Reflection as a stage of the lesson: types, techniques, examples

Each of us has the ability to direct attention inside our being, to be aware of our thoughts, states, moods and sensations. With this ability we can see ourselves from the outside. In addition, this ability has important practical significance, because it serves as a means of complete and effective self-analysis, allowing you to evaluate your own thoughts, actions and actions, analyze them and change them. This ability is called reflection.

What is reflection

The definition of reflection states that it is a quality inherent only to man, and serves as one of his differences from any other living organism. Over the centuries-old history, representatives of psychology, philosophy and even pedagogy have been interested in the phenomenon of reflection (also called self-reflection). All of them attributed a huge role to reflection in the functioning of a person’s personality, and also looked for a variety of ways for its independent development in themselves.

The term "reflection" comes from the Latin word "reflectio", meaning "to reflect" or "to look back." In fact, this concept has many interpretations, each of them unique in its own way.

If we turn to Wikipedia, we will see that reflection is understood as drawing a person’s attention to himself, his consciousness, the products of personal behavioral activity, skills, abilities and knowledge, as well as rethinking all of this. This also includes analysis of actions already committed or planned. Simply put, reflection is the ability to look inside your consciousness (and even subconscious), evaluate your behavioral patterns and emotional reactions.

When we say that a person is reflective, we mean that he focuses on his own “I” and comprehends (or rethinks) it. The ability to reflect allows you to go beyond the boundaries of “I-space”, indulge in active reflection, engage in introspection, draw conclusions from all this and use them in the future. It gives you the opportunity to compare yourself and your personality with others, evaluate yourself critically, adequately perceive and see yourself as other people see.

But it will also not be superfluous if we point out the difference in the understanding of self-reflection in psychology and philosophy. In philosophy, it is understood as the highest phenomenon, which includes reflections on the foundations of human culture and the original design of the existence of all things.

The ancient Greek philosopher Socrates considered reflection one of the means available to a person for knowing and improving himself, because the ability to look critically at one's thoughts and actions distinguishes a person from other creatures and makes him a higher being in the evolutionary chain. It is this ability that allows us all to move along the path of progress and become free from stereotypes, templates and prejudices, to avoid misconceptions and mistakes.

The French philosopher Pierre Teilhard de Chardin held approximately the same views. Plus, he pointed out that reflection gives people the opportunity to know and be aware of this knowledge itself. And the German philosopher Ernst Cassirer said that people need reflection in order to isolate the most important points among the huge amount of “garbage” contained in the depths of the subconscious and the vicissitudes of feelings.

But the interpretation of reflection in psychology is of greater interest to us, because This is where its practical significance is revealed. Psychological science considers this phenomenon as a special form of introspection, as a result of which it occupies an important place in the science of the human ability to access the subconscious, analyze thoughts, actions and goals.

The famous Soviet and Russian psychologist Lev Rubinstein called the ability to reflect the ability to realize the boundaries of one’s own “I”, and also pointed out that in the absence of this ability a person cannot develop and become a full-fledged personality. Thus, reflection turns into the ability to stop the endless flow of chaotic thoughts and switch from mechanistic thinking to awareness of the individual spiritual and mental inner world. The result of this is the opportunity not just to think, but to truly reflect, analyze and live fully.

All of the above shows us the importance of reflection in a person’s life, and also once again suggests that it is necessary and important to develop it in oneself. Living in the crazy rhythm of modernity, a person does not have enough time to stop, think about his actions and get to know his own inner world.

At the same time, the ability to conduct high-quality self-analysis, look critically at your mistakes and change your actions based on the conclusions received is extremely important, because helps to fully develop and become a self-sufficient person. By developing it in ourselves, we can come to the realization of our uniqueness, learn to understand our difference from any other person, form our own thoughts, define goals and even find our purpose in life.

However, we should talk in more detail about the role of reflection in a person’s life, but first let me offer you a short video that tells you in an interesting, simple and understandable form what reflection is.

