Schon Shock: a case for refraining reflection‐in‐action?

Abstract

This paper assesses the contribution of Donald Schön's The Reflective Practitioner to thinking about professional knowledge and expertise. While containing an important original idea, the notion of reflection‐in‐action, Schon seems more concerned with finding examples to counter what he calls the technical rationality paradigm. Hence he neither analyses everyday practice nor attempts to consider how reflective processes might serve different purposes or vary from one context to another. Most of his examples fail to provide evidence of reflection‐in‐action and none of them relate to crowded settings like classrooms. Indeed it is difficult to see how one could distinguish reflection‐in‐action from reflection‐on‐action when the action is cool and deliberate rather than hot and rapid. Three recommendations are made for reframing Schön's account of reflection. First, to redefine the key prepositions so that in refers to context on refers to focus and for refers to purpose. All Schön's examples relate to reflection on action and for action, only some are in action. Dewey's concept of reflection is outside the action and for learning; and hence for future action rather than current action. Second, to recognize the significance of the time dimension: a rapid intuitive process is not the same as a slower, more deliberate, process. Third, to distinguish between a decision‐making or problem‐solving process and a metacognitive dimension within that process. The novel aspect of Schön's book is its contribution to a theory of metacognition.