IFN521 Foundations of Decision Science
Semester 1 2024
Assessment 3 – Reflective Journal
Rationale and Description
Reflective writing can be helpful in working through challenging situations. Writing down your thoughts about recent events helps you organise them and make sense of them. It allows you to take time to process the emotions associated with significant events, but at your own pace and on your own terms. If you lack experience in dealing with particular challenging situations, your quick decisions may not look as appropriate in hindsight. Reflecting on these situations and the decisions made, will allow you to consider what you might change next time. In other words, reflective writing helps you learn from challenging situations. A reflective journal provides evidence of your thinking about how you are learning.
However, writing reflectively is not just about learning. Many studies have shown that personal wellbeing benefits flow from writing about difficult situations. The process of writing allows you to process things that may be difficult to speak about, or that you do not want to dwell on. It can give you an opportunity to express emotions but without the risk of making that expression to someone who may not understand you. A reflective journal provides evidence of your thinking about how you are coping with new and challenging experiences.
Reflective practice is an essential meta-level skill for most professions. It requires the practitioner to develop a level of self-awareness which can identify personal strengths and weaknesses and seek out ways to capitalise on those strengths and remedy the weaknesses.
A reflective journal provides evidence of your thinking about your strengths and weaknesses and the effect they have on professional practice.
Learning Outcomes
When successfully completed, this assessment task should evidence:
1. your ability to reflect on personal capabilities and appraise yourself in relation to expectations for information professionals.
2. your thinking about your own learning and how you coped with new and challenging learning experiences.
3. your participation in the learning experiences offered in this unit, and the extent to which you have learnt from them.
Essential Elements
It is important to reflect regularly - at least every week when you engage with the learning experiences of this unit - and keep a written record. This written record will not be directly assessed, but you could be asked to furnish it as evidence of your ongoing work towards your reflective journal during the semester.
You must use first person point of view in your writing, giving your personal opinions, and using the words ‘I’ and ‘my’ throughout. Your writing needs to relate to your personal views and experience and authentically reflect your learning throughout the semester.
The following questions must be addressed in your final submitted journal.
1. Thoughts – What do I notice about my learning? What does it mean for me? Why is it significant?
2. Feelings – How do I feel about these learning experiences? Why do I feel this way? What do these feelings say about me as a learner?
3. Challenge – What problems exist in my learning? How do they challenge me? What impact will these challenges have on my goals and aspirations? What solutions did I come up with to address these challenges?
4. Self-reflection – What are my strengths and how do I use them? What should I improve and why? What other ideas can I use to develop myself?
5. My Career – In 5 years ’ time, my career will be [describe what that career looks like]. How can I apply what I have learnt in this unit to my future career? How have my
perspectives/expectations on my future career changed based on what I’ve learnt in this unit?
6. The Future – What do I think organisations and work environments will look like in the future? How do I think what I have learnt is relevant to that future?
Your honesty and integrity are an essential component of this assessment and may be verified by the teaching team from other sources. For example, your participation in workshops and on-line discussions on Slack may be used to verify claims you make about engaging with the learning activities.
Your writing must be your own original work and must not include any text from other sources unless clearly identified as such. If there is doubt about whether the reflective journal is your own work, the unit coordinator may require you to furnish evidence of your regular reflections in order to verify originality.
Further detail on the steps required for completing the Reflective Journal is outlined in the ‘detailed instructions’ section below.
Marking Criteria
This assessment is criteria referenced, meaning that your grade for the assessment will be given based on your ability to satisfy key criteria. Refer to the attached Criteria Sheet and ensure that you understand the detailed criteria.
It is important to realise that you are required to not only know what is needed for the task, but that you also demonstrate and provide evidence of your understanding and ability to complete the task. This means that you need to make your knowledge and understanding clear to the person marking your assignment. It is not the marker’s responsibility to interpret work that is ambiguous or unclear, nor will you have the opportunity to further clarify your work after submission.
You will not receive marks or percentages for this assessment. You will receive an overall grade (e.g. pass - 4, high distinction - 7) based on the extent to which you meet the criteria. In general, the most important criterium (listed at the top) will be essential to the grade, and the least important (at the bottom) will affect the grade when other criteria are in conflict or are ambiguous.
