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Reflective Essay Writing: How to Cope with It Successfully?
Are you bored with writing about some uninteresting subjects? Congratulations, with your assignment on reflective essay writing you will have an opportunity to write about yourself! Let’s discuss what reflective essay writing implies and how it should be done.
Students are often given an assignment that implies reflective essay writing on a course taken by them or a project fulfilled during it. When writing a reflective essay in some discipline, you can touch upon the following matters:
- How do you understand the purpose of a course/project?
- What skills and knowledge did a course/project help to improve?
- What previous background and skills did you need when attending a course or fulfilling a project?
- How does a course/project relate to your career plans?
However, the focus of reflective essay writing is much broader than studying. In many cases, students are required to write a reflective essay on some experience beyond their studying.
For example, an assignment may imply writing a reflective essay on:
- Leadership experience
- Biggest achievement
- Biggest failure
- Team work
- Participation in a project
Do not forget that reflective essay writing is not all about describing events, but also about REFLECTING them. When writing a reflective essay, describe how you felt, what you thought, how you evaluated the situation, what conclusions you made etc. This is what a reader expects from your reflective essay writing.
Reflective essay writing allows using the first person. At the same time, it is important to stay formal, though you will add personality to your essay. Compare these two examples:
- Informal: The course was really amazing: it was very helpful in terms of…
- Formal: I enjoyed taking this course, as it helped me to develop…
In the second case, a writer stays genuine, but uses the formal writing style, which is appropriate for reflective essay writing.
