This post reflects on “Reflective Writing – some initial guidance for students by Jenny Moon, University of Exeter” on the supplied reading list.
In some anonymous feedback for ‘Introduction to Photography’, which is a unit I lead on the frst year of BA Photography, there was a comment about reflective writing not being long enough.
‘I would like 200 more words allowed in the critical analysis’
This was the only comment we received about the reflective writing (incorrectly called critical analysis). I was struck by it because we have worked to generally reduce word counts in the first year, as we work towards allowing students with diverse learning needs to be better catered for.
If we consider this piece of advice form Moon’s guidance there is an interesting distinction on the quality of the reflective writing:
“It is worth thinking of the quality of reflective writing as being on a continuum from rather superficial writings that are largely descriptive, to much deeper writings in which the questioning is more profound. Neither is necessarily right or wrong – they are just different.”
Having reflected on this piece of text, and the way we deliver guidance on reflective writing, which is often a key assessment criteria, it seems essential that we better prepare students to write ‘quality’ feedback. So the word count is perhaps less important than the preparation. I will use this guidance from the University of Exeter as a teaching resource next academic year.