What is 'reflective writing'?
Take a step back for a moment, and think about good practitioners of any profession that you have come across. What makes them good at what they do? First they have a certain amount of skill – techniques, knacks gained through experience. They have knowledge gained through their training: they discuss practice issues with colleagues, they keep up to date in their practice by reading, and apply evidence from their reading to their practice. And yes, they have the ability to reflect – to think about what they have just done, the person they are working with, and what went well, and what went less well in their interactions or activities.
Reflection is important because looking back in order to think about what we have just done, helps us to make changes in our interactions with people, and to get better at what we do.
Reading and research feeds all aspects of a practitioner
- knowledge about the situation we encounter
- skills to bring to the situation
- understanding of the wider context and issues
- and the ability to reflect and see the gaps in our preparedness, and pinpoint things we need to change.
