Reflection is often seen as a routine part of teaching. But what if it could become a powerful, structured form of professional learning rooted in real classroom dilemmas? NIE Education Research Scientist Dr Lee Shu Shing shares how teacher reflection, when treated as disciplined inquiry, can deepen pedagogical reasoning and strengthen practice.

Reflection in Today’s School Landscape

Reflection is not new to teachers in Singapore. From preservice preparation to in-service professional learning initiatives such as Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) and mentoring conversations, educators are regularly encouraged to reflect on their practice. Yet, in the busyness of school life, reflection can sometimes become compressed into brief post-lesson summaries or documentation exercises.

“Reflection is part of teachers’ practice and teacher learning,” Dr Lee Shu Shing explains. “It happens in real classrooms. It is not abstract because it forms teachers’ pedagogical reasoning and decisions.”

However, teachers today face constant challenges and distractions. Administrative responsibilities, curriculum demands and the immediacy of classroom management can crowd out mindful pauses. Reflection may be construed as an inward-looking, individual task, triggered by everyday challenges, rather than a meaningful avenue for professional growth.

When reflection becomes episodic or compliance-driven, its potential diminishes. Instead of serving as a tool for deep inquiry, it risks being reduced to answering familiar prompts such as what worked and what did not. Shu Shing’s research asks a timely question: how can schools reframe reflection so that teachers become inquirers and leverage it as a powerful way of learning from their classrooms?

From Reflection to Situated Professional Learning

Shu Shing’s study, Teacher Reflection as Situated Professional Learning, builds on earlier research into teachers’ conceptions and uses of reflection. The study examines how teacher mentors design reflective processes, how teachers experience them and how contextual and individual factors shape reflective practice in schools.

At its core is a shift in understanding. Reflection is not a form-filling exercise. Nor is it a post-lesson recount of successes and failures. Instead, it is a principled and systematic inquiry anchored in authentic problems of practice.

“Reflection is not a post-lesson summary of what went well or what did not go well,” Shu Shing explains. “It involves a closer examination that begins with problems of practice, teachers asking questions they are genuinely curious about, making changes and examining students’ experiences and artefacts to glean professional insights.”

This means grounding reflection in evidence. Teachers draw on lesson materials, student work and assessment data. They engage in inner dialogue as well as conversations with colleagues and mentors. The process is iterative and forward-looking, informing the next instructional move rather than merely describing the previous one.

In this way, reflection becomes situated. It is contextualized to the teacher’s students, curriculum and school culture. It is not generic advice applied broadly, but disciplined inquiry rooted in lived classroom realities. Teachers learn from and with each other.

What Meaningful Reflection Looks Like

What does this look like in practice?

Shu Shing shares the example of a mentor who role models his thinking about practice within a community of teachers. Instead of presenting solutions, he positions his own classroom dilemmas as starting points for inquiry. He asks questions he is genuinely curious about. Why are students not responding as expected? How are they experiencing a new instructional strategy?

“He might ask students to understand why they are not following his instruction,” Shu Shing explains. “He could also ask students whether the changes he made to his teaching have benefited them.”

These student conversations become evidence. The mentor documents his pedagogical reasoning, tracing the changes made, the evidence gathered and the shifts in mindset that occur along the way. Through this process, reflection becomes visible and shared, rather than private and assumed.

The benefits extend beyond immediate student outcomes. Teachers develop clarity about why they make certain decisions. They build deeper empathetic understanding of their students. They become more intentional in linking theory and practice.

Importantly, reflection is no longer an add-on. “Reflection is not extra work,” Shu Shing emphasizes. “It is a disciplined way of being curious and learning from my practice, and a way for teachers to make their thinking visible.”

Creating Conditions for Authentic Reflection

For reflection to move beyond compliance, school conditions matter.

Time is a key challenge. Without protected space, reflection remains squeezed, hurried and surface, between urgent tasks. Another hindrance lies in viewing reflection as a one-off effort to address numerous issues simultaneously. In contrast, disciplined professional inquiry requires sustained focus on a specific problem in an iterative manner. The focus is not solely on developing teachers’ professional insights. Equally important in this progress relates to developing teachers’ mindsets and beliefs. How they see themselves as agents in their professional learning and growth as a community.

School leadership plays a crucial role. Leaders, working hand-in-hand with School Staff Developers, set the tone and allocate resources so that reflection is treated as core professional work. This includes carving out time for reflective dialogue within communities and prioritizing pedagogical reasoning over efficiency alone.

A safe and non-judgmental environment is equally important. Teachers must feel able to surface uncertainties, tensions and dilemmas without fear. Documenting thinking through student work, assessment tasks and classroom artefacts helps ground conversations in evidence rather than opinion.

Existing structures such as PLCs and mentoring conversations can be strengthened by anchoring them in clear problems of practice. Instead of collegial sharing alone, communities can adopt disciplined inquiry structures that move from describing problems to analysing evidence and identifying instructional implications by tapping on the Singapore Teaching Practice.

For individual teachers pressed for time, Shu Shing suggests a simple but powerful mindset shift. Replace the question “How did my lesson go?” with “What did my students tell me about the lesson? What evidence do I have?” Instead of asking “What went wrong?”, ask “What am I curious to learn from my class?”

Such questions reorient reflection towards curiosity and evidence. They invite teachers to slow down, examine their reasoning and learn from their own classrooms.

Shu Shing’s study is on-going, the premise is to help teachers understand that when reflection is situated, dialogic and evidence-informed, it becomes more than routine practice. It becomes a meaningful pathway for professional growth, rooted not in abstract ideals but in the lived complexities of teaching. Shu Shing is open to sharing her ideas and encourages schools to reach out for conversations.