Use of Reflective Journals in Development of Teachers' Leadership and Teaching Skills

Abstract

Abstract Focusing on the contribution of reflectivepractice to teaching practice amongst student teachers, thisstudy examines the impact of reflective journal entries of 16student teachers from Faculty of Education at the ArtvinCoruh University in Turkey. Quantitative and qualitativeresearch approaches were employed for this study includingopen-ended questioning techniques (surveys and interviews),written reflections under reflective categories showing howthe participants reflected on their teaching experience asanecdotal data. Participants were trained through a 10-horientation on reflective writing program developed by theresearcher. To categorise the reflective writing types,identification of Hatton and Smith [12] of types of reflection(instrument 1), was employed. Participants were laterrequested to answer a 26 open–ended questionnaire(instrument 2), the questions of which were constructedbased on Richards and Lockhart’s [16]. Findings haveimplications for how reflective journals can be employed andused in school-based contexts and pre-service teachereducation.Keywords Student Teachers, Reflective Journals,Leadership, Teaching Skills, Reflective Writing Strategie