The Reflexive Classroom Manager

Description

240 pages
Contains Bibliography
$25.95
ISBN 1-55059-292-0
DDC 371.102'4

Year

2005

Contributor

Reviewed by Luke Lawson

Luke Lawson is a teacher and administrator in Vancouver, B.C.

Review

Current trends in education suggests that learning from personal actions
and reflecting on those actions is of greater benefit to educators—new
teachers and student-teachers in particular—than merely reading how-to
texts.

The Reflexive Classroom Manager is an excellent introduction to the
educational field of action research, a methodology of researching
(understanding) and action (change) that is usually associated with some
type of reflection. In practice, action research involves the teacher
undertaking a period of time in a classroom or similar setting,
reflecting on that experience, and then suggesting how to change future
outcomes. To illustrate this three-step process—act, reflect, and
revise—the author provides a series of anecdotes drawn from the
experiences of elementary and secondary teachers.

The final chapters, including an examination of verbal and non-verbal
communication, are more prescriptive and add nothing to the main focus
of the book. Despite this, The Reflexive Classroom Manager is an
invaluable resource for new teachers.

Citation

Ryan, Thomas G., “The Reflexive Classroom Manager,” Canadian Book Review Annual Online, accessed December 5, 2024, https://cbra.library.utoronto.ca/items/show/15864.