Using learning journals to identify critical incidents of understanding

Learning journals have been used extensively in Art and Design at University College
Worcester (UCW) as a means of evidencing the kind of approach, deep/surface, students
have taken to their learning. They are increasingly being recognised as a more reliable
means of establishing whether students understand what they are doing than the finished
artefacts such as paintings, ceramics and even essays. This paper will outline the role of the
journals in relation to the assessment scheme, which is structured around Biggs’ SOLO
taxonomy (Biggs J, Collis K, 1982), and explore several of the problematics that arise in
both their use and their non-use. The paper will also examine the nature and use of learning
outcomes since they play a significant role in the journals themselves.