Becoming a Reflective Teacher: The Role of Stimulated Recall

In order to teach student teachers to be reflective practitioners, teacher educators must provide definitions and models that are useful to their student teachers. Recall of the teaching events of a lesson is an important part of reflectivity. To determine the extent to which student teachers can recall these teaching events, a study was conducted to answer questions about the differences between unaided and aided recall of deviations from a planned lesson. Results indicate that student teachers recall less than half of their deviations, and are especially prone to fail to remember student-initiated deviations. Implications for teaching reflectivity include the advisability of employing stimulated recall techniques when teaching student teachers how to be reflective.