Forms of reflection

There are also three forms of reflection, which depend on their focus:

situational - analysis of what is happening in the present time (right now I am sitting on the couch and writing this text);
retrospective – assessment of past experience. This form is useful in that we can draw useful conclusions for ourselves based on inferences about past events (yesterday I was writing a text on the same couch and the TV was on, disturbing me. That’s why today I’m working in silence);
perspective – thinking, planning for the future. Preparing myself for future events (perhaps tomorrow I’ll give myself a day off and just lie on this couch).

The role of reflection in human life

If we consider the issue of the meaning of reflection in a person’s life in detail, we can draw several telling conclusions. Thanks to reflective activity, a person can:

control and analyze your own thinking;
evaluate your thoughts, looking at them from the outside, and analyze their correctness, validity and logic;
clear your mind of unnecessary and useless thoughts and reflections;
transform latent capabilities into active and effective ones;
know yourself more deeply;
evaluate your behavioral patterns and adjust your actions;
determine a clearer life position;
get rid of doubts, hesitations and indecision.

Having the ability to reflect, a person grows many times in understanding himself and his personality, masters more powerful self-control and follows the path of useful changes in life. But if a person has this ability poorly developed, he will know himself worse, and will also continue to make repeated erroneous actions.

It is obvious that a person who always acts in the same way, but at the same time expects new results, behaves at the very least stupidly and ineffectively. Therefore, it is easy to conclude that reflection helps to correct such behavior, eliminate disruptions in thoughts and actions, begin to accumulate important experience and grow personally.

It is for this reason that reflection has become a method actively used by psychologists around the world. Psychologists use it to help people look inward and explore their essence. Provided they carry out methodical and professional work, psychologists help clients find the right solutions to difficult situations, resolve problems and look for answers to all questions within themselves.

Let's point out the specific results that can be achieved by a person who turns to reflection as a method of psychological and psychotherapeutic assistance. Such a person can understand:

your experiences and sensations at this stage of life;
your weaknesses, hidden deep in the subconscious and subject to outside influence;
ways to use problems, difficulties and obstacles on the path of life for your own benefit and to improve your life.

In most cases, in the process of using the reflection method, a person, with the help of a specialist, also begins to realize several parts of his personality:

I am a separate individual;
I am a person among other persons;
I am an ideal being;
I am a separate individual as perceived from the outside;
I am a personality among other personalities as perceived from the outside;
I am an ideal being as perceived from the outside.

To achieve an understanding of the above things, psychologists can use one of three methods of reflexive therapy:

Situational reflection. Helps a person to understand the essence of the current situation, approach it critically and determine all the subtleties of what is happening.
Sanogenic reflection. Helps a person manage his emotional manifestations and consciously block negative, meaningless and difficult thoughts, reflections and experiences.
Retrospective reflection. Helps a person look at past experience, conduct a thorough analysis of his mistakes and learn from them important and useful experience.

According to many practicing psychologists, reflection is one of the best, most useful and effective ways for a person to achieve inner harmony and begin to improve themselves, collect a mosaic of their thoughts into a single whole and transform them into holistic ideas that contribute to the achievement of success and well-being.

Reflection, intentionally used by a person (it doesn’t matter: independently or through a psychologist), becomes a path to understanding one’s inner world, an opportunity to look at oneself through the eyes of other people, and also to gain the image of an ideal self - the person a person dreams of becoming.

We noted above that psychologists, when working with their clients, use one of three methods of reflexive therapy, but reflection itself can be of several types. We will also talk a little about them before we tell you how to develop reflection in yourself.

The concept of the reflection method

Definition 2

The reflection method is a method, subject to the application of which only the one that was realized by the student becomes the educational result of learning.

The main goal of reflection methods is to create a methodological framework for the carried out substantive activity, which will subsequently be used due to its effectiveness and productivity.

The leading methods of reflection used by the teacher for conducting in a team and group are:

Problem-search method
Motivation and stimulation of the learning process
Modeling
Boolean Methods
A control method, which consists of a number of the following techniques: organizing problem-based learning situations, posing problematic questions and tasks, conducting problem-based experiments and research.

