Reflective Practice Workbook

Most practitioners reflect constantly, in the car home or over a coffee after a difficult consultation. Writing it down is different. Written reflections often stall in description: a detailed account of what happened, a sentence about how it felt, and a vague promise to do better. National Boards ask for reflection because it shows how learning changes practice, and that is exactly the part that tends to go missing.

A reflective model gives your thinking a structure. It prompts you to analyse why something happened, to connect it to evidence and standards, and to commit to a specific change. The workbook builds those prompts into a guided writing space, so you can produce a useful reflection in ten minutes for a routine event, or work through a significant incident in depth.

Gibbs' reflective cycle

Gibbs' cycle has six stages: describe what happened, explore your feelings, evaluate what went well and less well, analyse why, draw conclusions about what else you could have done, and write an action plan. It is thorough and is the basis for the structure in Ahpra's information sheets on reflective reports, so it suits significant events and formal writing. Its common trap is spending too many words on description and feelings. The workbook nudges you to give analysis, conclusion and action at least half the space.

Driscoll's What? So what? Now what?

Three questions, developed for health practice by John Driscoll from earlier work by Terry Borton. What happened and what was my part in it? So what does it mean for my practice, the patient and the system, and what do the standards say? Now what will I do differently? It is quick, which makes it ideal for everyday CPD entries and short debriefs.

Rolfe's framework

Gary Rolfe and colleagues took the same three questions and added detailed sub-prompts under each one. That turns a quick model into one that can go deeper when you need it: you can answer the headline questions in a few lines, or work through the sub-prompts when a situation deserves more thought.

Other lenses for particular situations

The workbook also offers prompts drawn from Johns' structured reflection, useful for complex ethical and interpersonal situations, and Brookfield's four lenses, which ask you to view an event through your own eyes, the patient's, your colleagues' and the evidence. These help when you suspect your own assumptions are part of the story.

Twelve months of access in your student portal, saved reflections and exports at any time. The workbook does not write reflections for you and does not check them against a Board's requirements. Its job is to help you think clearly and write in your own words, which is what makes a reflection credible.

If you need to write a single statement quickly, start with the free reflective statement template. If you want to learn the skill in depth, the course on reflective practice and writing a reflective statement covers the models, worked examples and the structure Ahpra's information sheets describe.