Types of Reflective Journals

Key phrase journal

Students are asked to integrate an identified list of terms and key phrases into their journal entries as they describe and discuss their community service activities. Students may be asked to underline or highlight the key phrases in order to identify their use.

Double-entry journal

For this journal, students use a spiral notebook. On the left side of the journal students describe their service experiences, personal thoughts, and reactions to their service activities. On the right side of the journal, they discuss how the first set of entries relates to key concepts, class presentations, and readings. Students may be asked to draw arrows indicating the relationships between their personal experiences and the formal course content.

Critical incident journal

Students focus on a specific event that occurred at the service site. Students are then asked to respond to prompts designed to explore their thoughts, reactions, future action, and information from the course that might be relevant to the incident. For example:

Describe an incident or situation that created a dilemma for you because you did not know how to act or what to say.

Why was it such a confusing event?
How did you, or others around the event, feel about it?
What did you do, or what was the first thing that you considered doing?
List three actions that you might have taken, and evaluate each one.

How does this course material relate to this issue, help you analyze the choices, and suggest a course of action that might be advisable?

Three-part journal

Students are asked to respond to three separate issues in each of their journal entries:

Describe what happened in the service experience, including what you accomplished, some of the events that puzzled or confused you, interactions you had, decisions you made, and plans you developed.
Analyze how the course content relates to the service experience, including key concepts that can be used to understand events and guide future behavior.
Apply the course materials and the service experience to you and your personal life, including your goals, values, attitudes, beliefs, and philosophy.

Directed writings

Students are asked to consider how a particular aspect of course content from the readings or class presentations, including theories, concepts, quotes, statistics, and research findings, relate to their service experiences. Students write a journal entry based on key issues encountered at the service site.

Adapted from Bringle, R.G. and Hatcher, J.A. Reflection in Service-Learning: Making Meaning of Experience. Educational Horizons. Summer 1999. 179-185.