Harvard Psychology and Education

Alternative education

For the Initial Reflection our advice is  to pick one or two themes covered in the initial sessions of the module and select one reading on that theme. Do not be over-ambitious: it is more valuable to you to consider a limited range of ideas in depth than to try to cover everything. The chosen reading should be from the session reading lists; but you may of course reference other texts.  (For the theme, i have picked the alternative education, and the attached is the class reading)

Your Initial Reflection might have the following structure:

1. Introduction: explain why this is a theme in education that is important to you (about 200 words). For example, in relation to your own experience or to more general concerns.
2. Analysis of an argument or two from the reading: summarise what you consider to be one or two ideas or arguments from the text you have selected (about 400 words). Note: at some point we suggest you use a quotation from the reading, properly formatted and referenced, as evidence of what the author said in the area you have selected.
3. Conclusion: critically reflect on what you have learnt about different ways of understanding your theme, and discuss any interesting questions raised by the text (about 400 words)
Includea list of any references you have mentioned (this does not count towards the word-count).

In Part 3, you can focus on different views of your theme.  This could mean looking at strong and weak points in the arguments or saying what different people have said about your theme.  If there are any questions raised by the text for you, you can describe these and explain the extent to which they are or are not important in relation to the theme.