Reflection by design: applying a design methodology to enhance student learning journey through reflective practice

There are multiple forms of reflective practice, such as models developed by Kolb (1984) and Gibbs (1988), which are routinely drawn upon within Higher Education teaching, learning and assessment. However, in the authors’ experience, these are used in an ad hoc manner across different modules and activities with little attempt to embed a coherent longitudinal approach to support development of reflective practice across an academic programme or within the wider student journey. This chapter reflects on a project which used service design thinking to inform and develop student engagement with reflective practice across one year post graduate courses within a UK Higher Education institution. It reports on the authors’ experience of: introducing reflective concepts; co-creating interventions with the students; embedding these within the student journey and evaluating the effectiveness of a pedagogical approach derived from service design thinking to engage students in the reflective process. The project was undertaken drawing on experiences from students who have an understanding of concepts from service design, but the chapter goes on to consider how lessons learnt could be applied more widely with higher education teaching and curriculum development practices. It concludes by arguing that service design offers a new way of conceptualising how reflective practice fits within student learning journeys. It also suggests that pedagogic tools developed from service design may offer an alternative way to engage students in deeper critical reflection across their learning journey and support development of individual reflective practice.