If you’re writing a reflective essay, you’re sharing your ideas and feelings on anything, whether an event or an article, lesson, or lecture. For an essay to be considered reflective, the writer must be able to assess a one-time event from a current perspective.
The result of this is that to create a reflective essay, the writer must reflect on his own experiences and assess how they have molded him. In essence, it’s a reflection on your own life’s journey, highlighting the lessons you’ve taken away from it. In this essay style, you have to be honest about your ideas and feelings to reveal your thinking, personality, aspects of character, and background. So, in addition to describing the event or work, your reflective essay should include your ideas, emotions, and responses.
In a reflective essay, you will not be tasked with arranging data already handed to you. Instead, you’ll be able to think logically and fluently about your ideas. Emotions may also be engaged. Emotional descriptions are necessary, but they cannot “muddy the waters” so that your reader doesn’t receive a comprehensive “picture.”
Let’s look at how to write an excellent reflective essay now that you know all of this.
Take notes:
First and foremost, let’s set the stage. You must be able to make sense of what you’ve just read or seen. A good suggestion is to take some notes throughout the process, particularly on the items that influenced you.
If it’s a reflective essay based on a movie, consider watching the film at least twice before you begin writing your essay. The first time through is for a general response, and the second time through is for taking notes. A book is no different. It is essential to know how to write a reflective essay about a book or a movie so that you can present enough information to back up your thoughts. In addition, it is necessary to cite any passages that support your response.
There is no way to recreate your experience when listening to a lecture or participating in a field study. So as the encounter unfolds, it would be best if you noted the things that resonated with you. A second opportunity won’t be given to you.
However, taking notes while having an experience isn’t always feasible. So take notes as soon as you can after the event to help you recall them when you are about to write the essay later.
Getting started on a reflective essay isn’t the most pressing issue. For starters, consider the following questions:
How would I describe my overall impression?
How did I feel about the experience — was it positive or negative?
Do I have a new perspective on a subject due to this experience? Has it influenced my prior biases or prejudices?
Why was I unmoved by the film, book, or event if I wasn’t?
Make a list of your responses to the following questions. These will form the basis of your reflection essay’s points.
Organize your thoughts: There is no need to worry about the commencement of reflective essay papers. Instead, your body paragraphs should be your primary emphasis at this point. This is a standard format for most school papers and essays.
Let’s assume you’ve just completed a field experience for a school course in education. You spent a week in a real classroom, watching and learning from teachers and students. What you’ve seen and experienced thus far is enough to warrant a decent reflection paper. Besides the questions above, you’ll want to construct other questions depending on the subject matter itself, such as:
Was the classroom management satisfactory?
How was the instructor able to meet the requirements of each student?
Were the exercises designed to pique students’ interest?
Your essay may be divided into three portions based on the answers to these three questions.
So, what’s the best way to craft a reflective piece of writing? In the same manner in which you would compose any other essay. Everything else is the same as before, except for the content and the fact that you are the resource in this case.
Make sure you don’t contradict yourself:
A paragraph describing being bored or disinterested should not be included in a reflection paper if you have already said that you were inspired by a particular piece of literature, film, or speech.
Reflective essays should be sincere and accurate:
Do not fabricate a story only for the sake of eliciting a response. You need to explain why you weren’t affected by anything. Write down three reasons why you were unmoved and address them clearly in the body paragraphs of your analytical piece of writing. For essay writing, and if you need help with assignment writing, reach out to grademiners.com who are regarded as one on the best writing service.