Rethinking reflection in teaching and teacher education: A review of the existing frameworks and a proposal for an alternative terminology

Abstract

Reflection in education is usually associated with teachers reviewing their own practices in order to identify problems and find possible solutions to be applied in practice. Following the scoping review design suggested by Arksey and O’Malley (2005), the paper focuses on the existing theses written on reflection in education in the Turkish context as well as the major frameworks employed in the field on reflection in teaching and teacher education. Based on this review, the aim of this paper is to argue that the term “reflection”, which is used to represent a deep cognitive and metacognitive process about teaching and learning experiences is misleading and insufficient. Thus, relying on mainly the concepts used by Gestalt psychologists, a new term to be used instead of reflection is proposed: insighting. This new term, not only represents the inward look and deep philosophical questioning needed for successful reflection, but it also represents a positive conceptualisation of the act of deep thinking, removing it from being conceptualised as an aspect of “problem solving” alone.