ABSTRACT
Typically, the formal processes, frameworks, and theories that characterize the field of instructional design and technology provide only a starting point in the work of expert practitioners. Professional designers tend to base decisions on reservoirs of prior experience and practical judgment that are flexible and adaptable, and that allow them to cope with the variability, nuance, and paradoxes that characterize authentic working conditions. In the literature this is known as reflective practice, or being a reflective practitioner (Schön, 1983). Reflective practitioners are “active … agents of innovation”. They can be found “responding to complex and dynamic forces, thinking multi-dimensionally, and continually monitoring the relationship between one’s goals and actions”. They solve problems and contribute toward important aims not because of their proficiency in following generalized processes, but through their sensitivity to local needs and ability to respond in whatever manner their circumstances dictate. Given the importance of these capacities in instructional design, especially when solving the difficult problems that designers often face, helping students develop into reflective practitioners should be a key outcome of instructional design education. My purpose in this chapter is to provide guidance to instructional design educators in pursuit of this goal. I do this by reviewing the importance of reflective practice within professional contexts, and by describing strategies educators can use to help their students nurture the dispositions associated with reflective practice. But first, I turn to a situation that may be familiar to many readers.
