Le Brun, M J; Macduff, A --- "Developing the Reflective Practitioner Online (in Law)" [2005] LegEdDig 41; (2005) 14(1) Legal Education Digest 11

Developing the Reflective Practitioner Online (in Law)

M J Le Brun & A Macduff

[1993] LegEdDig 92; (2005) 14(1) Legal Education Digest 11

39 Law Teacher 1, 2005, pp 16–28

The ability to reflect on and to learn from one’s work is a skill needed by professionals today, whatever their field of professional endeavour. Although many educators appreciate the value of having students learn the skill of reflective practice, some have found that teaching this skill in a systematic way that is meaningful to students is more difficult than teaching them the steps involved in reflective practice. In this article, the authors outline a design for a WebCT module that they are producing. The site teaches reflective practice in a systematic way to students enrolled in the Graduate Diploma in Legal Practice (GDLP) at the Australian National University (ANU) Legal Workshop.

Several, but not all, of the GDLP instructors agree that the concept of reflective practice is important to the overall teaching/learning approach in the program, even though it has not been taught explicitly. Nevertheless, to date there has been no curriculum development that embeds this central skill firmly, systematically, and coherently in the online GDLP program. The authors decided to remedy this situation by developing an online site to introduce the skill of reflective practice to the students and to develop the skill through links to reflective practice exercises in other compulsory and elective subjects.

Most students commence the GDLP by enrolling in Skills for Practice. In this two-week, face-to-face intensive module, students are introduced to the skills that they will develop during the GDLP: communication, problem-solving, research, managing work, interviewing, negotiating, advocacy, writing, and drafting. In Combined Skills, students come together to reflect on their skills development and consider current issues in legal practice. The main purposes of Combined Skills are to give students a forum to discuss practice issues and to help them reflect on how their skills have developed during the GDLP. Legal Practice Placement offers students work experience in a legal environment. Workshop instructors and placement supervisors monitor students’ progress and provide support, direction and feedback. As part of learning about the role of reflective practice, students are expected to keep a journal in which they record their experiences during the GDLP.

The decision was taken to teach some lawyering skills online using WebCT, for example, interviewing and negotiating. The online ‘text’ is divided into stages with questions and sample answers for each stage. Students can record their answers to open-ended questions about the interview as well as view sample answers to the questions. The formal written responses that were received from the students to the interviewing module have been so positive that the same approach is being used to teach negotiating and communicating online.

In order to introduce reflective practice into the entire GDLP curriculum three issues needed to be addressed. First there was anecdotal evidence to suggest that students did not ‘get the point’ of the limited reflective practice experiences that were already in the curriculum. Secondly, students needed to appreciate how reflective practice could be used to improve legal practice skills across different subjects. Finally, since the ANU Legal Workshop delivers its program in a predominantly online environment, we needed ways to deliver reflective practice online that made the best use of the technology.

The Reflective Practice website is the first point of entry for students enrolled in the GDLP. On entering the website, students will be asked to describe their career goals and asked to answer questions regarding their expectations of the GDLP and what they seek to achieve. Later, students will revisit the answers to some of these questions at the end of the course (the point of exit) as part of the overall cycle of reflective practice.

Ideally, the preference would have been to divide the ‘your reflections’ section of the website into three main parts: (1) A section that includes relevant course documents, some of which are also distributed in hardcopy. (2) A space in which students record their reflections. (3) A feedback section in which instructors, placement supervisors, and peers can provide feedback.

One challenge was in designing the sorts of learning materials and experiences that will encourage students to want to use the portfolio in a meaningful and useful way. The Combined Skills course site is to be divided online into three sections: (1) ‘Pet topics’, ‘Placements’, and ‘Reflections on reflections.’ Ideally ‘Pet topics’ will include information about the assessment for the Combined Skills and WebCT postings from instructors and students; (2) ‘Placements’ will include a video and text that describe the Workshop placement program: pro forma report forms that the students must submit as part of their assessment; a link to the telephone booking system; and other relevant documents; (3) In ‘Reflecting on reflections,’ students will be able to record their reflections on their skills development within the placement program and in Combined Skills. Before completing the GDLP, each student will have to complete one final reflective entry, thus revisiting the career goals that they identified at the commencement of the GDLP and reflecting on how their skills have developed during the course of the GDLP program.

The development of this site has raised some technological and administrative problems that have required and will continue to require attention. A second difficulty arises because students complete the GDLP at different times, according to the program in which the student is enrolled. Once these issues are addressed satisfactorily, we will face another hurdle, that of instructor co-operation. Not all educators understand what reflective practice is and appreciate its benefits.

The authors’ aim in writing this article is to share their thoughts about how educators can help learners develop the skill of reflective practice in an online environment over the course of an entire program of study. To give one illustration: it is clear that reflective practice has a significant role to play in educating professionals for practice, even if, to date, it remains largely untapped, especially in the online environment. The benefits of online education and training for professional practice are considerable. This potential can be enhanced even more by integrating reflective practice intentionally and systematically at the heart of the online environment.