Results of student goal discussion

In class on 8/27, students broke up into small groups to discuss what they considered to be the most important goals for the semester and how what kind of learning approaches they could apply to achieve them. Here is a summary of the results:

• Group 1: Learn to program, learning new languages, learn to work in teams.
• Group 2: Code faster and more efficiently, learn version control, become a better programmer
• Group 3: Learn Javascript, Create items for ones portfolio, learn to work in teams
• Group 4: Programming, Proficiency, Confidence, Networking
• Group 5: Working on a team, new development tools, being organized, obeying standards.
• Group 6: Time management, collaboration, code efficiently.

The next question involved what learning strategies to employ, and here are responses:

• Keep a calendar, stay on schedule
• Be an active listener and participate
• Take your time, document.
• Get comfortable studying in groups
• Allocate 10+ hours a week.
• Study efficiently.
• Help each other
• Break up learning into “25 minute study sets”
• Don’t take long breaks from programming
• Get enough sleep.

I also asked for risk factors. There was overwhelming consensus for at least one: procrastination. Other risk factors included:

• Time management
• Lack of trust in others
• Sleep deprivation