
Article
In‑verse reflection: structured creative writing exercises to promote reflective learning in medical students
Journal of Medical Humanities
(2022)
Abstract
Medical educators recognize the value of reflection for medical students and the role creative writing can play in fostering this. However, direct creative writing tasks can be challenging for many students, particularly those with limited experience in the arts and humanities. An alternative strategy is to utilize an indirect approach, engaging students with structured tasks that obliquely encourage reflection. This paper reports one such approach. We refer to this approach as in-verse reflection, playing on both the structure of the writing and its novel approach to reflection. Students were invited to write, in verse-like structures, about their personal and clinical experiences as medical students. Thematic analysis of their creative outputs and reactions identified four principal themes: the challenges of life as a medical student, the emotional demands of the medical course, a sense of connectedness and solidarity with fellow students, and a sense of marginality within the hospital system. Students generally found the tasks highly engaging and conducive to reflection, producing texts representing significant insights into their experiences as medical students. The reported method offers a relatively simple, structured, and guided approach to reflective writing, adding to the repertoire of methods available to educators in the medical humanities.
Keywords
- Clinical experience,
- Creative writing,
- Critical thinking,
- Medical education,
- Medical students,
- Reflective practice,
- Student experience,
- Higher education
Disciplines
Publication Date
2022
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10912-022-09740-7
Publisher Statement
Open access article licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made.
Citation Information
David McLean, Neville Chiavaroli, Charlotte Denniston and Martin Richardson. "In‑verse reflection: structured creative writing exercises to promote reflective learning in medical students" Journal of Medical Humanities (2022) ISSN: Print 1041-3545 Electronic 1573-3645 Available at: http://works.bepress.com/neville-chiavaroli/42/
Creative Commons license

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons CC_BY International License.