As teachers we all know how busy and content-packed the school year can get. Therefore, student reflection in the classroom can sometimes end up being pushed to the back burner. Oftentimes it feels like it has to be this huge, well-planned and expansive project or activity. Other times it seems to spiral into a confusing, meaningless mess. 

In actuality, there are several ways that reflection can and should be incorporated within and amongst the required classroom content.

First of all, let’s talk about what makes reflection beneficial in the classroom.

1. Reflection helps students gain a deeper connection with their learning. A reflection can draw their attention to the purpose of their learning as well as shine a light on their own approach toward their learning. In other words, reflections make it more obvious to students what skills, knowledge, or standards are being targeted AND they can help students analyze how well they are applying their own efforts towards their own learning.
2. Reflection creates and strengthens the learning community. Actively reflecting and sharing this reflection within your classroom helps students become even more connected with each other. They’re able to see how other people in the space are doing with their learning and find commonalities. This reflection can help them identify positive classroom relationships as well as areas that need growth.
3. Reflection amplifies purpose by producing feedback. Out of reflection, students AND teachers gain insight into their own functioning. Students can identify strengths and weaknesses in order to improve for upcoming learning units. Teachers can identify the same in order to improve that same unit for next year and make adjustments for lessons, routines, and more to come! 

Secondly, let’s discuss HOW reflection can be incorporated in quick, easy ways that still provide deep, meaningful outcomes.

1. The 3-2-1 Strategy

I’m not sure if you’ve ever heard of the 3-2-1 structure before but it is fairly straightforward and HIGHLY flexible. Basic explanation: three of 1 thing, two of another thing, and 1 of the last thing. I know – “thing” – is an incredibly nondescript word, but it needs to be because of the adaptability of this structure.

For starters, this 3-2-1 can be used after reading an article, reading a novel, finishing a unit, finishing a quarter, semester, trimester, etc, or even at the beginning or end of the school year. It could even be used as a bell-ringer or exit-ticket activity! 

If you are specifically using it for reflection, here are some ways you might employ it. You might choose to have a student reflect on 3 Skills they learned, 2 Actions that helped them learn, and 1 Question they still have. You could build student rapport in the space by having students create shoutouts: 3 Most Organized Students, 2 Most Active Participants 1 Most Creative (Most Diligent, Most Determined, Most Focused, etc.).

This type of reflection provides a FANTASTIC AMOUNT OF FLEXIBILITY and its fairly simple approach makes it easy for students of all academic abilities to understand and participate.

For additional support, you could even provide students with word banks, sentence starters, or even choice boards to help them reflect on and discuss the current learning in the classroom.

If you CLICK ON THE PICTURE to the left, you can receive this fantastic Freebie. Not only does it contain a template that supports the flexibility of this reflection strategy, it also contains multiple ideas for your 3-2-1s and ways students can share after reflecting!

2. The Pair & Share Strategy

This strategy is also very flexible. Have students pair up with someone in the class and complete a reflection. Once they are done reflecting, they can share their thoughts with the class.

For this strategy I would recommend doing a simple reflection. Check out some ideas below:

1. What were your strengths during this learning unit? What were your weaknesses?
2. What are two key skills you learned during this learning unit? What actions, activities, or routines helped you learn these skills?
3. Who is a person in your life (or in this classroom) that you look to to provide a positive example of work ethic? What do they do that you would like to apply to your own learning?
4. What was your favorite activity, skill, knowledge point, etc about this learning unit? What was your least favorite?
5. What is something that I can do as your teacher to better support your learning in the upcoming learning unit? What is something about you and what is going on in your life that I should be aware of for the upcoming learning unit?

These are just a few ideas that you could work with in this pair and share strategy.

As far as pairing and sharing goes. I have several ideas for that too!

Pairing can be done in a multitude of ways. Students can simply pair with the person sitting closest to them. They could pair with a friend. You can pick sticks for pairs. The teacher can select pairs (this may be especially useful if you have a class that can present tricky behaviors or that have specific learning support needs). There are even several apps or websites that can be used to randomly create pairs (or small groups). Check out this website to learn more!

3. Journaling

Writing is a fabulous way to get students reflecting. The beautiful thing about journaling is that once you have created, built, and practiced the routine, it can turn into a very seamless way to incorporate reflection.

Because writing is a product skill, students are forced to connect with the content or topic on a deeper level. From improving mental health and building self-confidence to enhancing critical thinking skills and boosting academic performance, journaling has HUGE, comprehensive benefits for students. Not to mention the fact that they would be building a life-long skill that would continue to provide positive and meaningful support. If you’d like to learn more about the benefits of journaling check out this article written by the University of St. Augustine for Health Sciences. 

Again, I will emphasize the flexibility of this strategy. The number of journaling prompts one can use are endless – truly! Also, there are a ton of great journaling resources that are out there and even if you want to use just a standard notebook for journaling, there are so many great websites that provide journaling prompt ideas.

Daily Journaling Sets are one of the core resources I create. Each journal set in Sets 1-10 contains over 10 journaling prompts and in sets above ten there are 15-20+ journaling prompts included. 

In addition, each set contains a completed model that is great for teaching the writing routine and building learning targets for your students. Each journaling page also provides sentence starters for students that help them keep writing even if they get a little stuck! Click this link or the picture above to purchase the Reflection & Goal Setting journal, but make sure to check out the rest of my journaling sets too!

4. Virtual Reflections

So clearly flexibility is the name of the game of this post, because virtual reflections are also extremely flexible! 

For this reflection type, think about utilizing whatever technology you already have in place at your school OR utilizing one of the many other online options.

1. Create short answer or multiple choice reflective check-ins using google forms, schoology quiz, or whatever “quiz” tool your virtual classroom provides.
2. You could do something similar using other online platforms like Edpuzzle, Nearpod, or Peardeck. This provides a little more fun in the way of graphics and visual interest than the first options. Many of these also provide the possibility of doing simple classroom polls.
3. Bring in the fun with gaming by using platforms like Kahoot, Blooket, or Gimkit. With these platforms you can create multiple choice questions that can provide reflective insight while students also get to engage in fun games in between.

The beautiful thing about these virtual reflections is that you have all of the data in one place. Most provide a quick and easy way to see exactly what the outcome of the reflections are and make it super simple to apply that data to how you approach upcoming units or revise previous ones!

In closing,

Student reflection plays a vital role in deepening student learning and improving academic outcomes. Adding reflection doesn’t have to be this large, scary, messy monster of a task. It can be broken down into small, manageable activities that make sense to students and are easy for teachers to facilitate. Examples included here were:

1. The 3-2-1 Strategy
2. The Pair & Share Strategy
3. Journaling
4. Virtual Reflections

I just updated this blog with an additional reflecting FREEBIE. On the right you’ll find the Classroom RESET Reflection template. This is a fabulous tool when coming back from Spring Break, Winter Break or simply when your class seems to have gotten a bit out of whack!

It has students tap into their own senses by prompting them to identify what something “looks like, sounds like, and feels like.” in order to really get at the more CONCRETE ways of discussing routines and expectations.

Whether you use my resources, find others you like, or make your own, student reflection is ALWAYS worth the time!

Best of luck.

Talk soon.