Of great importance for the organization of reflection is the presence of reflective activity skills in students and teachers. That is why it is important to form and develop reflexive skills through specially organized educational and cognitive classes.

The reflective activity of students (pupils) during training sessions manifests itself in the form of reasoning about how the lesson went, what knowledge was gained, how new educational knowledge is related to previously learned knowledge, what is its value. Based on the students’ reflection, the teacher draws conclusions about their use of methodological techniques and methods of work, recognizes their own activities, evaluates them, and corrects them if necessary.

Types of reflection

The classification of reflection presented below is considered one of the most common in psychology. Each species has its own specific characteristics and characteristics. Let's look briefly at these types:

Personal reflection. In this case, the object of knowledge is the personality of the reflecting person. He evaluates himself, his actions and actions, thoughts and behavior, attitude towards himself, other people and the world around him.
Intellectual reflection. It is activated when a person solves some intellectual problem. Thanks to such self-reflection, he can return many times to the initial conditions of this task (or situation) and find the most effective and rational ways to resolve it.
Communicative reflection. Here a person tries to get to know other people. This is done by assessing and analyzing their actions, behavior, reactions, emotional manifestations, etc. At the same time, a person seeks to understand the reasons why people behave in one way or another in order to get a more objective idea of the inner world of others.

However, the above types of reflection do not exhaust all their diversity. Those types of it, which we have already mentioned, relate to either a philosophical or psychological understanding of this phenomenon. But reflection can also be considered from the point of view of science and society:

Scientific reflection. Designed for research and analysis of scientific knowledge and tools, methods for obtaining scientific results, scientific justifications, theories, points of view and laws.
Social reflection. A unique type of reflection, the essence of which is to understand the emotions and actions of other people by thinking for them, on their behalf. Interestingly, social reflection has another name - “internal betrayal.” The inner world of others is known through one’s own reflections, i.e. a person “enters the character” of the person he is interested in and tries to understand what both this person and those with whom he interacts think about themselves.

Any type of reflection (philosophical, psychological, social or scientific) occupies a special place in a person’s life. Depending on the goal being pursued, you can turn to a specific “direction” and act based on it. It’s very easy to choose examples of reflection:

if you need to better understand yourself, you need to turn to personal reflection;
if you need to better understand the process of solving a problem, you need to turn to intellectual reflection;
if you need to better understand another person, you need to turn to communicative or social reflection;
If you need to better understand some scientific direction or scientific method, you need to turn to scientific reflection.

It may seem that all this requires enormous effort, specific knowledge and unique skills, but in reality everything is much simpler. Reflection, whatever it may be, is almost always subject to a single algorithm (it may differ only in form (depending on the type of reflection), but not in essence). And now we want to tell you how to develop reflection in yourself, i.e. how to learn it.

Benefits of Reflection

Reflection can help a person. Thanks to the analysis of the activity produced as a result of reflection, the following useful properties of this phenomenon can be identified:

gaining new knowledge;
confirmation of existing knowledge or dispelling doubts;
awareness of the connection between theoretical knowledge and practical knowledge;
understanding your actions: why in that situation you acted this way and not otherwise;
elaboration of actions and ways in which decisions are made (the concept of double-loop learning);
awareness of your strengths and weaknesses;
development of your mental qualities, with the help of which you can more effectively analyze your thoughts;
increasing the level of self-control, knowledge and control over actions;
awakening the desire to be more active;
the result of a completed action more often corresponds to expectations, because it is performed deliberately and with great desire.

Such useful properties can be applied not only to reflection, but also to other areas. For example, a musician analyzes how he played the violin today. An understanding comes to him, like a student, of what to do to play more virtuoso. Conclusions can help him achieve success in creativity.

3 important steps

which every woman should go through

Anika Snagovskaya

Author and presenter of women's trainings on harmonizing feminine energy. Master of removing limiting beliefs and master of constellations.

