One Who Makes the Palomar PACT

The Palomar Academy for Collaborative Teaching (PACT) under the auspices of BSI/HSI held its first ever year-end presentations in early May. Much of the content was nicely summarized and disseminated in Sheri Ortega's Student Peer Mentor Newsletter that she sent campus-wide on May 23. In this post, I'd just like to add what history prof. George Gastil did for his PACT piece: teaching students self-assessment to achieve goals. Since the first of George's three-stage self assessment process takes place at the beginning of a term, a review of George's way is timely as we get ready to begin summer school next week.

George's purpose is twofold: to help students see their strengths and consider how they can become more effective students, and to help them recognize their own progress instead of relying on recognition from the instructor all the time.

Self-Assessment I
Students first write a brief learner profile of themselves, which includes helpful information such as years in school and interests. They also include a picture of themselves that they don't mind other people seeing.
They then write three goals for how they are going to grow and develop during the class, which usually involve skills such as writing and expressing ideas. Examples of goals that are useful and goals that are not are provided to the students.

• Useful ones:
• "Start each assignment at least a week before it is due."
• Learn to write with short paragraphs and complete sentences."
• Learn to explain to a classmate.
• Not so useful ones (because they don't tell how to get there):
• "Get an A."
• "Don't procrastinate."

Finally, students indicate how they will measure progress on each goal. They are told that most goals work best if their progress can be measured on a weekly or bi-weekly basis.

Self-Assessment II
About half way through the course, students assess their experience with the goals by writing a one-pager and answering these four questions:

1. How have you been doing with respect to your goals?
2. Have you found that any of your goals need revising or changing?
3. In what ways have you found the goals helpful so far?
4. What are you going to do about your goals for the rest of the term?

Self-Assessment III
For the final self-assessment, students answer these four questions:

1. How have you done on goals?
2. How has the goal-setting process worked out for you this term?
3. Are there other ways you have grown and developed this term?
4. What goals do you expect to have for future classes?

George is keen to provide feedback. For example, he makes suggestions while reading his students' first self-assessments, telling them how their goals could be more clearly focused.

At the end of the semester, most of George's students report that they have made significant progress on the goals. One of the students comments, "this is the first time anyone has asked me to think about my own goals in a course."

George also sees a side benefit of doing this activity on Blackboard: it serves as an easy way for his students to start using Blackboard if they have not used it before.