I can get by with a little help from my friends: Peer mentoring - critical friends for the reflective practitioner

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Research and Development in Higher Education Vol. 29: Critical Visions Thinking, learning and researching in higher education

July, 2006, 392 pages
Published by
Alison Bunker and Iris Vardi
ISBN
0 908557 69 8
Abstract 

As educators, our competence in being reflective practitioners is based on the belief that we have within us the ability to self review, find solutions, plan, apply and critique again. How good at all this are we? Ongoing support to sustain and build our capacity as reflective practitioners will enable us in this endeavour. Peer mentoring draws on the notion that collectively within a group of peers there is a pool of skills, experience and resources that can be used to support educators as they review their work experiences in order to develop their professional skills and competencies – “no one knows as much as all of us”. It is a powerful and enabling collegial process. It is synonymous with critical reflection and promotes a most effective professional development tool to support being a reflective practitioner. The peer mentoring process outlined here illustrates how reflective processes can unfold in the presence of others and also describes guidelines to manage the pitfalls that collaborative exchanges with peers can encounter.

Keywords: Peer mentoring, reflective practice, effective mentoring processes