I have prepared three lessons for you that will help you better understand yourself, remove the restrictions that prevent you from feeling loved and living happily.

Video lesson with meditation: 5 states of femininity

You will learn about 5 female states that exist in every woman, how they manifest themselves and which archetypes are most manifested in you and which are not developed.

Video lesson + meditation: How to let go of past relationships

I’ll tell you what you need to do to free your heart from old feelings and break the energy threads connecting you with your past partner.

Audio recording: Neuro-af

Thanks to this neuro-affirmation, you can regain self-love and feel sincere gratitude and happiness for every day.

Take your gifts!

Sometimes we use reflection not only as a useful life skill, but also as the only way to make the right decision. Professor Graham Gibbs published a book in 1988 called Teaching by Doing: A Guide to Teaching and Learning Methods.

In it he writes the following:

“It's not enough to just have experience to learn. If you don't think about these experiences, you may quickly forget them or lose your learning potential. It is from the feelings and thoughts that arise as a result of reflection that generalizations or concepts can be generated. And it is generalizations that allow us to effectively solve new problems.

Likewise, if behavior is expected to be changed through learning, it is not enough to simply learn new concepts and develop new generalizations. This training needs to be tested in real situations. The student must make the connection between theory and action by planning the action, doing it, and then reflecting on it, relating it to the theory.”

How to develop reflection in yourself

Almost anyone can develop the ability to reflect. To do this, you need to follow the recommendations below. Each of them does not have to be considered as some kind of stage of self-reflection, but in general they can all form a complete algorithm.

So, what do you need to do to master the skill of reflection:

After making any decision, analyze its effectiveness and your actions. Try to look at yourself from the outside, see yourself in the eyes of others, understand what you did right and what needs improvement. Strive to see if you had the opportunity to act differently - more correctly and more effectively. It is also important to evaluate your experience after any events and decisions.
At the end of each working day, analyze it. Mentally return to what happened during the day and carefully examine what you were dissatisfied with. Try to look at unsuccessful moments and awkward situations from the outside in order to see them more objectively.
From time to time, analyze your own opinions about others. Your task is to understand whether your ideas about them are correct or incorrect. At the same time as you develop your reflection skills, you will also develop your communication skills.
Try to communicate more with those who are different from you, who share different views and beliefs. Every time you try to understand another person, you will activate reflection, train flexible thinking and learn to see the situation more broadly, as well as develop empathy, which will improve your relationships with others.
Use problems and difficulties to analyze your actions, the ability to solve complex problems and get out of difficult situations. Try to look at different situations from different angles, look for unobvious pros and cons in them. It is very useful to find some funny moments in any situation, and also to treat yourself with a certain amount of self-irony. This not only perfectly develops self-reflection, but also allows you to find innovative ways to solve problems.

In principle, these few recommendations will be enough to understand what needs to be done so that the ability for reflective thinking begins to activate and develop. But we still want to give a few more good exercises for its development:

Exercise "Carousel". Aimed at developing skills of reflection, establishing contact and quickly responding to the behavior of another person. The essence of the exercise is that you need to meet at least one new person every day and maintain a small conversation with him. At the end of the meeting, you need to analyze your actions.
Exercise “Without a mask”. Aimed at removing behavioral and emotional rigidity, developing skills of reflection and sincerity in behavior, as well as subsequent analysis of one’s own “I”. Several people take part in the exercise. Everyone is given a card with the beginning of a phrase, but without its ending. In turn, all participants must sincerely finish their sentences.
Exercise “Self-portrait”. Aimed at developing the skills of reflection and self-analysis, as well as the ability to quickly recognize another person and describe him according to various characteristics. The point of the exercise is that you imagine that you need to meet a stranger, but in order for him to recognize you, you need to describe yourself as accurately as possible, and this applies not only to appearance, but also to behavior, manner of conversation, etc. It's best to work with a partner. If you wish, you can change the “polarity” of the exercise: you describe not yourself, but your assistant.
Exercise “Qualities”. Aimed at developing reflection skills and forming correct self-esteem. You need to take a piece of paper and a pen, divide the sheet into two parts. Write 10 of your strengths on the left and 10 weaknesses on the right. Then rate each positive and negative quality on a scale of 1 to 10.

