Reflection through Drawing the Learning Journey
I’ve done reflection activities ever since I started teaching in university about 3 years ago. I was always under the impression that reflection had to be done through words, but after our ITS session in March, I began to reconsider my assumptions on what reflection truly is. Is it simply about writing our thoughts down like in diary entry? Or can we also reflect effectively through other means? I was particularly struck by the learning journey map (video below) that was introduced by one of our ITS instructors. The key point was that reflection could be done not just through writing, but could also be done through drawing.
The focus of my latest experiment was once again on my Creativity and Communication class. This time, the students were tasked with creating a prototype of an app or service to address a significant problem they depicted in a video for their first project. Common problems in the past were students creating their prototypes too late, not doing enough testing of their prototype, and still being confused about what prototyping was after the project. To help with the learning journey of the students this time, I adapted the learning journey map into my own course, and had students reflect but then draw out their learning journeys and project milestones from this prototyping project.
From this experiment, one key thing stood out. Although the students were initially very confused by the map, they were able to better reflect on the project milestones and what they learned from the prototyping process. The students were also much more encouraged by seeing the results in this visual form, and were much more motivated to continue working on perfecting their prototypes.
From this experiment, I learned that the reflection really doesn’t have to be just through writing. Effective reflection can be done through a variety of ways, graphing/drawing included.
