HOW CAN I CHECK IN ON MYSELF AS A LEARNER AND

“BOUNCE BACK” FROM A SETBACK?

Throughout this College Thriving course, we have shared skills and perspectives designed to
support first year college students as learners, friends, UNC community members, and emerging
adults – living and developing through a growth mindset. Among college students, one of the
most common challenges that test these skills are academic setbacks. These may come in many
forms – ranging from a lower than anticipated score on a homework assignment to a piling up
of coursework and disappointing grades when an unexpected life stressor causes them to fall
behind. In this module, we integrate different skills from this course that together prepare you
to face academic setbacks as well as introduce new ways of using a growth mindset when the
going gets particularly tough.

Underlying the tools in your College Thriving kit is growth mindset – the perspective that the
challenges of life are an opportunity to learn about ourselves and one another in order to not
only survive but thrive. Growth mind-set helps us connect the dots among the various tools and
think about how to bring them together to address academic setbacks.

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You can think about your academic journey as grounded in your values, sense of purpose and
identity that guide your exploration of careers, majors and courses which you structure
through smart goals. These goals form plans to access and employ self-care strategies, social
support, UNC services and resources, and study skills and strategies that will help you
overcome challenges that most college students face (including institutional and personal
challenges that may lead to unhelpful thought spirals and mental health concerns).

In other words, your academic journey may follow your very own Carolina-blue brick road with
its own set of challenges and strategies for resilience. The tools you have gathered from this
course (and beyond) can support you in dealing with academic setbacks. But the most
important thing you can do is to take charge of your own journey – and that is where
self-regulated learning comes into play.

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Self-Regulated Learning
For some students, high school came easy because there was a lot of structure around learning.
For example, there may have been daily reminders about what to complete by when, routine
assignments that broke down writing an essay over weeks, time in class dedicated to studying
for exams with partners, and more. In college, some of those scaffolds are not present and
students are expected to become more
independent learners. As a college student,
you are expected to keep your own calendar,
break down assignments and studying into
smaller parts on your own, and ask for help
on what you specifically need. This can feel
like a big challenge for some students who
haven’t reflected on what being an
independent learner means. Many students
haven’t yet learned about tools to
successfully make this transition. Some
students won’t realize they don’t have the
learning skills they need until they have an academic setback. This can feel devastating and
overwhelming and lead to some unhelpful thoughts and thought spirals. One goal of College
Thriving is to ensure all students receive some of the tools to “learn how to learn”.
Self-regulating learning is a useful framework taking control of your own learning experience.
This cyclical process occurs through a series of repeated steps in which students plan for an
academic task, monitor their performance, and then (most importantly) reflect on their
outcomes. The reflection phase allows students to learn not only about the material they have
set out to master but also about the strategies they use to learn. It is a cycle based on growth
mindset, which is precisely why it is a cycle!
Let’s take a closer look at how to use a capstone tool that picks up where SMART goals and
study strategies leave off. The following chart provides a guide for how to use self-regulated
learning to meet one of your own SMART goals moving forward. You may not address all these
steps in your next self-regulated learning cycle but if you hit on the big three –> Plan – Monitor
– Reflect -> you can take charge of your own learning trajectory.

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Self-Regulated Learning with SMART goals

