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Learn How to Use Johns Model of Reflection with Examples

21 Feb 2026
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A Complete Guide to Johns’ Model of Reflection | Instant Assignment Help

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Every one of you must have gone through a situation where you might have reacted inappropriately. And the reason behind your action remains unclear even after thinking repeatedly about the situation. However, what if you get to learn that Johns model of reflection can help you handle such circumstances in a better way? Yes. It is a structured method of self-reflection that helps in examining experiences deeply, finding what actually went wrong and how to improve them. The method was developed especially for nursing assignment, but it is used widely by professionals due to its critical questioning methods.

What Is Johns Model of Reflection?

The Johns reflective model was invented by Christopher Johns in 1994 to help students in the healthcare field, especially for nursing. This framework allows students to break down their clinical experiences and identify the outcomes. When developing the model, Johns focused on creating a method that helps students look inwards and outwards.

It basically means consider your personal thoughts and emotions while looking inwards and considering the real situation and influential factors when looking outwards. Thus, each phase of John's reflective model in nursing provides questions that cover these factors.

Key Purpose of Johns' Reflection

The key purpose of designing this clinical reflection model is to bridge the wide gap that exists between concepts and real-world practices. Here are key features that help in bridging this breach:

  • Stimulates Organised Reflection- The Johns' model of reflection uses 5 core questions that guide practitioners to examine their valuable experiences in a systematic way.
  • Promote Deep Learning- It goes beyond surface-level analysis, encouraging students to think about the cause and effect of their actions. Additionally, students can take corrective measures to eliminate these errors.
  • Enhance Self-awareness - Being an evidence-based reflection model, it helps learners to identify their actions and primary assumptions. Thus, it fosters enhanced clinical judgement with emotional resilience.

Johns Reflective Model Step by Step Guide

Having come across the above details, you must have learned that Johns model of reflection has several key phases. But do you know what exactly each stage indicates? Well, below is a detailed description of the five phases with Johns' model reflective essay example that will help you understand the model precisely:

Phase 1: Describe the Experience

It is the initial stage of the model that requires you to define the event on which you want to reflect. However, you don't need to explain everything in detail. It only focuses on key factors, such as what happened and who was involved. and the context of the event.

This stage emphasises setting the scenario for detailed evaluation, enabling practitioner to recall their events precisely.

Phase 2: Reflection

The second step of Johns 1995 model of reflection stresses self-scrutiny. Hence, it covers all questions that are personal or related to the feelings of practitioners. This phase requires you to reflect within by answering questions, such as how you felt, what you were trying to achieve and your thoughts at that time.

This stage helps you connect how your feelings contributed to the event on which you were reflecting.

Phase 3: Influencing Factors

This phase of Johns model of reflection asks about your external and internal factors with their impacts on the event that led to a specific action. Thus, when approaching this phase, you will need to consider your personal feelings, values and beliefs. These factors help you look inwards when reflecting.

Additionally, it includes external factors, such as team dynamics, availability of resources and environment for outward looking. These features encourage self-analysis and help in finding areas for improvement.

Phase 4: What Could I Have Done Better

It is a crucial phase of reflection in healthcare education where students will explain different alternative strategies that they could have used for better results. It examines the effectiveness of their actions through questions, like the good and bad things of the experience, things that worked in their favour and ways to improve the process.

This analysis encourages productive criticism, which helps students to learn and develop essential skills. 

Phase 5: Learning

It is the last stage of this reflective practice in nursing, requiring students to analyse potential transformation that may take place after this experience. Further, it asks how this experience can be used in future conditions.

This stage is crucial for reshaping your existing actions and applying Johns' model in practice into impending practices.

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Benefits and Limitations of Johns' Reflective Model

Here is a table that highlights the limitations and advantages of Johns' Model of reflection that allow practitioners to analyse their weaknesses and transform them into their strengths.

Advantages

Disadvantages

It encourages deep, crucial reflection by helping professionals by asking organised cue questions.    

This model requires students to answer several questions, which leads to time consumption, mainly in busy environments.

Johns reflective model questions are designed to promote self-awareness through evaluating personal assumptions and values influencing practice.

Students often feel that the questions are complicated, which creates confusion, especially for beginners.

The model integrates concepts with real-world practice, allowing practitioners connect their experiences to practical knowledge.  

John's reflective model requires strong reflective proficiencies and transparency that not all professionals can possess initially.

It helps in identifying the precise learning needs of students and the weak areas that lead to professional development.  

The reflection may feel mechanical if it is completed as a scholarly requirement and not as a learning tool.

How to Use Johns' Model of Reflection?

Now that you are aware of the key stages of this professional reflective practice model, let's find out how to apply this model effectively:

  1. Define the Most Impactful Event - Begin the reflection by explaining the complete situation. Try to focus on factual data rather than including opinions. Now, set a clear context for your Johns model of structured reflection by providing details to help the reader comprehend the clinical situation.
  2. Organise Your Thoughts - Now, consider questions like how you felt during that event and what your thoughts were. Collect your thoughts and write down your emotions by focusing on personal assumptions, beliefs and reactions. It leads to ethical reflection in practice and helps in identifying your morals.
  3. Record Influencing Factors - Start recording internal and external factors that you think influenced your decision or action. These may include policies, workload, your skills, confidence level and values. This step of Johns model of reflectionwill help you evaluate why events happened in a certain way.
  4. Analyse Professional Practice - Once you identified these factors, evaluate your actions against ethical norms and professional principles. Recall, were your actions aligned with nursing policies? This step provides crucial nursing assignment help by connecting your practice to qualified frameworks helps in strengthening critical thinking.
  5. Create an Action Plan - At this last stage of John's reflective model, you need to conclude the lessons learned from the experience. Moreover, write down actions that you will take for future improvements. Focus on writing skills that you need to develop and create a realistic plan to achieve them. Also, if you are writing your assignment, then make sure you once check the document on software such as a free plagiarism checker UK to ensure originality of the content.

