Why must CAS students reflect?
Reflection is the most important part of the CAS program. Without reflection, in fact, it isn't a CAS program. Reflection is central to building a deep and rich CAS experience. It enhances student learning by helping them explore skills, strengths, limitations and areas for further development. Through reflection students examine ideas and consider how they might use prior learning, or apply their CAS learning to other areas of their lives.
The overarching intention of reflection in CAS includes the opportunity for students to:
deepen learning
consider relevance of experience
explore personal and group values
recognize the application of knowledge, skills and attributes
identify strengths and areas for development
gain a greater understanding of self and others
place experience in a larger context
generate relevant ideas and questions
consider improvements in individual and collective choices and actions
transfer prior learning to new situations
generate and receive constructive feedback
develop the ongoing habit of thoughtful, reflective, practice
What should my reflection be about?
The foundation of reflection includes:
Describing what happened: Students retell their memorable moments, identifying what was important or influential, what went well or was difficult, obstacles and successes.
Expressing feelings: Students articulate their emotional responses to their experiences.
The following two elements add greater depth and expand perspectives.
Generating ideas: Rethinking or re-examining choices and actions increases awareness about self and situations.
Asking questions: Questions about people, processes or issues prompt further thinking and ongoing inquiry.
To extend reflection even more, ask deeper questions of yourself.
What did I do? could become:
Why did I makes this particular choice?
How did this experience reflect my personal ideas and values?
In what ways am I being challenged to think differently about myself and others?
How did I feel? could become:
How did I feel about the challenges?
What happened that prompted particular feelings?
What choices might have resulted in different feelings and outcomes?
Another way to think about reflection is uing a taxonomy developed by Peter Pappas. The most basic level, describing what happened, can be extended to application, evaluation and creative responses as outlined below. (This model is the work of Peter Pappas, http://www.peterpappas.com/2010/01/taxonomy-reflection-critical-thinking-students-teachers-principals-.html)
Remembering: What did I do?
Understanding: What was important about this experience?
Applying: Where can I use this again?
Analyzing: Do I see any patterns in what I did?
Evaluating: How well did I do?
Creating: What should I do next?
Forms of reflection
Reflection can come in many forms and be both very private and very collaborative. You should explore many styles of reflection and feel free to select the methods and forms of reflection that most suit you. Reflection could include:
written pieces, including prose, poetry, song lyrics or a script
audio recordings of you speaking or singing
videos
visual representations such as collages, posters, comic strips or drawings
group reflections, such as debriefing in teams and clubs
Practicalities of reflection
Reflections and evidence should be uploaded to Toddle. For each experience listed on your CAS worksheet, you should collect the associated evidence and reflections using the appropriate tab. Please see your CAS advisor for help on how to do this if you have questions.
IB does not dictate frequency or total number of entries for evidence and reflection. Use your best judgment on this. The evidence and reflection you present for each experience should document what you have done and what you have learned from it. A good rule of thumb is to reflect at the beginning, during and after your experience. For any given outcome, you should aim for at least 2-4 good reflections of what you learned about it in a year.