What is a reflective essay? The main goal of such paper is to reflect your thoughts and feelings regarding a specific topic, event, or phenomena. This type of essay is often assigned in educational facilities to help students learn how to develop and express their opinion, and to sharpen their critical thinking skills.
So, you are assigned to write a reflective essay – where to start and what steps to make to handle this task? Although writing a reflective essay can be challenging, there are certain tips that can help you make the process simpler. In this article, we are going to share with you a step by step guide on how to write a flawless reflective paper.
Steps To Writing A Perfect Reflective Essay
1. Pick a topic
If your teacher hasn’t assigned a specific topic for your essay, the first thing you’ll need to do is to pick a subject to write about. Often, for this type of essay, students pick a specific event and focus on expressing their opinions about it.
Since reflective writing is very personal, you can choose to write about your personal experiences. For example, a suitable topic would be a difficult situation you faced, something significant that happened in your life, or even a special book you have read. Whatever topic you pick, the main goal is to state your opinion on it.
2. Generate ideas
Once you have a specific topic in mind, it is the right time for brainstorming. At this stage, you should start shaping your thesis and generate ideas to support it.
A great trick for this step is mind-mapping. This technique can be extremely helpful when writing this and other types of essays. The core idea of this technique is to write down your topic or thesis in the center of a paper and then draw multiple lines coming out from it. Next to each line, write down an idea, example or argument related to your topic. Such a mind-map will help you clearly see all your ideas.
3. Make an outline
Now, when you have some ideas for your paper, write a detailed outline. Although many students prefer to skip this step, it is actually important for success as a detailed outline helps you to follow the right paper structure and ensure that you won’t miss out on something important.
Here is a basic structure you can use for your outline:
1) Introduction
a) Hook that grabs the reader’s attention
b) Smooth introduction to the paper’s topic
c) Thesis statement
2) Body
a) Paragraph 1: Main idea + arguments/examples supporting it
b) Paragraph 2: Main idea + arguments/examples supporting it
c) Paragraph 3: Main idea + arguments/examples supporting it
3) Conclusion
a) Summary of key points
b) Restated thesis
This is a standard structure that can be used to write any type of essay, including a reflective one. Depending on the word limit stated by your teacher, you may add more paragraphs to the main body of your paper. However, be sure to keep your essay concise and straight to the point.
4) Know where to ask for help
Academic writing can be hard and time-consuming. Sometimes, students can’t handle their assignments due to a lack of time, skills, inspiration, or other reasons. If that sounds like you, it is vital to recognize when you need help and not to be afraid to ask for it!
If you feel like you can’t write a compelling reflective essay on your own, don’t hesitate to ask for help.
Where to look for assistance? Ask around! Many college students use academic help online, so some of your peers may point out to a good uni essay writing services in Australia and share their experiences. Listen to the advice of your friends and check out customer feedback about a particular writing service to make the right choice!
5) Write your paper
When writing your essay, follow the outline – this will help you ensure a logical flow of data and proper structure. Also, be sure to use simple and understandable language.
Pay special attention to your introduction. It should be eye-catching to make readers engaged.
6) Proofread and edit
Finally, your last step should include careful proofreading and editing. Take a few days to rest after you finish writing. Then re-read your paper to detect any mistakes you might’ve made. Then, edit your text until it looks flawless.
It is also a good idea to ask someone else to proofread your work. A friend or family member can give you objective and indifferent feedback about the quality of your essay.
The Bottom Line
Receiving a task to write this type of essay, many students feel confused and overwhelmed. They don’t know how to start their paper and how to make it look good.
Although a reflective paper is not the hardest type of essay, many students are struggling with it simply because they have no idea how to write a reflective essay to the highest standard. Hopefully, this step by step guide will help you overcome this challenge and get a high grade with ease!
Author’s Bio: This post has been created by a professional academic writer Jeff Blaylock. Jeff has years of experience in helping students of all academic levels with writing their papers. Throughout his career, Jeff had successfully completed dozens of students’ orders and, thus, knows better than anyone else how each particular type of paper needs to be written. In this article, Jeff shares a comprehensive step-by-step guide on how to write a flawless reflective essay.
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