from teaching to learning. Educational developers are paying closer attention to structures and systems, adopting a more sociological approach. Despite this evolution, the work of educational developers remains highly varied, raising questions about the fundamental nature of the field and what unites its diverse aspects. This article delves into these questions by examining educational development through the lenses of signature pedagogies and the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL). We propose a thought experiment: Is SoTL a signature pedagogy of educational development, simultaneously enacting and revealing the practices, values, and assumptions that underpin our field's work?

The Evolving Landscape of Educational Development

In "Reflections on the Changing Nature of Educational Development," Gibbs (2013) urges educational developers to critically examine their activities and consider new directions. Leibowitz (2014) suggests that a clear definition of the field remains elusive due to the influence of institutional context, faculty needs, and higher education trends. Educational developers operate in various settings, from established teaching centers to embedded positions within disciplines or focused initiatives. This variation prompts questions about the unifying elements of educational development.

Scholars have explored these questions, with Cruz (2016) outlining a taxonomy of the Scholarship of Educational Development, delineating four domains: practice, integration, higher education, and synthesis. Others have analyzed the evolving nature of educational development in the United States (Beach, Sorcinelli, Austin, & Rivard, 2016; Sorcinelli, Austin, Eddy, & Beach, 2006) and the professional and institutional profiles of educational developers globally (Green & Little, 2016).

Signature Pedagogies: Reflecting Identity and Worldview

Shulman’s concept of "signature pedagogies" (2005) provides a valuable framework for self-analysis. A signature pedagogy teaches the knowledge and practice of a discipline and reflects its identity and worldview. This distinguishes it from generic teaching practices used across disciplines (Chick, Haynie, & Gurung, 2009). For example, clinical rounds in medicine teach the content of the field and enact its practices and values by focusing on the medical care of a specific patient.

A signature pedagogy has an "implicit structure" that reflects the "moral dimension" of beliefs about professional attitudes, values, and dispositions (Shulman, 2005). Analyzing signature pedagogies reveals insights into the personalities, dispositions, and cultures of fields, shaping future practice and symbolizing values and hopes (Shulman, 2005). While Shulman (2002) cautions against taking heuristics too seriously, this framework helps focus attention on salient issues and provides shared language for scholarly exchange.

SoTL as a Signature Pedagogy of Educational Development

Considering SoTL as a signature pedagogy of educational development offers clarifying insights about both fields and their relationship. This essay presents a "vision of the possible" (Hutchings, 2000).

Surface Structures

SoTL emerged to demonstrate teaching as a scholarly activity (Boyer, 1990). Bernstein (2008) argues that the products of teaching should be rigorously evaluated for excellence by peers. Faculty often begin SoTL work by recognizing a "teaching problem" as a research question (Bass, 1999). This grassroots approach dominated in the 1990s and early 2000s, with faculty learning and practicing SoTL independently. The Carnegie Scholars program focused on individual faculty inquiries rather than institutional structures.

The convergence of SoTL and educational development is evident in the increasing overlaps of literature and practitioners. Felten, Kalish, Pingree, and Plank (2007) posited a "Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Educational Development." Hutchings et al. (2011) included a chapter on SoTL's connections with educational development in an overview of SoTL's evolution. More recently, scholars have explored these intersections from national perspectives, including the United States (Little, 2014), Singapore (Geertsema, 2016), and Canada (Kenny et al., 2017). Condon, Iverson, Manduca, Rutz, and Willett (2016) define faculty development in the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) sense, offering faculty opportunities to learn new approaches and technologies.

Like educational development, SoTL has remained a relatively loose set of practices rather than a singular methodology. Some celebrate the welcoming and flexible "big tent" of SoTL practice (Chick, 2014; Huber & Hutchings, 2005), while others question whether its apparent incoherence means that SoTL is more "hype" than "hope" (Woodhouse, 2010).

