PaperBased.net

I love those quiz lists that come around in the email and on sites such as MySpace. They are such a quick and easy way to sum up exactly where you are at a certain period in your life. Yes - some of the questions can be a bit silly and don’t really search that deep, but I still find it quite revealing when I go back and re-read my answers a few months or even a few years down the track.

With this in mind I have created a printable one page list of journal prompt questions to sum up the last 3 months.

Download Printable Journal Prompts - The Last 3 Months

Two sources I need to credit for sparking the idea for this template:

A post on MetaFilter that asked about good questions to ask ourselves once a year. Check out the responses to the post as there are some great prompts/questions to ponder there.

A post on the Embodiment Livejournal Community by red_sleeve who printed out a 500 Question quiz, filled in her answers and placed it in an envelope inside her journal. The idea was that she could read the list in a years time. A cool idea and the envelope in her journal looked great too!

What is a Response Journal you ask?  It’s basically a journal of responses to something you are reading.  This site explains it as:

Keeping a response journal will give you an opportunity to express your own opinions about what is happening in the novel you are reading. Passages that upset you, make you happy, or that you simply do not understand, can be discussed in your journal entries.

The site also has a great list of prompts to use.  A similar resource, titled "What is a response journal?", is available at Instructional Strategies Online.  This site includes a number of PDF templates to download and print.

Busy Teacher’s Cafe has a great bookmark template of simple response journal prompts.  You can view the PDF template here.  Print one out and use it as a bookmark in the next book you read.  You can jot down notes on it as you read.

Some more prompts and some tips on writing a response journal can be found in the Lesson Bank at Teachers.net .  There’s also a very nice list at brtom.org, these ones are more for older kids and adults - they are well written and will really get you thinking.

The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World represent great works of ancient times that embody the best of mythology, religion, art, power, science and beauty.  They are, in chronological order:

• The Great Pyramid of Giza
• The Hanging Gardens of Babylon
• The Statue of Zeus at Olympia
• The Temple of Artemis at Ephesus
• The Mausoleum of Maussollos at Halicarnassus
• The Colossus of Rhodes
• The Lighthouse of Alexandria

Sadly only the Pyramid at Giza is still standing today, the others all having been destroyed by natural disaster.  You can read more about the Seven Wonders at Wikipedia.

What are the seven wonders of your life?  List them out and write about what makes them a wonder for you.

Image courtesy of the stock.xchng

Do you identify yourself as a dog person or a cat person?

Or are you neither?

Perhaps you’re just an animal lover in general?

Was there a specific event or a time in your life that influenced you to prefer one type of pet over another?

Images courtesy of the stock.xchng

Have you ever had your fortune told?

What was the experience like?

Where did it happen? What were your surroundings like? Was the decor and atmosphere appropriate to the situation?

Was the reading accurate?

Would you have it done again?

What does the term Community Service mean to you? Does it conjure up ideas of forced service to the community, the result of a court sentence for the guilty to perform community service hours as a penance? Or is it more like a leisurely Saturday morning sizzling sausages at the local Apex or Lions club charity fundraiser? Perhaps it’s volunteer time spent chatting with residents of a nearby nursing home?

Do you currently get involved in any community service projects? Have you volunteered your time for a good cause in the past? If you haven’t, would you consider doing so in the future or not? For what reasons?

Imagine that everyone in your city or town was now required by law to perform a minimum of 3 hours community service per month. What would your reaction be? Would you be pleased? Unhappy? Worried? What sort of activity would you choose to do?