In the looking glass: reflection on past experience as a key to the future

Carol Boothby (Northumbria University) presented a paper looking at the use of reflection in Northumbria’s Student Law Office, aimed at supporting students in becoming lifelong learners.

Carol’s slides are embedded below.

How can the concept of lifelong learning be effectively communicated to students? What space has to be created in the curriculum to enable this? And what problems may arise in assessing reflective practice?

At Northumbria Law School students spend a fourth year developing their legal skills in a clinical environment dealing with real clients under supervision, giving them a taster of the sometimes Alice in Wonderland world of lawyering. Their pre-existing views on an ordered world of evidence and courtrooms can be thrown into disarray by the experience of dealing with individuals. In order for clinic to create a longer lasting and worthwhile learning experience students need to have the opportunity to reflect on this experience, to put it into context and to see how they can use that experience to perform more effectively in the future.

The idea of lifelong learning is being taken forward through reflection on live client work. Assessment incorporates the emphasis on reflective practice, with 30% of the final mark dedicated to written reflections. However, these are currently summative in nature, and often the result is a stilted account of an experience, tailored to what the writer believes the marker is seeking.

Some innovative methods are being piloted to overcome this – wikis have been intoroduced to allow students to have a dialogue on their cases and experiences, and the use of journaling is being trialled with the aim of improving the quality of written reflections.

“Learning to learn, or the development of learning power, is getting better at knowing when, how and what to do when you don’t know what to do.”

— (Claxton, 1999)

Alison Bone (University of Brighton) reports:

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Carol explained the advantages of using reflection in a clinic environment. Students are introduced to reflection as a tool and asked to design a poster addressing the body of work on reflection. They are also asked to look at the boundaries existing between the client and student advisor and are assessed by three pieces of reflective work, two of which were compulsory (skills in practice and law in action) plus one from clinic in legal education, justice and ethics, clinic and your career or clinic and public disclosure.

Reflection is essential in creating effective lifelong learning. The students are required to write a personal development plan reflecting on their experiences. This enables them to examine values, value judgements and professional conduct alongside ethical and moral duties generally within the study of law and its practice.

Students receive lectures on how to reflect and a set of exercises. Unfortunately, most do not tackle the assessment until the end of the year, and because the marking criteria are not very specific some of their pieces lack focus. This could be addressed by asking for pieces of assessed reflection throughout the year.

About Carol

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Carol Boothby is currently acting director and solicitor tutor in Northumbria University’s award winning Student Law Office and sits as a judge in the Appeals Service. She has presented papers on clinical practice at a number of national and international conferences.

Last Modified: 9 July 2010