Five Principles of Good Practice in SoTL and Educational Development

Focused on student learning: SoTL begins with questions about student learning and gathers evidence to inform and improve educational practices.
Grounded in context: SoTL builds on prior research and is rooted in the local context of a particular classroom, discipline, or cohort of students (Felten, 2013).
Methodologically sound: SoTL employs rigorous methods to gather and analyze data, ensuring the validity and reliability of findings.
Done in partnership with others: SoTL often involves collaboration with colleagues, students, or other stakeholders to enhance the inquiry process and broaden perspectives.
Appropriately public: SoTL findings are shared with the broader community to contribute to the collective knowledge base and inform educational practices.

These principles outline good practices in SoTL and echo the surface structures of educational development. Educational developers attend to the scholarly, disciplinary, and local contexts of their work, building on research about learning and teaching while being attentive to specific disciplinary contexts (Gurung et al., 2009; Taylor, 2010). They also bring "cosmopolitan" perspectives to their institutions (Bernstein, 2013), translating what’s shared within the larger scholarly community to local circumstances. Effective educational development methods are carefully tailored to the needs and goals of particular individuals, departments, or institutions. Educational development, like SoTL, is most effective when it is done with rather than to individuals.

Deep Structures

Signature pedagogies also enact a field’s "deep structure," its epistemological frameworks for how learning happens and how knowledge is constructed. The deep structures of SoTL and educational development have grown from similar roots, emerging from understandings of learning as a constructive act, drawing inspiration from Dewey, Freire, and others. The synthesis How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School (Bransford, Brown, & Cocking, 2000) introduced a wide audience to learning sciences research, sparking a boom in both SoTL and educational development.

SoTL aims to enhance student learning, focusing on faculty as inquirers and learners. Bass describes the methods of the Visible Knowledge Project, a SoTL program that sought ways of making student and faculty knowledge more visible to each other (Bernstein & Bass, 2005). In educational development, we recognize that students are not the only learners: faculty are their "students," putting faculty in the position of learner. Brookfield asserts that all instructors should take on that student role through educational development because the most important "pedagogical content knowledge" is understanding how students experience their learning (1995). Shulman concludes that "the ultimate test of understanding rests on the ability to transform one’s knowledge into teaching" (1986).

SoTL and educational development share the understanding that both student and instructor are learners. Varying degrees of growth mindset optimism exist and are voiced in both SoTL and educational development. This sense of hope is built into the "deep structure" of educational development and SoTL. O’Meara, Terosky, and Neumann (2008) documented this optimism in their study focusing on the ways in which Faculty Careers & Work Lives are discussed. They found an alternative mindset, a "narrative of growth" marked by professional fulfillment, learning, agency, relationships, and commitment.

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Part of the "narrative of growth" of SoTL is grounded in its "methodological pluralism" (Huber & Morreale, 2002). This refers to the flexibility of its practitioners in their willingness to learn new ways of conducting research and making meaning. Disciplinary experts become more aware of the range of methodologies. Simmons et al. (2013) describe this "meta analysis of our research activity as scholars" as a demonstratable stage in SoTL identity development. Taylor (2010) asserts that “In [educational developers’] work with colleagues, it is not sufficient to ‘know about’ a discipline. Rather, our practice requires that we ‘know in’ that discipline by participating in shared problem solving, discussions, debates, and commitment to teaching and learning.”

This orientation toward growth, learning, and hope in the face of significant ongoing challenges and constraints is also seen in how both educational developers and SoTL practitioners believe in the forward motion of learning.

Brookfield's Four Lenses of Critical Reflection

Stephen Brookfield's model of critical reflection provides a framework for educators to examine their practices through multiple perspectives. The four lenses are:

Students' Eyes: Gathering feedback from students about their learning experiences.
Colleagues' Perspectives: Seeking input and observations from fellow educators.
Theory: Examining educational theories and research to inform practice.
Personal Experience: Reflecting on one's own experiences and assumptions as an educator.

By using these lenses, educators can identify and scrutinize the assumptions that shape their practice, leading to more informed and effective teaching.

