Fostering the ability of reflection in students through teaching and learning research labs

A process model to reflect on the use of language in foreign language teaching

Abstract

The article addresses the question of how the ability to reflect of prospective teachers of Romance idioms as foreign languages can be recorded and promoted within the framework of teaching-learning-research labs. A theoretical model was conceptualized and developed during an interdisciplinary joint project of educational sciences and the institute of didactics of Romance languages. This model captures the ability to reflect by determining the quality of reflection (see Leonhard 2008), whereby the latter includes the analysis of subject-specific breadth and depth of reflection. The goal of this ‘process model to reflect on the use of language in foreign language teaching’ is to analyze the reflection of the use of language in Romance foreign language teaching. The breadth of reflection is based on the teachers’ and learners’ competencies of foreign language (KMK 2012) as well as on the competencies of foreign language teaching. The depth of reflection is assessed following the cyclical model of reflection ‘ERTO’ (see Krieg, Kreis 2014), integrating the breadth of reflection as previously defined. Taking a specific event (concerning the use of the language) as one’s starting point, it is possible to analyze to what extent a reflection process is triggered and expressed in breadth and depth. The theoretical considerations lead to a system of categories to analyze written reflections by students.