The Building from Experience Project: 

Examining Formative Experiences and their Impact on Developmental Patterns and Outcomes

Reid Riggle, Associate Professor of Education, St. Norbert College, DePere, WI USA

Introduction

How did you arrive at where you are?  What factors and experiences influenced the person you are now?  Reflecting on formative experiences can be useful in understanding how individuals arrived at the set of qualities that make up their characteristics; who they are.  In doing so, they are trying to trace developmental patterns and influences to understand the unique forces that resulted in the set of qualities they possess.  Looking back like this is not just nostalgia, it is an attempt to identify critical events, structural factors, and people who influenced the formation of each person’s identity, values/beliefs, and habits/skills.  

Image by Mediamodifier from Pixabay

Reflecting helps pre-service teachers examine their path, facilitating their understanding of self and how their journey can facilitate their understanding of the forces and processes that influence all of us; including the K12 students they help to support and guide. 

Process

Pre-service teachers in EDUC 279: Child & Adolescent Development

 at St. Norbert College were asked to reflect on their developmental experiences and their relation to the person they are today as a means to find personal connections with central concepts from the course employing self-inquiry, reflective writing, sharing, and peer feedback as a means to consider the forces and factors that influence development of school aged children and adolescents.  

Each pre-service teacher produced a series of six targeted reflective documents articulating their experience; one a week over six weeks.  These documents were shared with the class in a common Google Folder.  The authors received peer feedback on each essay from “editorial boards” comprised of their classmates.   At the classe’s suggestion, the editorial boards were rotated each week so that authors received feedback form the majority of the class at some point and all editorial boards had a chance to read the perspectives of the members of the class.

The matrix below lays out the focus for the reflections.  Each author selected six of the nine areas in the grid for their reflections.   The only stipulation was that an area could not be repeated and that all six variables must be addressed.

Focus of Reflections PeopleStructural FactorsCritical Events
IdentityViewViewView
Values/BeliefsViewViewView
Habits/SkillsViewViewView

At the end of the process each author selected one of their six reflective essays to share in the OER.  Authors were encouraged to refine their final choice for publication based on the feedback of their peers.  

The professor served as the senior executive editor, overseeing and monitoring the process, then making the final approval on each of the pieces for publication.  Consequently, although the professor set goals and created the structure, the work was largely driven by the members of the class.  

The collective process of inquiry helped the members of the class to form a “baseline” of understanding that they can use as a reference to explore theory and research on human development as it relates to their practice as educators.