Every excellent lawyer is a self-reflective practitioner.
A self-reflective practitioner is one who develops techniques for consciously learning from his or her experiences. A self-reflective practitioner plans each task to be performed prior to acting, and then reflects upon the execution of the task after the task is performed to consider what worked best, what did not work as well as expected, and what he or she would do differently the next time. As one tool to aid you in developing into a self-reflective practitioner, you will be keeping a journal of your experiences in the Criminal Justice Clinic. Writing about your work will encourage deeper and more detailed reflections. Rather, you should record what you are thinking and feeling about your experiences with clients, the criminal justice system, the lawyers you work with in the Public Defender Office, opposing counsel, reading assignments for the seminars, concepts, and skills under study in the course.