Prá ctica IV – Residencia Pedagó gica

What Is a Reflective Essay?

Reflective essays describe an event or experience, and then analyze the meaning of that
experience and what can be learned from it. What makes an essay reflective is that the
writer is analyzing a past event from the present.

Reflective essays require the writer to open up about their thoughts and emotions in
order to paint a true picture of their history, personality, and individual traits. They
should include a vivid summary and description of the experience so that the reader
feels they have also experienced it. They should also include an explanation of their
thoughts, feelings, and reactions.

How Do You Organize a Reflective Paper?

The organization of a reflective essay is very similar to other types of essays.

Cover

Introduction

Development

Conclusion

References

Your paper should have 10-15 pages with pictures included.

Letter: Arial

Line spacing: 1.5

Justified text

APA Style

How Do You Write a Reflection Paper?

Writing a reflective essay, also known as a reflective paper or reflection paper, is as
easy as following the step-by-step instructions below.

1. Choose a Topic Idea

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The first step of writing a great reflective essay is choosing a topic, so choose wisely!

2. Study Your Subject

Depending on your topic, you may need to close your eyes and remember, read, watch,
listen, or imagine. Spend a few minutes vividly thinking or re-experiencing your
subject.

3. Brainstorm

Write down everything you can think about your subject. You want to describe this
subject as vividly as you can, so think about smells, tastes, noises, and tastes along with
what you see. Try to write down vivid adjectives that describe these sensory
experiences. Look up sense-describing words for help. You can write these down in
sentences or in phrases. Just get as much down as you can. Later, you will turn this into
a paragraph.

4. Pick Reflection Questions

Read through the list of reflection questions below and select at least three you want to
answer.

1. What did I notice?

2. How did I feel about this?

3. Why did it make me feel this way?

4. How was my experience of this unique to me? How did others who were there
experience it differently? Why?

5. How has this changed me?

6. What might I have done differently?

7. What is the meaning of this event in my life?

8. How is this similar to something else that I've experienced?

9. How can I use this to help someone else?

10. How does this event relate to the rest of my life?

11. How is this typical in my life?

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12. Was this a good or a bad thing for me?

13. How did this experience foretell things that would happen later?

14. Was my experience the same as someone else's or different?

15. What skills did I learn?

16. How can I apply what I learned to my life?

17. How can I apply this experience to my studies?

18. How can this help me in my career?

19. What about this experience challenged me socially?

20. In what way did this expand my understanding of my own culture? Or a different
culture?

21. How was this emotionally important? Or emotionally difficult?

22. What questions did this experience make me have?

23. How has this changed the way I think?

24. How has this made me realize someone else was right?

25. How was this unexpected? Or how did this fulfill my expectations?

26. Would I want to repeat this experience?

27. Would this experience be the same if I did it again?

28. How did this affect me and why?

29. Why did I have the reaction I did to this?

5. Answer the Questions You Selected

Read your questions and then answer them. This doesn't have to be in formal essay form
or in perfect sentences. You just want to get as many ideas down as possible.

6. Identify the Meaning of Your Experience

Before you can begin writing your essay, you need to decide what is the most important
thing you learned from this experience.

A further tip – using wider sources

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Although a reflective piece of writing is focused on personal experience, it’s important

you draw on other sources to demonstrate your understanding of your experience from
a theoretical perspective. It’ll show a level of analysis – and a standard of reliability in
what you’re claiming – if you’re also able to validate your work against other
perspectives that you find. Think about possible sources, like newspapers, surveys,
books and even journal articles. Generally, the additional sources you decide to include
in your work are highly dependent on your field of study. Analysing a wide range of
sources, will show that you have read widely on your subject area, that you have
nuanced insight into the available literature on the subject of your essay, and that you
have considered the broader implications of the literature for your essay. The
incorporation of other sources into your essay also helps to show that you are aware of
the multi-dimensional nature of both the learning and problem-solving process.

Remember to check your grammar, punctuation and spelling.

https://owlcation.com/humanities/How-to-Write-a-Reflective-Essay-with-Sample-Essays

https://www.oxbridgeessays.com/blog/complete-guide-to-writing-a-reflective-essay/

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