Degrees of reflection in academic development: Construction and application of a tool to assess critical reflection in portfolios and projects

A central part of the one-year programme of the Centre for Teaching and Learning in Higher Education, university teachers choose between the development of a reflective portfolio (Bachmann, 2015) or a project based on the premises of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) (Boyer, 1990) on their teaching practice. As part of a systematic programme review, we conducted a study to better understand the reflective processes of participants expressed in their portfolios or projects. The overall aim is to improve the support of this learning process in considering the diverse entry requirements of participants. The results of this study provided a basis for the re-design of the programme in sense of intensifying the reflective practice with the use of a reflective analysis tool. The following questions are at the core of our study: How can the quality of reflection in portfolios and projects be assessed? What dimensions or levels of reflection do we look at? At what level of reflectivity do our participants operate? To answer these questions, first a model and a rubric for analysing the quality of reflection in portfolios or projects was developed based on an extensive literature review. Second, portfolios and projects of participants were analysed and semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with the same participants. Results show differences in the reflective processes between projects and portfolios; that the difference in teaching experience influences the quality of reflection in both text types but that also the motivation and fulfilment of entry expectations conditions the reflection level in learning processes.