TEXT
Smoke and mirrors? Evaluating the use of reflective practice as a management learning technique.
This paper explores the value of reflective practice on a professional management programme in the School of Business at a new university. The purpose is to gain a fuller understanding of the perceptions of staff and students about the teaching and learning experience. Theoretical perspectives that define reflective practice and evaluate its uses and abuses are critiqued and used as the basis from which to explore the purpose and value of reflective practice on a management programme. Two forms of primary material were collected and transcribed: structured interviews with a sample of Certificate in Management students; and a meeting between tutors on the CM programme. The paper compares theoretical constructs of reflective practice with staff and student perceptions about it. The paper concludes that staff and students shared an understanding of the reflective practice process and a commitment to experiential learning and attributed a value to the process as a vehicle for connecting theory to practice and internalising learning. However, little evidence was found to support the use of reflective practice as a tool for critically exploring or improving practice. In addition a number of limitations were surfaced, in particular a tendency for students to perceive the exercise as primarily an assessment device which consequently affected the content and style of writing and a general lack of confidence in the grading process.http://www.leeds.ac.uk/educol/documents/00002316.htm