Plan, set goals, and lay out strategies

Plan Set Goals Lay out Strategies Set Expectations for
Outcome
What learning task will I How will I structure the What resources do I Given how much time I have
focus on? task into sub-goals and need to complete this available, my strengths and
intermediate assignment? weaknesses, and my current
checkpoints? standing in the course, what
type of outcome would I like?
Do I need to "ace" this, or is it
OK if I can just complete it
successfully?
What do I know about Create SMART goals If I run into a challenge, Is there something I want to
this task? Is it one I around this structure what supports can I gain or learn from this task
have done before? How and make sure that the access? Meet with a TA? other than completing it on
did it go last time? schedule fits in with my Check in at the UNC time for a given grade? Is that
other commitments – Writing and Learning built into my plan?
remember to use my Center? Have I given
calendar! myself time to use those
resources if you need
them?
Use strategies and monitor performance
Stick with the Plan Collect Data Adjust Monitor Progress
Implement the Make self-observations If the unexpected arises, Track progress on meeting
strategies on the plan about what is working revisit the overall plan intermediate and sub-goals
and follow my with the plan (the and adjust – with an eye along the way.
schedule. what, who and where). toward the overall
outcome.
Pay attention to Consider keeping notes Be sure to take
self-care to maximize in my calendar or advantage of resources
opportunities for planner. to support me – use my
success. back-up strategies.
Reflect on my performance
Evaluate Compare Refine Keep Track
Did the plan work the What was different this Refine my set of Write a reflection – notes to
way I had hoped? What time than in my other strategies for building myself so I will remember what
worked well? What did learning plans? my next learning plan. I learned when I have this type
not? of learning task again.
Be careful to avoid What did I learn about Identity places for Take it beyond learning – what
unhelpful thought how I learn that I want growth going forward. did I learn about myself, my
spirals & perfectionism! to take forward? goals, my career exploration,
and my values that will help me
in my next learning exercise?

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A Case Study
Let’s look at an example of how self-regulated learning can frame a cycle for continual growth:
Mariana received a lower grade than she expected on the first exam, lower than the grades she
was accustomed to earning in high school. These thoughts came to her: “Was this the right
place for her?” “Would she continue to feel like she wasn’t cut out for this kind of college-level
work?” She recognized that these were unhelpful thoughts that could result in a thought spiral.
To interrupt these thoughts, she decided she needed to assess her situation and take some kind
of action.
Using the self-regulated learning cycle, Mariana started by reflecting on her performance on
the first exam. She went through the exam to look at which types of questions on which she did
well versus struggled. It seemed she did well with recall and memorization type questions, but
not as well with questions that required more analysis and application. She talked to her
professor in office hours and received lots of useful and practical tips about how to practice
these kinds of questions. The professor made her feel better about how these kinds of skills
were difficult for many students transitioning from high school but that with practice she was
more than capable of improvement.
Having identified places for growth, Mariana moved onto planning, setting goals, and laying
out strategies for exam 2. Her goal was to score at least 15-20 points higher on her second
exam. She decided that she would pull out all the questions from the class that required
application and analysis thinking and then write out explanations to each question – as if she
was teaching another person on a discussion board. After this independent practice, she
planned to take a practice exam and discuss each question with a friend in her class. She
blocked time for each smaller task on her calendar for the next week and made a date with her
friend.
Mariana used the strategies she planned and monitored her performance. As she practiced,
she skipped writing out the explanations to questions she thought she understood well enough.
Yet, when she saw model answers to these questions, she realized understanding was not the
same as knowing something deep enough to teach it. As a result, she changed her strategy and
wrote the explanations to all the questions, allowing her to process the concepts more deeply
and confidently. She scored herself on the practice exam and did well. She and her friend met to
review the practice exam, but the friend wasn’t as well prepared as Mariana.
What happened? Mariana hit her goal and increased her exam performance by 16 points. She
felt really proud of herself. When she reflected on her performance, she saw evidence that her
study skills were improving and working better for her. She realized that she didn’t need to wait
until a week before an exam to do this kind of work, and if she started earlier it could reduce
her stress. She began incorporating this strategy into her daily assignments. It was also apparent

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that her friend wasn’t her ideal study partner. She reached out to someone else she met in the
class to see if they wanted to study with her.

Thought Questions About the Case Study:

Do you relate to any of Mariana’s story?
Did Mariana set reasonable goals and sub-goals?
Is Mariana’s work as a learner done because she hit her goal?
Want more information?
https://serc.carleton.edu/sage2yc/self_regulated/what.html
Flanagan, L., "Why Understanding Obstacles is Essential to Achieving Goals" MindShift, KQED
News, (December 2014) Accessed online
at http://ww2.kqed.org/mindshift/2014/12/26/why-understanding-obstacles-is-essential-to-ach
ieving-goals/.

Zimmerman, B. J. (2002). Becoming a self-regulated learner: An overview. Theory into Practice,

41(2), 64-70.

Zumbrunn, S., Tadlock, J., & Roberts, E. D. (2011). Encouraging self-regulated learning in the
classroom: A review of the literature. Metropolitan Educational Research Consortium (MERC).

See the complete list of all references used in this module.