This qualitative study explores student learning progression through reflective writing on a tertiary-level course in social work. The study is based on the content analysis of three sets of data: student reflective writing, instructor formative feedback on this writing, and student end-of-course reflections. Our findings demonstrate that…

Purpose: Reflective journal writing is considered as a form of reflective practice. The research studies suggested that journal writing allowed the teacher to reflect on their practices, improved their self-awareness and supported their professional development. Even though the research showed that journal writing as an effective tool for…

In this note, I argue for and discuss my experiences with explicitly incorporating principles of critical and creative thinking in a transitions course which serves mathematics, mathematics education, and statistics majors. I describe several specific assignments and classroom tasks designed to enhance critical and creative thinking. I also…

In this article, I trace how my teaching has changed as I have become increasingly involved in educational development. I divide my career into three phases (pre-educational development, part-time educational development, and full-time educational development) and analyze qualitative and quantitative data from multiple sources of evidence in each…

Scaffolding is crucial as transfer of learning does not occur naturally and teaching-learning strategies found to be effective for experts may not be suitably adopted as is for novice learners. Furthermore, opportunities are often "found" or "made." The quality of solutions, however, is mediated by different conceptualizations…

Instructors from two different disciplines collaborated to teach a preservice teacher education course examining the concepts of language and culture with the expectation that mindfulness-based reflective practice could enhance comprehension of course content and provide introspection for transformation. Two questions were studied: how to promote…

This mixed-method in vivo exploratory study examines the learning strategies that prepare students for social work practice and shows that these strategies can make a measurable difference. Though many authors have called for self-awareness to promote cultural sensitivity, the concept of the integrated personal/professional self has not previously…

An important topic of current brain research is "cognitive overload." It is about the capacity of a person's working memory and the strategies employed when that capacity is taxed. The most common strategy for coping with cognitive overload is shutting down, like that point in a conversation with a non-English speaker when everything one…