Beyond End of the Year/Semester Reflection

The end of the year is a time when many of us pause to reflect whether or not January will begin with a New Year’s Resolution or not. The end of the semester is similarly a time when many of us catch our breath and look back on the previous few months. However, what if we could reflect more regularly throughout the semester, even during the chaos of peak instruction periods? I know this is something to which I aspire, especially as an early career librarian who is always looking to improve my practice (especially in instruction).

Mandi Goodsett argues in her 2014 article, “Reflective Teaching: Improving Library Instruction Through Self-Reflection,” that reflective teaching practices – practices that help the instructor/librarian reflect on the class – can help fill the training and experience gap surrounding instruction that many early career librarians (including myself) encounter (12). Goodsett recommends a mix of journaling with recording one’s own classes (with student and professor permission) and feedback from a “critical friend” (12-14). Goodsett used the different sources of reflection to create a more comprehensive picture of how to improve her instruction using both her own perspectives (journaling), her students’ reactions to the lesson (recording), and advice from a more experienced colleague (critical friend) (12-14). While this system worked well for Goodsett and I can attest to the value of a “critical friend” (in my case, my ACRL Instruction mentor), it may be difficult to recreate in its entirety depending on the dynamics of your library and institution.

At LOEX 2023, Michele Santamaria and Kimberly Auger advocated for using Notion software as a tool for a variety of library related tasks, but also as a method for making reflective journaling part of your regular practice. I use Notion as my task management software (inspired by this session at LOEX), but I have yet to achieve the kind of reflective uses of it that Santamaria and Auger discussed in their presentation. The crux of their session was to find a system that helps you manage tasks, have space for journaling reflection, and stay organized in a way that feels like it is helping you rather than being another chore or repetitive task that you don’t want to do. The grace that Santamaria and Auger advocate for could blend well with any of Goodsett (2014)’s strategies as a librarian works to become more reflective and better organized about their instruction without being too hard on themselves either.  

Being more consistent about instruction reflection can also make more formal assessment a more natural part of the instruction process, rather than a daunting thing that comes around on occasion. Sarah Wagner, Erika Mann, and Ann Marshall (2021) examined two different student feedback forms from library instruction sessions and the feedback that they received in order to argue for strategies to use this assessment feedback to help librarians improve as well as have something to use with outside parties (23-27, 29-31). Wagner, Mann, and Marshall encourage librarians to stop and reflect on why they are using the assessment tools that they use and whether or not they are actually getting the kind of data they need from that assessment (25). Adding in reflection about assessment, something that Wagner, Mann, and Marshall acknowledge is daunting for many librarians because of assessment’s role in justification of library services, judgement of instructional effectiveness, and personal performance reviews, can help reduce that stress because the librarian will be more confident that the assessment is optimized to gather useful feedback from students that can be used to both improve instruction and for the previously listed external tasks (23-24, 28-31).

While my reflection on reflection today is brief, these articles and sessions have encouraged me to work to bring in some of Goodsett (2014)’s reflective strategies, especially journaling, into my work on a more regular basis this coming semester. How do you incorporate reflection into your instruction? What are your goals for the new year/new semester?

References

Goodsett, M. (2014). Reflective teaching: improving library instruction through self-reflection. The Southeastern Librarian,62(3), 12-15. https://digitalcommons.kennesaw.edu/seln/vol62/iss3/3?utm_source=digitalcommons.kennesaw.edu%2Fseln%2Fvol62%2Fiss3%2F3&utm_medium=PDF&utm_campaign=PDFCoverPages.

Santamaria, M. & Auger, K. (2023, May). Creating flexible and nourishing work systems: using Notion to “librarian” more humanely [Breakout Session]. LOEX 2023, Harrisburg, PA.

Wagner, S., Mann, E., & Marshall, A. (2021). Toward a thoughtful assessment practice: using reflection to guide library instruction assessment. The Reference Librarian, 62(1), 23-33. https://doi.org/10.1080/02763877.2021.1913466.