Johns Model of Reflection Example 

Here is a Johns' model reflection example that highlights a nurse's personal experience of working in a clinical care centre.

Stage 1- Define the Experience

When I was working in a clinic during my evening shift, I was assigned the task of administering medication to an elderly patient. He was suffering from the disease of hypertension.  When I walked towards him, he immediately refused to take these medicines. He was looking very nervous and anxious when I tried to interact with him. However, I started explaining to him why medication is important, but he declined the treatment.

Stage 2: Reflection on Feelings

I was feeling frustrated and pressured at that moment because I was concerned about his health issues. Moreover, I wanted to complete the medication round on time without delaying the process. That time, I instantly realised that I was focusing on finishing my task and not understanding his anxiety and concerns.

Stage 3: Influencing Factors

The environment at the clinic was very busy at that time, which influenced my behaviour and initial response. On the other hand, I felt that my way of communicating was not convincing, as he failed to identify the importance of medication. It leads to self-realisation about things that I was doing wrong.

Stage 4: Assessment of Professional Practice

After realising all these factors, I tried to calm down and decided to sit near him. I went to him and started asking a few open-ended queries. It helped me understand his fear about potential side effects from the medication. I quickly started explaining everything about the medical treatment and ensured there were no side effects.

Stage 5: Action Plan

This entire event taught me how to prioritise active listening and empathy while dealing with patients. I will start working on these skills to avoid this situation in future. Also, in the upcoming time, I will first address the concerns of patients before starting any treatment.

Johns Model Vs Gibbs Reflective Cycle And Schön reflection

Students may find ample reflective models that provide essential assignment help when they asked to write a reflection on their experiences. There are several alternatives that students may use, such as Gibbs' reflective cycle, Kolb's Experiential Learning Cycle and Schön's reflection. Not only this, but they will also find Johns model vs Schön reflection to compare both models to identify the best one that matches their needs.

Following this, here is a comparison between John's model and Gibbs' reflective cycle to help you find an ideal reflective process for yourself.

Particulars

John's Model of Reflection 

Gibbs' Reflective Cycle

Schön reflection 

Stages

It has five phases: description, reflection, influencing factors, evaluation and learning that foster critical questioning for improvements.

Gibbs has six stages, including description, feelings, evaluation, analysis, conclusion and action plan.

This model has two primary stages: reflection in action and reflection on action. This includes thinking when the event is happening and thinking after the process for evaluation.

Key Focus

This model is focused on evaluating the internal and external factors of an individual by considering factors such as values and ethics.

This cyclical process is ideal for developing an up-front action plan and repeated experiences.

It strongly stresses professional learning by encouraging users to think logically during and after a situation to enhance their decision-making abilities.

Suitable For

It is best for analysing complex clinical scenarios, navigating ethical problems and professional development by evaluating the weaknesses of individuals.

Gibbs works best for examining repeated experiences for fostering incremental and long-term improvements.

This reflective model is suitable for changing professional environments, including healthcare, management and teaching. It is because these require continuous improvements.

Add similar section for Schön reflection model in this comparison

Final Thoughts

In essence, above Johns' model of reflection explained simply for students who lack awareness about its significance and usage. This model enables practitioners to examine their past experiences and learn from them, but only if used properly. Instead of giving prompts on AI like Do my assignment for me? Students should personally reflect on their experiences by using this simple method. Moreover, if you are struggling with strict deadlines, then seek an expert's assistance at Instant Assignment Help. We provide customised projects to meet your academic standards without compromising on quality!

You may also read: Gibbs' Reflective Cycle: Stages, Tips, and Real-Life Examples

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    Most Popular Questions Searched By Students

    • What is Johns’ Model of Reflection in Nursing?
      John's Model of reflection is a structured framework that is designed for nurses to assist them in analysing their regular clinical experiences and critical situations seriously. It guides them to examine thoughts and evaluate situations through five key phases, including description, reflection, influencing factors, significant learnings and alternative actions.
    • Why is Johns’ Model of Reflection Important?
      John's model of structured reflection is important, especially for nurse practitioners, because it gives an organised and inclusive framework to assess complicated clinical experiences, which fosters deep self-awareness to identify areas for improvement. It allows users to bridge the key gap between scholarly knowledge and real-world clinical experience.
    • How Does Johns’ Model Improve Clinical Practice?
      The model provides a comprehensive 5-stage analysis framework, forcing practitioners to analyse their ethics, emotions and actions critically to enhance their decision-making skills. It leads to improved patient results as well as allows users to transform their regular experience into valuable learning prospects.
    • What Are the Advantages of John's Model of Reflection?
      Key advantages of using John’s Model of Reflection include enhanced critical thinking, improved self-awareness, integration of conceptual knowledge with practical problems and an ethical foundation.
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