Research-related teaching has become a central pillar in higher education over the last four decades, converging into the ‘scholarship of teaching and learning’ (SoTL) movement. According to the framework developed by Healey (2005), research-based learning in higher education is located in the quadrant ‘participation x research processes/problems’. The phases of research-based learning mirror the phases of a typical research process (Pedaste et al., 2015): students conduct a research project by pursuing their own research question, acquiring and applying research methods, presenting and discussing their research findings. Reflection is an essential phase in research-based learning: It enables students to document, interpret and evaluate their learning process, and to receive feedback from peers and faculty staff. This, in turn, requires students to consciously perceive and reveal insights on their research competence (e.g. Hunter et al., 2007; Thiem et al., 2023). Whereas theoretical and empirical work on research-based learning and reflecting is widespread for teacher education programmes, it is still rare for educational science programmes (e.g. Afdal & Spernes, 2018; Brew & Saunders, 2020). To fill this research gap, our study examines reflection in and on research-based learning among educational science students. (RQ1) Which activities do students perceive challenging in the research project? (RQ2) What topic areas do students address in the reflected research situations? (RQ3) How do students self-assess their research competence through the research project? For this purpose, we designed a university course along the method of research-based learning. The students had to plan and conduct a research project and write a narrative report during the project, in which they reflected on challenging research situations. These reflections were qualitatively analysed regarding research phases/activities and topics (Mayring, 2022). In addition, a fully structured questionnaire was administered at the end of the project and used to quantitatively analyse the students’ self-assessed research competence. The results show that especially research methods (conducting and analysing interviews, presenting and discussing findings), project organisation (organising interviews), as well as emotions and self-regulation pose notable challenges in research-based learning. Furthermore, the results show that the self-assessed research competence is moderate to high in all facets, but highest in research methods. The findings of our study provide in-depth insights into research-based learning and reflecting that can be used by faculty staff to design and evaluate their university course.

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