Making thinking public: reflection in elementary teacher education

Abstract

In this phenomenological study I listened to pre‐service teachers' voices and unearthed the discursive practices present in reflective teacher education. The dialectic of the personal and the public are used to present the findings of this study on reflection in elementary teacher education. I begin by describing the essence of reflection as recounted by the participants. Reflection is essentially a personal, private process, but when brought into teacher education, the personal becomes public. The contradictory realities of classroom discussion and reflective written assignments are central to the discussion on making the personal public. The findings indicate that the personal, private process of reflection is made public due to the accountability of teacher education.