Ongoing Reflection and Practice

As I consider this process of teaching for intellectual character, I realize that it is a personal reflective journey, and that the transformation of my students as thinkers only comes as I learn how to transform the experience and culture of my class, and that THAT comes best when it arises organically through deep personal reflection and self-examination. So, I recommend that you finish the last 3 chapters of Ritchhart's book, and here are some final thoughts to continue this professional journey:

1. Engage with yourself as a teacher:
   What are MY values? What do I believe about learning and the goal of teaching? What kind of thinker am I?
2. Attend to the defining aspects of dispositions:
   Creating a more thinking-rich classroom itself requires a dispositional stance:
   o Inclination
   o Ability
   o Awareness
3. Engage with colleagues
   -Why does this concept/skill/topic matter to our discipline? How would engaging in this help our students become better thinkers?
   -What thinking dispositions should we be actively cultivating? How do you scaffold activities or tweak assignments to place greater emphasis and value on the demonstration of those dispositions?
   -Observe one another teach.

Let me just say how much I've appreciated everyone's thoughtful and earnest participation, most of all your willingness to examine yourselves and allow us to enter into your own reflective journey!