Reflective Practice

Notes on Reflection

'''NB. Use this as a guide only, to help you in preparing your Reflective Essay - it is not a set of criteria.'''

A reflection essay is a way of recording more personally your thoughts, feelings and opinions about your study, and specifically your own (intercultural) communication practices and experiences throughout the course. It may include questions, observations, analysis and reflection about events, experiences and issues. It can be subjective and informal in style.

Reflective essays are relatively more broad than research essays (they outline a response to a broader learning experience; i.e. your communication practices and team work)

Focus on improvement rather than judgement alone, to help you assess and then build on your own strengths. It is an opportunity to identify ways of addressing weaknesses and plan appropriate action – so discuss as a team!

A reflective piece is:
 * designed to encourage you to critically examine and reflect upon yourself/your work.
 * critical analysis, reflection and interpretation of one’s own communication practices/experiences
 * the ability to identify and assess best practice

Why might it be valuable?
 * organize and critically evaluate what you learn
 * review your progress
 * increase self-awareness
 * think critically about issues and beliefs
 * make sense of a set of experiences
 * improve understanding and build new understanding

''And this is even important for long-standing professionals, who often never have the time to evaluate and reflect... always straight onto the next task!!!''

Reflect upon strengths and weaknesses within your own (intercultural) communication practices, ideally making connections between course and practice; it includes:


 * A reflection on your own learning during the course.
 * Comment on what worked well and what did not work well throughout. Be specific about what you would do the same, or differently, as a result of your reflections

What should written component look like/include?

It can be subjective in style, but while you may use the first-person pronoun ‘I’, your written expression shouldn’t be informal or colloquial. You are still trying to convey a sense of critical distance on the communication process, and evidence of your reading (on groups), making connections between course content and practice is required.

The reflective essay is a critical evaluation of the team process: it is not just simply just a description of it. It can include commentary on your expectations at the beginning of the course/assessment, what worked well, what went wrong, and what you learned that might improve your research practice if you were required to complete a similar task again.

Structure your writing in the form of an introduction, main body and conclusion (which should relate directly to the experiences described in the main body of this piece of writing).

The reflective essay doesn’t require the same degree of referencing as research essays as they are responding to work already done in the course and previous assessment tasks. It does require a re-reading of your course readings, your past assessment, lecture & feedback notes. It could also include some research into intercultural communication and team work, for example.

Possible Areas for Analysis:


 * What makes a good/effective team?


 * How did you maintain the team/get the most from the group?


 * What went wrong? What could you have done? How did you resolve disagreement/problems/conflict?


 * What were the difficulties/challenges of group work (at uni/in general)?


 * How was it interesting/valuable? Benefits? (Particularly in this class, given its title)

Think about:


 * interpersonal skills: giving and receiving feedback


 * professional judgement and decision making skills


 * problem solving skills


 * planning and goals setting skills


 * increased understanding through articulation of underlying theoretical position


 * clarification of values and attitudes inherent in decisions


 * self-assessment

You still need to:


 * Demonstrate insight into the learning, communication & team process (through exploration and analysis of your own communication practices/experiences)

detail or example
 * Makes the reader understand the abstract ideas underlying the reflection through use of specific


 * Use appropriate language & effectively use writing to enhance reflection (e.g. appropriate description, review, analysis and structuring of piece)