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LEARNING CONTRACTS

John Heron regards an educated person as one who is self-directing, self-monitoring and self-correcting. In other words, they set their own goals, work out how to achieve them, track their own progress, and adjust their activities in the light of experience. In the educational context, this is reflected in the process of creating and implementing a personal learning contract. Ideally, this process would occur in every course, but because of the time required it is difficult to apply fully to short courses.

So how does this process work? As usual, the course facilitators set the scope of the curriculum, and criteria by which to assess achievement of essential learning outcomes. However, even in short courses the details of the curriculum and desired outcomes may be negotiated between facilitators and participants, depending on their interests and abilities.

When time is available, each participant creates their own personal learning plan in which he or she identifies what they wish to achieve within the context of this particular course – their learning goals. They then decide the steps they will take and the resources they will need in order to move towards those goals, and choose criteria by which they will know they have achieved them – the assessment criteria. Other members of their learning community help them refine and sharpen these goals and criteria until they are clearly defined, realistic and achievable. Often, the goals may shift or change during the course in the light of learning that has taken place, and periodic re-evaluation of the learning contract is an important part of the process.