With these tips and exercises, you can develop your ability to reflect very quickly. And if you follow our recommendations for at least three weeks, you will form a useful habit for life, and reflection will become your faithful companion in life.

Having learned to reflect correctly, you will notice a lot of positive changes in your life: you will begin to better understand yourself and understand the people around you, you will make more correct decisions and easily learn from mistakes, you will begin to predict possible scenarios for the development of events and even the behavior of other people, you will be prepared for the unexpected circumstances and unexpected turns in life's path.

All this will bring a huge amount of positive energy, harmony and a sense of self-sufficiency into your life and inner world. You can develop in this direction throughout your life, becoming better and better all the time. But we also cannot forget that there must be moderation in everything, because excessive and hypertrophied self-reflection can lead to self-examination, self-flagellation and other negative mental states. And then you will have to look for ways to get rid of reflection. But this is a topic for another article.

With this, we summarize the material, and as a good afterword, we invite you to watch a short video in which psychologist Yuri Nikolaevich Levchenko gives an interesting point of view on soul-searching and tells why it does not lead to anything good.

Did you like the article? Join our communities on social networks or our Telegram channel and don’t miss the release of new useful materials: TelegramVKontakteFacebook

We also recommend reading:

Storytelling
Social perception
Hyperreflection: how to get rid of excessive reflection
Drop everything and start again
Personality criteria
Questions of existential significance
How to get rid of reflection
Mature personality
Reflective learning: why is it necessary to analyze experience?
Existential psychology: ideas, stages of development, representatives
Empiricism in modern philosophy in simple words

Key words:_D1034, _D1043, 1LLL, 4Psychoregulation, 4Self-knowledge

The benefits and harms of reflection

The benefits of reflection

Firstly, it will help you see what exactly you did wrong and avoid similar mistakes in the future. Secondly, with the help of analysis you can understand what you really want to achieve from life. Only if you realize why at a certain moment you acted the way you did and not otherwise, will you be able to change something in your behavior. For example, your parents imposed on you that you need to study to become a lawyer. But you understood that this was not your path at all, and you could achieve much more by becoming a musician.

By working on yourself, you will change your quality of life. Harvard Business School conducted a study and found that call center employees who reflect on their work are much more effective (by 23%) than others. Thinking employees are more savvy and confident in their actions.

When we learn to understand and listen to our inner voice, it will be much easier for us to communicate with people around us: to understand their emotions and feelings.

The harm of reflection

There are cases when reflection is more likely to harm a person. This happens if he starts delving into his thoughts. He constantly replays his past, present and wants to understand the future. For example, he always remembers some meeting and models in his head options for how life could have turned out differently.

This usually ends with mental problems. It is quite possible that this is due to incorrect reflection technique. For example, if you constantly ask yourself the question “why?”, then most likely you will not be able to concentrate on any one problem, but will try to solve everything at once. And this approach definitely won’t help.

When you engage in self-reflection for a long time, you will increasingly have negative thoughts. They are the ones who will bring fear, pain and other negative emotions into life. Usually such situations end in severe, protracted depression.

Reflection techniques

Critical thinking is due to the high level of development of the human psyche. This ability of an individual is considered an indicator of his development as a person. To carry out critical analysis, various reflection techniques are used. The most famous of them are:

Entering a reflective position. This technique consists in excluding direct interest in the situation in which the difficulty arose, and replacing it with the so-called “from the outside” view. In this case, there is a move beyond the current difficult situation into a position that allows one to understand the problem and find a way to resolve it. The starting point of reflection in this case is the awareness that certain difficulties have arisen and the recording of the situation in which they arose;
Reflexive reflection of the situation. Often, a change in perspective on a situation contributes to the emergence of ideas about the probable causes of the difficulties that have arisen. Reflective reasoning in this case is usually difficult to keep in mind. In this regard, there is a need to construct a schematic representation of the situation, which allows one to fairly objectively understand the current situation;
Reflective justification of activity. Based on reflection techniques that make it possible to find out the causes of difficulties, an understanding is formed of how to correct a difficult situation. A critical attitude to the problem allows you to justify the need for specific actions aimed at changing the situation and eliminating mistakes made.

