Learning Outcome

Prompts and hints

LO2:  demonstrate knowledge of current setting based procedures and practices relevant to learning, teaching and assessment.

MUST BE SUPPORTED BY REFERENCES

Description and critical analysis of procedures and practices within ECEC that you have observed and taken part in.

What procedures or policies were relevant to the incidents you have chosen?

Which of these are government advice (statutory or not statutory)?

Which of these are setting/class/teacher specific?

Are there any difficulties or contradictions raised by the policies or procedures?

Are there any ideas about power (gender, race, class, etc) that might influence policies and procedures?

Were you challenged by any of the policies and procedures? (This feeds in to LO3 as well).

What power-related theoretical perspectives could you draw on? (Critical race theory, feminism, habitus, social capital).

LO3 critically reflect on own personal and professional development.

LO5 demonstrate reflection on engagement in supporting children in furthering their learning within educational settings, implementing inclusive practices and pedagogy within settings.

LO6 demonstrate reflection on working collaboratively with children and colleagues within settings.

MUST BE SUPPORTED BY REFERENCES

LO3: Critical reflection of your own role in the setting and how you would want to develop or change your own practice.

What did you do/think?

Why do you think you did or thought that?

Thinking back through what you did/said, what other options could you have chosen?

What assumptions/prejudices or previous experiences might have informed your thinking?

What theoretical frameworks might you draw on (e.g. social capital, habitus, othering, Archer’s ideas about reflexivity, Archer’s ideas about structure and agency)?

Would you change anything about your response? (Why/Why not?)

LO5: Description and critical analysis of your experience of facilitating learning, inclusion and pedagogy on your placement.

LO6: Description and critical analysis of your experience of working with children and adults in the setting.

What learning/inclusion/teaching/provision will you comment on?

What happened? [this will be descriptive, you should summarise ideas and move to critically discuss the events]

What made you think about this?

What assumptions or expectations did you have about this?

What theoretical or academic perspectives can you compare your experience with?

What do textbooks or journals say about this pedagogy/learning etc?

Which aspects of what happened might be supported or challenged by different authors? Are these justified?

What is your critical assessment of what happened?

What features of the events are positive? [give reasons and describe how your view changed or stayed the same, using references to support your argument]

Which are negative? [give reasons and describe how your view changed or stayed the same, using references to support your argument]

Describe your interaction with staff and children.

What power relations or roles were in place?

Did you act the same or differently with different people?

Why/why not?

What were your assumptions about child/adult roles?

How were these challenged or reinforced by your experience?

What literature could you draw on around children and adult roles or perspectives?

Based on your reflections how would you want to position yourself (in terms of role and power) within a classroom context in future?

Academic Writing

Please see the rubric for the academic writing descriptors.

Writing should be in a clear font and size (e.g. Ariel or Calibri.

Writing should be in full paragraphs.

Please spell check your work.

Introduction: Introduce the task – why is reflection important, what type of incidents are you going to cover, what reflective model will you use and what theories or ideas will you draw on? This is a brief justification of why a reader should read this task and tells them what content to expect.

May include references

Academic style

Context: Describe the setting, when/how often you went, how many people, demographics etc. Describe your own prior experience of working in education/with children and the volunteer role you took on. This section should be concise!

Can use ‘I’ or academic voice as required.

May include references

Reflective model: Which reflective model have you adopted and why? Have you adapted the model in any way? Why/Why not?

Academic voice (Passive or impersonal).

MUST INCLUDE REFERENCES

Main content: This section is for you to organise depending on the experiences and incidents that you choose to relate.

You will organise the example you choose based on the reflective model that you have chosen.

Whichever model you choose you should include:

– Brief description of each incident, including relevant context and anonymised participants.

– Discussion of academic sources relevant to the incident.

– Critical discussion – where you compare and contrast and indicate which ideas you think are relelvant/helpful.

– Some indication of how your thinking changed/stayed the same, and why.

– Reference to academic ideas or theories which are relevant and either explain what happened and why, or describe how you have changed (e.g. have you gained social capital in the setting by doing X?)

You can choose how many incidents you describe. Do not just list events, and ensure that each event is discussed and critically analysed.

Remember: You must address all the learning outcomes, but you may cover all the L.O.s in each example, or some examples may focus more on one learning outcome than the others.

Mixture of academic voice and ‘I’ as appropriate.

Should be organised into paragraphs – paragraphs should be focussed on a main theme or idea.

Organise paragraphs logically so that your assignment flows.

Avoid single-sentence paragraphs. Use opening sentences of paragraphs to indicate a development of an idea or a change of topic.

Think about the order that you recall incidents in – you may wish to use several incidents to demonstrate the development of your thinking on one particular topic.

MUST INCLUDE REFERENCES

Conclusion: What events and ideas have you looked at?

What theoretical or academic perspectives have you considered/adopted?

How has your understanding of practice developed via this placement.

This should be a summary of your main content – no new ideas here.

Academic voice and ‘I’ as appropriate.

No new ideas. Refer to ideas in the order that they were introduced in the assignment.

MUST INCLUDE REFERENCES

Reference list

Must include some references from the module.

Evidence of own research required for higher level grades.

Academic sources and government websites only.