Reflective Teaching and its Importance

Reflective teaching involves thoughtful consideration and questioning of teaching practices, what works, what doesn't, and the underlying premises. McAlpine and Weston state that expanding knowledge through reflection increases a teacher's ability to develop. Philosopher John Dewey identified three attitudes that facilitate reflection: open-mindedness, responsibility, and wholeheartedness. Teachers can use various methods to promote reflection in their professional lives and classrooms.

History of Reflective Teaching

Reflective teaching has roots in the Enlightenment era. John Dewey saw teachers as reflective practitioners who could reform education. Donald Schon wrote about reflective practice in fields besides education, such as architecture and medicine. Education theorist David Kolb promotes reflection as a necessary part of engaging the learner. Carl Rogers states that reflection is appropriate to enhance self-discovery. Lev Vygotsky promoted reflection, as it helps students make connections between themselves and the world around them.

Reasons for Reflection

Teachers reflect on the assumptions underlying teaching and learning, the appropriateness of their instructional decisions, improving actions in a particular course, generalized knowledge or approaches to teaching, and cognitive awareness of their reflective processes. Dewey states that the function of reflection is to transform a situation of obscurity, doubt, conflict, or disturbance into a situation that is clear, coherent, settled, and harmonious. He proposes three attitudes that promote reflection:

Open-mindedness: The ability to remain open to multiple, alternative ideas.
Responsibility: Intentionally reflecting upon one's actions to bring about improvements in practice.
Wholeheartedness: The commitment to pursuing something worthwhile-in this case, reflection.

Applications of Reflective Teaching

Reflective activities include developmental portfolios, action research, writing educational philosophy statements, and telling stories within teacher dialogue groups. Brookfield outlines six additional points of entry for teachers to enter in self-reflection:

Teaching Logs
Teacher Learning Audits
Role Model Profiles
Survival Advice Menus
Videotaping
Peer Observation

Student Reflection

Teaching students to reflect is a strategy used within the classroom to help students reach their fullest potential. Dewey sees reflection as an educational experience that fosters purposeful and meaningful learning. Hubbs and Brand state that reflection can actively engage students with content in an intensely personal way. Reflective journaling can create learning conditions that result in meaningful and purposeful learning.

Reflective Journaling

Reflective journaling is a tool for reflection, used by students and teachers alike. Reflective journals are defined as "written documents used to stimulate learners to increase their awareness of their beliefs, values, and practices." Boud views journaling as a pedagogical device that can be used to extract meaning from events and experiences in the classroom, as well as to enhance writing and critical thinking skills.

Actions of Reflective Teachers

Zeichner and Liston state that reflective teachers:

Examine, frame, and attempt to solve the dilemmas of classroom practice.
Are aware of and question the assumptions and values they bring to teaching.
Are attentive to the institutional and cultural contexts in which they teach.
Take part in curriculum development and are involved in school change efforts.
Take responsibility for their own professional development.

The Role of Digital Environments in Teaching and Learning

Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs) are adapting to the demands of contemporary learners and rapid technological changes, prompting a re-evaluation of traditional pedagogical methodologies and sustainability directives. Digital environments are impacting teaching, learning, and assessment (TLA) practices. Student autonomy in assessments is influenced by the method of critical reflection adopted by instructors and learners.

Critical Reflective Practices and Digital Alignment

In contemporary education, each lens combines reflective engagement with reflective action, contributing to higher education institutions’ adaptation to the diverse learning needs of students. Biggs and Tang add to reflective engagement and reflective action through the concept of “Constructive Alignment,” (CA) where pedagogical architecture synchronises intended learning outcomes (ILOs), didactic approaches, and alternative learning strategies. This model effectively develops the learner’s cognitive engagement, capacity, and adaptability through dual lenses of reflective engagement and reflective action. Moreover, Biggs makes it abundantly clear that the teacher’s job is to create a learning environment that supports the learning activities appropriate to achieving the desired outcomes.

If the key is to make all components in the teaching system aligned to each other, then practitioners must recognise the acute impact of VLEs and digital pedagogies have on knowledge acquisition. The lack of alignment creates gaps in learners’ digital competencies, hindering their ability to achieve the (ILOs). These gaps, once manageable, now pose substantial barriers, demanding the urgent integration of digital skills into educational frameworks. John Biggs maintains that CA starts with the notion that the learner constructs his or her own learning through relevant learning activities.