Mastery of reflection techniques is one of the most important indicators of a person’s level of mental development.

Reflection functions

Reflection is an effective way to understand yourself, identify your strengths and weaknesses, and use your abilities to the maximum benefit in your activities. For example, if I know that I have a stronger visual memory, then when remembering information, I will not rely on hearing, but will write down the data to connect visual perception. A person who knows about his temper and increased conflict will try to find a way to reduce their level, for example, through training or by contacting a psychotherapist.

However, reflection not only gives us the necessary knowledge about ourselves in life, but also performs a number of important functions:

The cognitive function consists of self-knowledge and introspection; without it, a person cannot create an image of “I” or “I-concept” in his mind. This self-belief system is an important part of our personality.
The development function is manifested in the creation of goals and attitudes aimed at transforming the individual, accumulating knowledge, and developing skills and abilities. This function of reflection ensures personal growth of a person at any age.
Regulatory function. Assessing your needs, motives and consequences of actions creates the conditions for regulating behavior. The negative emotions that a person experiences when he realizes that he did something wrong force him to avoid such actions in the future. And at the same time, satisfaction from one’s activities and success creates a very positive emotional environment.
Meaning-creating function. Human behavior, unlike the impulsive behavior of animals, is meaningful. That is, when performing an action, a person can answer the question: why did he do this, although sometimes it is not possible to understand his true motives right away. This meaningfulness is impossible without reflective activity.
Design and simulation function. Analysis of past experience and your abilities allows you to design activities. Creating a model of a successful future, as a necessary condition for self-development, involves the active use of reflection.

It should also be noted that reflection plays a very important role in learning, so it is significant in the educational process. The main function it performs in education is to control the content of one’s own knowledge and regulate the process of their assimilation.

Social reflection

In social life, reflection is a kind of awareness of a person of who he is for other individuals.
In other words, social reflection in psychology is not only a person’s awareness of himself, but also an understanding of how other people treat him. This includes a person’s personality traits, reactions to various events, emotional impulses, mood and character. When joint activity arises between members of society, social reflection turns into subject-reflective relationships.

Characteristics of kinesthetics. How to communicate with kinesthetic learners?

What is reflection?

A certain category of people are prone to constant introspection.
But most of the population does not think about their actions. There are several ways to develop reflection and look at the world differently.

Try to analyze your day. Analysis must be done down to the smallest detail, down to random encounters, individual dialogues, unpleasant situations and joyful events.
Read the relevant literature.
Take some time to reflect.
Write down a few important issues that need to be addressed. Try to think of a possible way out.

Important:

The main way to develop reflection is communication. By contacting the outside world, experiencing positive and negative moments, a person learns self-analysis. After a long and eventful day, you should think a little about your experience and try to derive some benefit from it.

What is the use of reflection?

Reflective activity opens up new possibilities for a person.
Thinking over his actions and deeds, he learns to live correctly:

It becomes possible to control your thinking. A person tries to think in the right direction.
Reflection promotes self-criticism, which allows you to see your own shortcomings, analyze them and work on mistakes.
Self-analysis allows you to get rid of negative and depressing thoughts that poison human existence.
The analysis of experienced life situations begins, with subsequent conclusions.
Realizing past mistakes, an individual develops a strong personality and acquires his own position.

In the process of reflection, personal growth is observed.
A person changes and learns from his mistakes without repeating them in the future. But if a person lacks reflection, then he repeats similar mistakes and does not understand the cause of his distress. Philanthropist - helping for profit or a character trait?