Now that the term is nearly over, I have the opportunity to look back on the class and see how well I achieved the learning outcomes:
1. Learn and Follow
the BYU-Idaho Learning Model (prepare, teach one another, ponder and prove)
Preparing
was definitely important in this class. I'll be honest--in the past I've been
more of a finish-it-right-before-class kind of girl, and that definitely showed
in the beginning of this course. As the term progressed, however, I learned the
importance of preparing in advance so that I could then be taught by my peers.
It helped SO MUCH when I did that. Then I was also able to help my peers more
with theirs and, in my own small way, teach them. I think as far as teaching
one another, I had a great experience with my cohort, Holly and Whitney.
The three of us got very involved in each other's research and were able to help
each other a lot. I also got very into self-directed learning. I wasn't just
learning the exact amount that I needed to; I went beyond and found out a lot
of things that maybe weren't even necessarily the exact right quote
or whatever, but were just interesting things that were indirectly related,
even if they didn't necessarily make it into the paper. I think that helped me
focus the paper a lot more and round it out.
2. Write
Substantially and Publicly About Literature
Writing the
blog definitely helped me to meet this learning outcome. I invited my friends
on Facebook to read the blog quite often and sometimes they did--many of them
mentioned the blog to me. Blogging, I think, actually helped me to write a lot
more substantially than I would have if I had just written the paper.
3. Develop Research
Skills
I definitely
developed a LOT of research skills in this class! Visiting the library helped a
lot as far as scholarly research--I learned to use a lot of different databases
whereas before I didn't necessarily use a lot of different resources. I also
learned to do more informal, less traditional research that helped a lot in
clarifying my topic and my points in the research paper.
