Conditions for reflection

You should be thinking about possible experiences, subjects and opportunities for reflective writing before and during your placements, not only after them.

Some conditions which can assist you to learn through reflection include:

  • Preparation - when you enter into a new experience, try to identify opportunities for reflection.
  • Understanding - you need to know what the goals and expectations of critical reflection are. It is also helpful to understand the expectations of the course and profession. What does it mean to be an effective student or healthcare professional? How do your reflections relate to these expectations?
  • Time - it is important to give yourself the time to stop and think.
  • Objectivity - you need to maintain a level of objectivity about yourself and the impact of your actions.
  • Honesty - try to maintain an open, non-defensive attitude to the experience.
  • Meaning - you need to focus on the deeper levels of meaning – moral, ethical, social and/or professional issues (Branch & Paranjape, 2002), in addition to your emotional response.

Conditions inhibiting reflection

In the workplace, lack of time frequently limits opportunities for learning through reflection. People may not have time to stop and think or debrief with colleagues (e.g. during a busy handover between shifts). Similarly, time is an issue for students.

For students, perhaps the major obstacle to learning through reflection is devoting insufficient time to it, and consequently failing to explore the experience in depth. Also, students sometimes write simply to meet the assessment requirements, without genuinely engaging in the process.

This will lead to less meaningful insights or positive change.

The action-reflection model

There is a clear link between action, reflection and change within this style of learning. In the activity-reflection model there are four stages to the cycle of reflection:

  1. the initial or new experience
  2. reflection and observation
  3. development of a new concept
  4. experimentation.

The action-reflection cycle: Initial or new experience > Reflection or observation > Development of a new concept > Experiementation > Initial or new experience...

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