Sparse information exists on how elementary teachers might use reflective journaling as a tool for professional development (PD) to enhance their teaching methods. The problem is that even though elementary teachers have access to a variety of PD opportunities, these opportunities are often insufficient for meeting individual teachers' needs to…

Increased specialisation of disciplinary cultures creates barriers for students who may not understand the genre, style and conventions of disciplinary writing. Academic literacies research recognises that literacy is a social practice where writing is inextricably linked to knowledge construction. Learning to write, therefore, requires…

The purpose of the following case study was to examine the daybooks of 3 fourth-grade writers who autonomously determined the content they included across the pages of their composition books. Three themes emerged from an analysis of their daybooks: (1) Students used their daybooks to engage their "writing process"; (2) students used…

Reflective Learning Journals are used to engage students in the learning process. To motivate students to complete the Reflective Learning Journal it is common practice to allocate marks and it is in this area that problems arise. To address the problems rubrics have been used however, most rubrics are based on assigning marks to very…

Visual journals are reflective learning journals that engage the active and purposeful exploration and incorporation of art mediums and visual imagery into the journaling process. This paper focused on the ways that visual journals might be enacted in K-12 classrooms. We begin by introducing the four ways New (2005) identified that artists,…

Teacher educators are charged with the responsibility of training teachers who will be required to make numerous daily decisions. One effective method to equip teacher candidates to manage the multitude of teaching demands is through the implementation of reflective practice. This study aimed to investigate the placement experiences of The Ohio…

Listening journals provide a personal space for learners to document and share their inside thoughts about what they think, do, and feel regarding their learning. This study analyzes the journal entries of 19 second- to fourth-year business university learners. Over five weeks, they completed five listening journals on topics of their choice as…

In an era in which "all media are mixed media" (Mitchell, 2002), visual information is central in interpersonal and mass communication. Despite this daily consumption of visual information, "digital natives" (Prensky, 2001) are not prepared to critically engage with images (Brumberger, 2016). Scholars in the field of visual…

Interpersonal skills, which are variously called soft skills, employability skills, people skills, and noncognitive skills, are critically important in personal, academic, and workplace settings. This descriptive case study explored how individuals from underserved communities described the use of reflective learning journals in an interpersonal…

This explanatory case study aims to investigate conceptual changes on the part of gifted and talented students and describe their reflective thinking with regard to problem-solving as part of the problem-based learning (PBL) process. Twenty-two gifted and talented fourth grade primary school students participated in the study. The students were…

National studies continue to indicate that the graduating STEM student body is not representative of the diversity of the U.S. population. In addition to, or in the absence of, institutional change, instructors must learn how to implement equity-focused pedagogical changes in order to better support their students. This article describes my…

This qualitative study examined the use of reflective journal prompts during the student teaching experience to gauge the success of seven areas of teacher preparation. Results varied by certification areas. Showed strengths in reflection, classroom management, and planning. The areas for growth centered on objectives and essential questions,…

Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) not only has the potential to aid L2 academic writing but also poses unique challenges concerning impacts and ethics. Reflection journals, which promote critical thinking and metacognitive awareness, have the capacity to guide GenAI-assisted writing, yet remain underexplored. This study examines and…

This article shares the findings of a study examining the use of dialectical journals as liminal spaces for the development of critical reflection in practicing teachers. In an online graduate course on critical teacher inquiry designed to foster teachers as antiracist multicultural educators, teachers engaged in dialogue with themselves as they…

Contemporary critical literacy instruction primarily revolves around group discussion, yet the reflective nature of writing makes it an ideal strategy for supporting student sense-making about the world and how we operate within it. And semi-private reflective writing is especially necessary for instructional models that center text reading that…