Journal Writing Experience

I have had quite a few weeks to write in my journal and reflect on lots of things i have learnt in classes I  participate in and classes i  teach, Because i am still training and auditioning whilst teaching I feel I am in two different worlds being a teacher then going to the other side of becoming a student again. 
I decided to write two journals looking at theses two different aspects of teaching and being a student again.
I am going to discuss my journal of being a student in a acting class.
After my acting classes a few weeks back I thought to myself  I should write a journal on these classes as I was asked a question which I couldn't remember the answer to which I learnt in a previous class. I decided to make a journal of everything we do and new things I learn in the lesson, and it wasn't until I read  "Melanie Brown's" journal writing experience, that I realised exactly the same as her of  "how rewarding and beneficial writing a journal can be."


After looking at the techniques to support my writing and reflective practise in my journal, it  helped me reflect and remember every detail I learnt in the class so I wouldn't be caught in a situation where I didn't know the answer again (which I have now learnt..)

I found it really fun and easy to read  when using illustrated pictures,graphs,spider diagrams and charts. It was a great way of reminding myself of significant  words and their meanings, which I found really useful and eye catching. .Due to me being dyslexic I found that when writing the journal, using  pictures and a highlighter to colour certain words and titles reminded me that the information written  were important facts and I knew this was a technique that would allow me to remember significant information, so was very useful to me and I found is my best way of learning and reflecting.
Writing  lists of things in bullet-points and numbers of thing that I needed to do at home so that I wouldn't forget, which I found visually stood out on paper and was easy for me to understand and read

I found that I couldn't stop writing when expressing my feeling and initial thoughts in my journal , which I felt was my initial reflection. I found that although I would be able to understand it easily, however if someone else was to read it, it probably wouldn't make sense until I explained it to them in detail. Overall this technique allowed me to tune in with the lesson and my emotional encounter on the day, and also what I learnt in the class from my own perspective.


I also found that I described the events in the class in great detail and the emotions I felt at the time, this was a great  way to write short  sentences for e.g. emotion: (feeling sad) in a character based play but I wasn't able to expand on it to a great deal.

In my journal I added my own view on what I learnt in the class and realised that I started to use my imagination by stepping out of the box and I reflected on scenarios which might happen to me and things that I could try out in an audition which I didn't actually learn in the class itself, but learnt the grounding methods for. This technique has allowed to grow as an actress and become more knowledgeable in my chosen subjects.

In my journal of the acting class I wrote down some important names of actors and teachers for e.g.: "Stanisvlansky" and "Shakespeare." In my reflection process I explored these people and learnt that they were very inspirational practitioners to actors all over the world . Looking at these practitioners named in my journal allowed me to research through "Wiki and Google" to get a better understanding of how important these people were and allowed me to expand my knowledge and learning. This technique I found really useful as the source of information I received I could use to my advantage at anytime to research and get another persons view other than just one person. 

I felt that when evaluating how the class went and what I learnt it allowed me to get a better picture of the class from beginning to end and re-live what it was like again. It allowed me to sum up important points and facts that all came together which I learnt,. I felt like the evaluating part was  like "layers" building up through the journal to conclude to  the main point as the summary. It also gave me an opportunity  to show my point of view and allowed me to find areas in the journal that I could explore,  if i didn't feel it made sense, without any restrictions.

earning without even realizing.