Engelhard student reflection prompt
Fall 2008
NOTE: Please send your response through e-mail.
I will note whether this assignment is turned in and grade it similarly to the journals/blogs. You may count it as either a blog or journal entry. In your response, please note which you would like it to count as.
Your name will then be removed and your response shared anonymously with the Engelhard research team.
Prompt:
An important component of this course is reflective writing. This particular reflective writing assignment asks you to reflect on your personal experience and the course content (concepts and themes, readings, class discussions, information in the Engelhard module, the guest speaker, community-based activities, and assignments, etc.), in order to discover and illuminate the dynamic intersections between them.
Some of the materials we’ve studied and the concepts we’ve talked about may have struck a personal chord with you, such as the presentation and discussion Bringing your personal reactions into this piece of writing is appropriate, as the goal is to have you think about what we’ve been studying as it relates to larger life and societal issues. But it’s equally critical to tie in the issues discussed in class and the academic content of the course.
After organizing your ideas, please write a one to two-page reflective essay conveying your personal response to this class. Your essay should make explicit the specific connections you saw/see between your personal lived experiences, the content and activities associated with this course. More specifically, did the course’s attention to the social/psychological/moral/emotional dimensions of teaching and learning connect in any way to your own learning this semester and your past or present experiences?
There are many different ways you might approach this personal essay. You may choose to describe what was different about this class, compared to others (non-Engelhard courses) you’ve taken at Georgetown. You might give examples of how the learning environment or class atmosphere affected your learning in the course. If you feel you did better academic or other kinds of work in this course than in other courses, you could explain why you thought that was so.
Most college classes don’t openly address mental health and wellness issues. You may want to describe how such discussions in this class affected your experience of the course and your life as a Georgetown student. You could also discuss what your experience in this course made you think about outside of class, and if you changed any of your habits or behaviors because of what you learned or discussed in the course. You might also address whether the course generated new discussions or modified your interactions outside of class.
If this class raised any unsettling emotions for you, you may want to describe what they were and how you worked through them. You could also indicate if you now feel more confident that you could manage unsettling emotions and situations in the future..
Your response will be submitted anonymously to the Georgetown Engelhard research team as feedback on how the program is reaching its goals.