Doctoral Dissertations

Date of Award

12-2011

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy

Major

Educational Psychology and Research

Major Professor

John M. Peters

Committee Members

John Lounsbury, Chris Skinner, Mary Ziegler

Abstract

This study explored the experience of engaging in reflective practice through the framework of Levelising. Reflective practice has been of interest to professionals and educators of professionals for many years. However, Levelising is a recently introduced approach. Levelising categorizes the reflective process into four modes. These modes include an awareness of what is occurring (Level I), considering one’s actions (Level II), considering one’s conceptual frame (Level III), and considering the conceptual frames of others (Level IV). This study focuses on my personal experience of improving my facilitation using Levelising as a framework for reflective practice. The context of the study was a professional development workshop conducted over a nine-week period with 10 participants attending.

This study was conducted as action research in the form of an autoethnography. I kept a reflexive journal of my workshop experiences and used the journal entries to reflect after each workshop session. My reflections were the data I used to study my use of Levelising to improve my facilitation practice.

I engaged in on-going formative analysis during the course of the workshop. A summative analysis was performed following the conclusion of the workshop to identify how engaging in Levelising as a framework for reflections informed the decisions I made to improve practice.

Findings indicated that the use of Levelising in my reflection on practice increased my awareness of aspects of my facilitation that needed to be changed. Levelising revealed differences in my espoused theories and theories in practice. I became more aware of the need to question my assumptions, values, beliefs, and biases prior to, during, and following facilitation experiences.

Download
Files over 3MB may be slow to open. For best results, right-click and select "save as..."

Share

COinS