60 Reflective Essay and Final Portfolio Assignment Guidelines

Writing a Reflective Essay

Introduction:

Congratulations—you’ve nearly made it to the end of the semester! For the past several months, you’ve worked diligently on your topic for community change, all the way from identifying a community to which you belong to taking action on an issue you see in a community by writing a proposal and sending out a call-to-action letter. This last writing assignment and portfolio will give you an opportunity to reflect on all of these experiences. 

What is reflective writing?

The University of New South Wales (https://student.unsw.edu.au/reflective-writing) provides a valuable overview of what reflective writing is and is not:

Reflective writing is:

• • documenting your response to experiences, opinions, events or new information
  • communicating your response to thoughts and feelings
  • a way of exploring your learning
  • an opportunity to gain self-knowledge
  • a way to achieve clarity and better understanding of what you are learning
  • a chance to develop and reinforce writing skills
  • a way of making meaning out of what you study

Reflective writing is not:

• • just conveying information, instruction or argument
  • pure description, though there may be descriptive elements
  • straightforward decision or judgement, e.g. about whether something is right or wrong, good or bad
  • simple problem-solving
  • a summary of course notes
  • a standard college essay

You may also want to visit the UNSW Reflective Writing webpage, as it provides helpful tips for writing reflectively as well as some examples of different types of reflective writing.

How should you organize your reflective essay?

Because reflective essays are entirely subjective, there is no single organizational method. However, The Norton Field Guide to Writing, 5th ed. offers two helpful suggestions for structuring your essay. Feel free to use either organizational plan:

Organizational Plan #1

Organizational Plan #2

Assignment:

Part 1: Reflective Essay

Write a 2 to 3-page (about 500 to 750 word) double-spaced reflective essay that tracks your journey with your topic for community change. In developing your reflection, you will want to review the various assignments you completed during the semester, specifically:

• • • Multimodal Personal Narrative
    • Topic Proposal
    • Image Analysis Essay
    • Synthesis Essay
    • Summaries of 8 Sources
    • Proposal Argument
    • Call-to-action letter

It may also be helpful for you to consider the following questions:

• • • How does your topic relate to your personal values or to what is right?
    • How did you wrestle or grapple with this topic?
    • What were some obstacles to overcome?
    • What were high points?
    • How have your thoughts about this topic deepened or progressed?
    • How will you use the skills you acquired this semester in other classes or outside of class?

Additional Requirements:

• • • Your essay should be cohesive with a clear beginning, middle, and end.
    • Use specific examples (from readings, assignments, discussions, etc.) to support your claims.
    • Format your paper according to MLA conventions (Times New Roman, 12-point font, double-spaced, etc.).
    • Give your paper a title.

Part 2: Portfolio

As part of your final project, you will compile a portfolio of your major writing assignments in one Word doc, which means that you will need to cut/paste clean versions (without my grading/notes) of each of your final papers & rough drafts into one new document. The first page of this document will contain a Title Page; page 2 will comprise a Table of Contents (with page numbers). On page 3, you will include your Reflective Essay. After the Reflective Essay, you will include the final versions of your major writing assignments and the rough drafts. NOTE: You are required to revise at least one of these writing assignments and address this revision process in your Reflective Essay. You can choose which writing assignment you revise; in some cases, this may be a writing assignment you revised earlier in the semester for a higher grade.

Your portfolio must contain the following (in this order):

• Title page:
  • Your name
  • English 101-XX [Section number]
  • Composition Portfolio
  • Date

• Table of Contents:
  • Reflective Essay Final: “Your Title,” page XX
  • Reflective Essay Rough Draft, “Your Title, page XX
  • Multimodal Personal Narrative Final: “Your Title,” page XX
  • Multimodal Personal Narrative Rough Draft: “Your Title,” page XX
  • Image Analysis Essay Final, “Your Title,” page XX
  • Image Analysis Essay Rough Draft, “Your Title,” page XX
  • Synthesis Essay Final, “Your Title,” page XX
  • Synthesis Essay Rough Draft, “Your Title,” page XX
  • Summaries of 8 Sources, page XX
  • Proposal Argument Final, “Your Title,” page XX
  • Proposal Argument Rough Draft, “Your Title,” page XX
  • Call-to-action Letter Final, page XX
  • Call-to-action Letter Rough Draft, page XX

• Reflective Essay – Final Version
• Reflective Essay – Rough Draft

• Multimodal Essay Final Version
• Multimodal Essay Rough Draft

• Image Analysis Final Version
• Image Analysis Rough Draft 

• Synthesis Essay Final Version
• Synthesis Essay Rough Draft

• Summaries

• Proposal Argument Final Version
• Proposal Argument Rough Draft

• Call-to-action letter Final Version
• Call-to-action letter Rough Draft