A note from the authors:

Many professors want to use participation in the class for part of the grade assigned. Determining the amount of participation is always an issue and open to dispute by students. In order to avoid disputes, faculty can ask students to self-assess their participation which we then confirm or discuss further. Our experience with this is very positive. We find the students appreciate the feedback.

Our procedure is to ask students to fill in the self-assessment sheet after each class. We collect the sheets and review them quickly to see if we disagree with those assessments. If we agree, we initial the assessment. If we disagree, we state this and give reasons why. This may lead to further discussion about standards and expectations. At the end of the term, we calculate an average participation score for each person and assign a grade based on this.

Other faculty have asked students to complete the self-assessment every third or fourth class. They then follow a similar procedure but with fewer data points.

› Self-Assessment Sheets