9.4. Steps to Reflection
Researchers are consistent in describing the importance of thinking critically about our own lived experiences before we begin to think about how we can participate in a project, take action, and create meaningful change in our surroundings. The following steps can help your pause and make sure learning is actually happening.
Step 1: Monitor
Pause and ask yourself some questions: Did I comprehend the writer’s argument? Do I need to go back and reread the argument?
Step 2: Evaluate
Assess what you are learning and what you still want or need to know to ensure that you discuss an issue in complex ways that avoid binary thinking.
Step 3: Formulate strategies
Identify some next steps, based on your own self-assessment, for addressing any challenges, such as comprehending a technical argument, solving a problem you have formulated, or answering a question you have posed. What other sources of information can you consult? Whom can you ask for additional help?
Step 4: Apply what you learn about your own learning
Write down some of the challenges you have faced in writing – formulating a question, collecting materials, drafting, or revising, for example. How have you dealt with those challenges? How would you apply what you have learned to completing other academic writing assignments?
Exercise 9.4. Reflection Activities
This exercise will give you an opportunity to practice monitoring your work, evaluating what you are learning, formulating strategies, and documenting how you will apply what you learned.
Reflect upon and write about the steps you are taking to collect information for what you are writing, to draft your essay, and to revise your work.
- Pause and consider the approach you are taking and whether this is the best way to fulfill your goals as a writer and reach your audience.
- Assess what you are learning about taking a process approach to writing.
- Formulate some next steps for your writing.
- What have you learned so far about writing that you can apply to this and other kinds of academic tasks? That is, if you have faced some uncertainties, what did you do to address these moments? Did you talk to others in your writing group? Were they helpful? Or did you seek other forms of help to get what you needed?
