Abstract
This paper reports on the use of comics to help facilitate reflection on one’s past as part of an early childhood education degree programme in Spain. It is common in professional education programmes in the health and education fields to encourage students to reflect on their past in order to explore how this has shaped their development and how it has influenced their career decisions. A challenge with more traditional forms of written reflections in this area is that they often become simple descriptions without any critical reflection on past experiences. To address this, the research reported here aimed to explore the extent to which comics had the capacity to afford alternative and novel ways of reflecting on one’s past by providing students with the opportunity to create their own comics. Reporting on a sample of the completed comics and the students’ reactions to the task, the study found that despite initial reservations and limited experience of comics, the students completed the task to an impressive level. While there was variation in the quality of the completed students’ comics, they had utilised many of the unique affordances of comics to reflect their past lives. This paper discusses the implications of integrating comics into reflective practice activities and the challenges and opportunities they pose for practitioners.
Recommended Citation
McGarr, Oliver; Gavaldon, Guillermina; and Sáez de Adana Herrero, Francisco Manuel
(2021)
"Using comics as a tool to facilitate critical reflective practice in professional education,"
SANE journal: Sequential Art Narrative in Education: Vol. 2:
Iss.
6, Article 1.
Available at:
https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/sane/vol2/iss6/1