Study Abroad Journals for Modern Times

By Lauren DeAre

Adjunct Professor of Spanish, Colorado Mountain College

This summer our CMC Spanish Immersion trip set out for four weeks of study in Cuzco, Peru. Students are very busy during these four weeks with four hours of Spanish classes each day, cultural visits in the afternoons and on weekends, relaxing with host families and volunteering in the community. Making time for reflection is an important part of study abroad, allowing students to go deeper into their experience and giving them a chance to process living in another culture. 

A handwritten journal is the traditional assignment for study abroad students, but I've found that this has become an empty exercise for almost any student and especially for students under the age of 30. My students are not used to writing anything by hand and it's tedious to require a certain number of journal entries that will only be read by me and are usually written all in the last few days before being submitted. Instead, the students were asked to create a video that would allow them to reflect on culture, provide unique insight about their learning during the program and, unlike personal journals, their learning and work could be shared with the other students.

This summer, the Peru students followed four steps to create a video journal reflection using CMC's flip cameras, YouTube and Facebook. 

Step 1: Choose a site in Cuzco that has taught you something about Peru and Peruvian culture
Step 2: Write a draft of your video script and submit to your professor for editing: why is this site important? What did it teach you about Peru? What should other students know about this site?
Step 3: Film your video at the site, using your script (be creative!)
Step 4: After your video is posted to our Facebook site, go on and view the videos that your classmates created, post one comment (in Spanish) about each video.


The following video was created by Everett Gardner, a student in the program and who is also a CMC staff member at the Rifle library.

The results from our project were excellent and provided a meaningful way for students to reflect on their own experience and share their learning.