Reflections in general

It is really important when writing reflections that you really go into depth about what your understanding of the assignment was and then how your work demonstrates you have done it.

Use the rubrics provided by your teachers to be specific in the standards and skills expected of you and then you can address many of them in your reflection.

Talk about what you did well.

Talk about what you could still do better.

Talk about how you felt about the assignment while you were doing it.

What do you want the reader of your reflection to take away from the piece you have used?

Sample standard based portfolio reflection

I have chosen my independent reading assignment for my portfolio because I feel that it illustrates my ability to demostrate a variety of skills and standards in this class. Because I have achieved a 93 on it, I feel that I am more than meeting many standards. It shows that I can identify texts of various genres independently and then write brief critical analysis about my selections.

For questions 3 and 4 where it asked me to locate a passage that shows the author's effective use in language, I show that I am both able to identify different literary elements such setting and characterization as well as literary techniques like foreshadowing and figurative language in the text. In addition to identifying these elements, I can discuss and analyze the author's craft and effectiveness. I feel that is not enough to just mention, but rather also to discuss the effect it has on the audience by using these things. I feel that reading published author's work has further helped me develop my writing as well.

Other things I am successful with in the assignment is my ability to understand texts on more than one level. I show that there is deeper meaning by selecting a passage and then drawing my own conclusions and making inferences.

I think this assignment demonstrates my successful mastery of these standards. I have learned to read a novel more closely and become acutely aware not only of story line meaning, but author's purpose while reading. I've also been able to write about these things in a meaningful way.

In the future, I feel that I will need to be more specific in addressing theme in this assignment. I think that I misunderstood what theme was about in question 6. I could have also worke with symbolism, but I think I mistook theme to be the main idea, when really it is just an overriding idea and there could be many in a text. Author's use them to connect the story to readers. Sometimes I could have selected more effective passages too. I think I may have rushed alittle in my selection of a passage about setting.