RAPPORT
WWW.RECORDINGACHIEVEMENT.AC.UK
Issue 2 (2015)
responded with this: church was important as a
means of moving people on from where they are
now to where they need to be. This I had not.
zThe idea of moving people on is fundamental to
how we enable our students to achieve their
qualifications, how we support them as they grow
as human beings and how they will grow in their
careers ‘after us’. We have a repertoire of things
that we deem appropriate to use in such
situations. We might incorporate the unlikely,
unusual or untried, or we might stick to what we
know works for a whole heap of reasons I won’t
rehearse here. Here I would like to consider
examples of what the unusual – in the sense of
creative, imaginative or playful – might look like in
relation to a whole range of our endeavours. I’ll
outline the theoretical value to their use and also
the student and staff responses to them, whether
in teaching, professional and creative practice, or
research - and in all disciplines. I’ll start with
reflection and personal development planning
(PDP), in which eportfolio use is likely to be
implicit, however the theory and examples are not
limited to undergraduate study nor is the notion of
reflection only limited to one place and type of
self-evaluation, as evidenced in Figure 1.
What we know about reflection and PDP
First of all, we know this: reflection as critical (self)
evaluation is an embedded and expected part of
the university curriculum in the UK 1. For it to be
most meaningful to students it needs to be
nurtured explicitly, but not by imposing a single
straitjacket of practice. Student interest and
engagement with reflection varies from the
sublime to the hideous and all sorts in between.
Assessing it can be hard but is not impossible; the
recording and assessing of reflection is
predominantly in
written
form,
although
multisensory
and
experiential
forms
of
engagement exist. Models and styles of reflection
(tone, priorities, relationship with literature and
theory, content and so on) vary considerably. The
Figure 1
1
This can be traced back to the National Committee of
Inquiry into Higher Education recommendation in 1997
that all UK HEIs should provide “a means by which
students can monitor, build and reflect upon their
personal development” (NCIHE 1997). From this arose
the expectation that personal development planning
(PDP) opportunities should be available for every HE
student, embodied in the guidance of the Quality
Assurance Agency for Higher Education: PDP is defined
as “a structured and supported process undertaken by
a learner to reflect upon their own learning,
performance and/or achievement and to plan for their
personal, educational and career development” (QAA
2009).
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