Trails to Literacy: TOOLKIT

Evaluation Tools

Journals

Journal writing is an excellent way for learners to reflect on their activities. Journals can follow a variety of formats depending on the writing and self-direction skills of your participants and what you wish to accomplish.

• Free writing journal. There is no required structure, guidelines or expectations. Participants write as their thoughts lead them.
• Group list. The whole group brainstorms a list of topics or questions to follow.
• Structured journal. Students are expected to respond to one or more questions or to comment on a specific list of topics. The questions and topics should require some thought and reflection on their learning and goals.

It's best to react to student's responses, but not to judge them. One effective way to react to student's journals is to respond to their thoughts by asking them questions.

Rubrics

Before having students complete a particular project or activity, ask students to create a rubric for assessing their work.

A rubric helps students to think about what they will be learning and what will. Rubrics also serve as a check to ensure that activities are related to the original training plan and specific learning goals (i.e. grammar, spelling, measurement, etc.).

“Rubric” is an odd sounding word to many participants and therefore threatening. They should be provided with a friendly ‘orientation’, such as rating a chocolate chip cookie, pizza, video game, etc. There are numerous rubric samples available over the internet.