Future-Driven Pedagogical Transformation in (HEIs)

Dumitru outlines several criteria: learner involvement (formal/academic, personal), efficiency (efficient, inefficient), organisation (institutional, neo-institutional), independence (dependent, self-directed), participant number (individual, group, societal), intentionality (implicit, explicit), awareness (mechanical, logical), assimilation method (perception, discovery), and purpose (maintenance, innovation). An inability for instructors to meet this classification reveals a lack of proper application and structure. In such cases, students may struggle to achieve the ILOs due to misalignment between teaching methods and assessment tasks. On an institutional level, poor adherence to the criteria for broader structural change and inefficiencies has a knock-on effect for learning outcomes.

Brookfield’s Extended Reflective Lens

Extending Brookfield’s model to intertwine reflective and the adaptive theoretical frameworks analysed in literature create new directions. Beyond these theoretical considerations, VLEs have also received attention in relation to safeguarding and the critical necessity for individuals to cultivate digital proficiencies. Brookfield’s “Reflective Lens” model, in its current iteration, falls short in digital areas. A fifth lens, the “Learning Environment,” focusing on the profound influence of technologies on digital pedagogical paradigms shaping recent HE transformation can be introduced.

The extended model stimulates instructor awareness of emerging digital experiences conducive to effective knowledge transfer within both physical (classroom) and digital/virtual learning environments. A shift in pedagogical approach, from transactional to transformational engagement, catalyses the development of international digital learning experiences. This fifth lens evolves into a regulatory mechanism, designed to mitigate potential misalignments arising during the digital transformation of HEIs overtime, even with the unpredictable trajectory of technological innovation.

The Impact of VLEs on Student Learning

The abundance of accessible educational data, supported by technology-enhanced-learning platforms helps educators to mine and collate data on student learning behaviour. HEIs have shown a tremendous increase in online educational data to yield ample educational repositories and optimise users’ engagement with technological platforms. Studies report that students feel enthusiastic and motivated toward the use of VLEs, and they suggest that all educators should integrate VLE activities in the design of curricula.

Critical discussions on digital environments lean more toward deep learning pertaining to student learning and tutor-to-student knowledge transfer practices being affected by the students’ learning environment rather than the Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs) deep learning used in Educational Data Mining (EDM). Previous studies have explored how the blended use of VLEs can impact student learning and create a greater sense of community, combined with enhanced higher learning skills.

VLEs and the Physical Learning Environment

Blended learning encompasses face-to-face and online learning approaches. The VLE expands the reach for courses under blended learning structures through collaborating with instructors remotely and interacting with multimedia resources: videos, podcasts, and virtual simulations bespoke to various learning styles. Research indicates that VLEs facilitate a more personalised learning journey where students can progress at their own pace, revisiting materials as needed, and access support through online forums.

A well-designed physical space that is comfortable, well-lit, and resource wise plays the same role as how well a VLE interface is designed. Equally important, is the psychological aspect of learning environments, where safety and inclusivity are critical factors in academic success. Effective integration of digital tools into VLEs extend educational opportunities beyond traditional pedagogical and philosophical boundaries.

Within blended learning structures, a VLE does not replace the physical learning environment, but it enhances the students’ learning experience and combines the element of flexibility beyond the confines of the classroom. Careful attention to the user interface (UI) design and user experience (UX) is required for learners to reap the full benefits from VLE integrated technologies.

AI and VR Simulation

Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Virtual Reality (VR) based simulations add another dimension to immersive, interactive and adaptive learning experiences. These experiential approaches can improve spatial reasoning skills and increase creative ability in learners.

Overcoming Challenges in Reflective Practice

While reflective practice offers numerous benefits, educators may encounter challenges in its implementation. Conflicting terminology, complex studies, and time constraints can inhibit understanding and adoption. Overcoming imposter syndrome and addressing systemic issues require institutional support and a focus on celebrating successes.

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