Determining Reflectivity Levels of Prospective Teachers Through Blogs

Abstract

In this study, it was aimed to determine the reflective thinking levels of prospectiveteachers and the change of their reflectivity levels within the teaching practicum process. Forthis purpose, the blog postings, which written by the prospective teachers at different themes,were analyzed. Within the scope of the study, reflective thinking levels were discussed basedon the six different criteria with the following titles: Attending to feeling, sharing personalexperience, analysis and meaning-making, depth of reflection, language use and writingquality, use of textual evidence and historical context, and transfer of knowledge. In thisstudy, the document analysis method was used as a data collection technique. The study wascarried out with 37 prospective teachers, attending Teaching Practicum in the Department ofComputer Education and Instructional Technology (CEIT) of a state university in Ankara,Turkey. Prospective teachers wrote about their teaching experiences throughout teachingpracticum on their blogs. Blogs were evaluated with the help of the reflection level rubric,which prepared by the researchers. It was concluded that the lowest reflection level emergedwith regard to the use of textual evidence and historical context criteria and that lessreflective blogs were, in almost all criteria, with respect to the overall evaluation of thecourse (Theme-5). In the last section, further results and related recommendations arementioned.