Medicine, including pediatrics, is or should be a human enterprise; that is we physicians need to be aware of the patients and their families as persons while at the same time being simultaneously aware of our own personal responses to the patient-doctor interaction. To that end, I am asking each of you to be alert for instances in the course of the pediatric clerkship when you experience strong feelings in response to a particular circumstance. When this happens to you spend a few moments writing about it. Don't worry about writing style or even format- most of you, by the way, are pretty good writers and wouldn't have gotten this far were you not. Only try and convey some of the emotion you felt in the course of your clinical work.

The rationale for this assignment is well represented by this excerpt from an article in Academic Medicine:

"Reflection is thinking critically about thoughts or actions that seem to be occurring spontaneously and without conscious deliberation. It turns experience into deep learning-that is, reflection allows new experiences to either modify one's existing knowledge structures or schemas or be integrated into one's existing knowledge structures. True behavior change, in contrast to mimicked behaviors, can occur when one reflects on new experiences and changes their own knowledge structures."

At that session, please be prepared to read and share your experience. We will discuss what you've written, keeping in mind, however, that everyone who would like to share his or her writing should be given an opportunity. You will not be pressured to read. If what you have written is too personal or you feel uncomfortable reading it, so be it.