Reflection on Lessons¶

Strategy · All strategies
Evidence · 2 claims (2 for) · 4 studies (2 quant-synthesis, 1 review, 1 theoretical), q3–q4 · 2 of 4 report an effect size

Description¶

Reflection on lessons is a professional learning strategy in which teachers deliberately examine their instruction before and after teaching it. Before a lesson, reflection surfaces assumptions about pacing, difficulty, and likely misconceptions; after a lesson, the teacher records what worked, what did not, and why, keeping these notes organized alongside the lesson plan for revision. The practice converts teaching experience into an evidence base for iterative improvement rather than letting each lesson pass unexamined.

Design Implications¶

Reflection functions as self-regulated professional learning: teachers who monitor their own instruction against goals and adjust subsequent actions show stronger growth in instructional quality Self-monitoring improves self-regulation. [+M]. The mechanism parallels Feedback applied to one's own teaching — reflection is most useful when it targets the task and process levels (what the lesson asked of students, how the sequence unfolded) rather than global self-judgment Feedback is most effective at task and process levels. [+S]. Structured prompts (e.g., Gibbs' cycle: description → feelings → evaluation → analysis → conclusion → action plan) produce more actionable reflections than open-ended journaling.

Context¶

Requirements¶

• Protected time immediately before and after teaching, when memory of the lesson is fresh
• A consistent recording system — lesson-plan annotations, a reflection journal, or a digital template — so reflections are revisable and searchable
• Specific reflective prompts tied to learning goals, not just general impressions
• A commitment to act: each reflection should end with a concrete adjustment for the next iteration

Constraints¶

• Reflection without follow-through becomes ritualistic journaling with no effect on practice [-W]
• Purely affective reflection ("the lesson felt good") can reinforce ineffective practices; unguided reflection may confirm existing biases rather than challenge them [~M]
• Teachers with heavy course loads often deprioritize reflection under time pressure, so the strategy fails when it is not scheduled as part of planning time rather than added on top of it
• Reflection on isolated lessons misses patterns; without periodic review across lessons, adjustments remain piecemeal

Implementation Variability¶

• Pre-lesson reflection: anticipating misconceptions and planning Check-ins to detect them during the lesson
• Post-lesson annotation: brief margin notes on the lesson plan (2–5 minutes) versus full written entries
• Video-stimulated reflection: recording lessons and reviewing footage, which surfaces behaviors teachers do not notice in the moment
• Collaborative reflection: lesson study groups or peer observation, where reflection is shared and challenged rather than private
• Action research cycles: formalizing reflection into question → data → analysis → revision over a term

Target Learners¶

• The "learners" here are teachers, particularly early-career teachers still building an instructional repertoire
• Pre-service teachers, where structured reflection is a standard component of supervised teaching placements
• Experienced teachers benefit most when reflection is prompted by evidence (student work, assessment data) rather than impression alone [~W]

Target Learning Goals¶

• Instructional improvement: identifying which activities, explanations, and pacing decisions supported learning
• Adaptive expertise: building the habit of diagnosing why a lesson succeeded or failed, not just that it did
• Self-regulation of professional practice: goal-setting, monitoring, and adjustment applied to teaching Self-monitoring improves self-regulation. [+M]

Instructions¶

1. Before teaching, review the lesson plan and write brief predictions: where will students struggle, what will need reteaching, what evidence will show the goal was met?
2. During the lesson, note deviations from plan (mentally or in margins) — moments of confusion, unexpected success, timing problems.
3. Immediately after, spend 5–10 minutes recording what worked, what did not, and a hypothesis about why, using a structured frame such as Gibbs' reflective cycle.
4. End with an action: specify one concrete revision to the lesson or its successor (e.g., add an Advance Organizer, replace an explanation with a worked example, insert a Check-in).
5. Periodically review accumulated reflections across a unit or term to identify recurring patterns, and revise the underlying plan rather than patching individual lessons.

Related Strategies¶

• Action Research — formalizes lesson reflection into systematic inquiry cycles over a term
• 5-Minute Writing Conferences — a low-time-cost reflection format adaptable to post-lesson notes
• Activities for Student Self-Reflection — the student-facing counterpart; pairing teacher and student reflection gives both sides of the instructional exchange
• New teachers should diagnose problem areas with reflection, mentoring, self-assessment, observation of experts, and video review
• Review evidence of learning at three points: before, during, and after the lesson

Related Elements¶

• Coaching — instructional coaching externalizes and challenges reflection, guarding against biased self-assessment
• Articulation — the same mechanism of making reasoning explicit, applied to the teacher's own decisions
• Assessment — student assessment data provides the evidence base that keeps reflection grounded in learning outcomes

Examples¶

• Lesson Study (Japan) — collaborative lesson planning, teaching, observation, and structured post-lesson discussion; reflection is collective and evidence-based (Lesson Study Alliance).
• Video clubs — teachers meet to review classroom video clips with a facilitator, focusing analysis on student thinking rather than teaching performance (research by Miriam Gamoran Sherin and colleagues).
• A teacher notices during post-lesson reflection that students could follow the worked example but failed on independent problems; the revision adds a faded example sequence and a mid-lesson check-in before independent practice.

Key Sources¶

• Schön, D. A. (1983). The Reflective Practitioner: How Professionals Think in Action. Basic Books.
• Gibbs, G. (1988). Learning by Doing: A Guide to Teaching and Learning Methods. Further Education Unit, Oxford Polytechnic.
• Hattie, J., & Timperley, H. (2007). The power of feedback. Review of Educational Research, 77(1), 81–112. doi:10.3102/003465430298487
• Zimmerman, B. J. (2002). Becoming a self-regulated learner: An overview. Theory Into Practice, 41(2), 64–70. doi:10.1207/s15430421tip4102_2
• Jay, J. K., & Johnson, K. L. (2002). Capturing complexity: A typology of reflective practice for teacher education. Teaching and Teacher Education, 18(1), 73–85. doi:10.1016/S0742-051X(01)00051-8