Feedback
Part A of your reflective journal should be submitted for formative feedback. Formative
feedback does not count towards your final grade, but it is based on the same criteria that will be used to grade your final submission.
Submitting for feedback is highly recommended, as it will help you: (a) identify if you have satisfactorily addressed the criteria of the task, (b) understand where you can make improvements, and (c) spread your assignment load more evenly across the semester.
In order to receive formative feedback on this assessment, you must submit by the specified date:
PART A Due: Week 4 (See Canvas for exact date)
The teaching team will endeavour to provide feedback within 2 weeks of this date. Feedback will only be for Part A, and will not be available for Part A submissions after this date.
Detailed Instructions
1. Regular reflection A: During weeks 1 to 4, you should write a reflection each time you
work on aspects of this unit. It is expected that you will reflect at least every week, but most likely more frequently during this time. Your reflections should focus primarily on the new knowledge and skills you are learning in these weeks and should take account of thoughts, feelings, challenges, and self-critique. You can use the first 4 questions above (in Essential Elements section) to guide your reflecting.
You can use the “Reflective Journal – Weekly Notes” link at the end of each week’s page on Canvas to record your reflections.
2. Journal part A: Using your weekly reflections, write a reflective summary (1-page
maximum) around the questions listed in Essential Elements. The questions are associated with the first 4 aspects of reflection (thoughts, feelings, challenges, and self-critique).
Ensure that your reflection is about your thinking. Be careful to avoid simply describing or listing what happened, but also include your reflections and personal perspective by writing with the first-person (e.g. I found that ... My feeling was ... I think that ...). Ensure that you write from the first-person point of view. Use the criteria sheet (specifically, criterial 1-4, 7) as a guide for how the journal will be graded.
3. Submit part A: Ensure that your name and student number are at the top of the page. Save your Reflective Journal Part A as a PDF file and submit via the provided Canvas link by the due date. You should ensure that your file is named in the format studentNumber-fullName-journalPartA.pdf before uploading to Canvas. This submission is for formative feedback and will not count towards your final grade.
4. Reflect on feedback: Read the formative feedback you receive on part A and write a
reflection on how you can use that feedback to improve your reflective writing for part B.
5. Regular reflection B: During weeks 4 to 13, you should continue to write reflections related to your learning. It is expected that you reflect at least every week. Your reflections for part B should focus primarily on how you are applying your learning to particular situations, your career and what the future might look like. For Part B, you should take account of the questions associated with all 6 aspects of reflection above (in Essential Elements section).
6. Final Journal: Write a final reflection for the whole semester (2 pages maximum) based on the questions listed in the Essential Elements section, reflecting on all your weekly regular reflections including your writing and feedback for part A. You should include your content from part A, but you may choose to modify it based on the feedback that you received.
Ensure that all of the points of Essential Elements have been catered for in your writing, in particular writing from the first-person point of view. Also ensure that you have carefully read the criteria sheet (all criteria 1-7) so that you know how your journal will be graded, allowing you to write the journal in a way that gives you a good grade.
7. Submit complete Journal: Ensure that your name and student number are at the top of
the first page of your journal. Save your Reflective Journal as a PDF file and submit via the provided Canvas link by the due date. You should ensure that your file is named in the format studentNumber-fullName-journalFinal.pdf before uploading to Canvas. This submission will be assessed and contribute 20% of your final semester grade.
Submission
The assignment must be saved as a PDF and uploaded to Canvas using the link provided prior to the assignment due date. Your file should be named as indicated above and should include your name and student number at the top of the first page. You are encouraged to upload early to avoid unexpected issues close to submission time. You may upload multiple versions, but only the latest version prior to submission time will be marked. Take care that the last version you upload is the correct version.
Resources
The following resources may assist with the completion of this task:
• https://www.citewrite.qut.edu.au/write/reflectivewriting.jsp
• https://www.citewrite.qut.edu.au/academichonesty/atQUT.jsp
Questions
Questions related to the assessment should be directed to any of the teaching team or via Slack.
The teaching team will generally not be available to answer questions outside business hours, including over the weekend before the assessment due date. It is your responsibility to ensure that you plan to avoid the need for last minute questions.