SET Methodology & Data Interpretation

1. The results of teachers’ assessment and course grades should be clearly separated. While teachers’ results help to evaluate their personal teaching skills, course results are useful for evaluating overall content and organization. Although the results of teachers' assessments are good, certain elements of course organization (topics or assessment elements) may cause difficulties for students. Therefore, it is important to adjust course content. The opposite is also true, and even successful topics and control elements may not result in the desired outcomes due to the problems with the submission of material or an opaque evaluation system. Look at these two types of assessment differently. They can help you figure out where it is important to work on the course content and where to work on your personal teaching skills.

2. Consider each SET criterion separately.If teachers’ grades are averaged, then course evaluation results are usually shown separately for each criterion. This helps us to understand what exactly needs to be corrected. Perhaps there are not enough practical elements of the work or the novelty of knowledge gained in the given course is not enough. Therefore, it is necessary to improve these features in particular, in order to produce the best results. 

3. Difficulty of the course for its successful completion should not be very high or low. While other criteria should be maximized (i.e., “the more, the better”), the overall difficulty of the course should remain at the average level or slightly above average so as to stimulate students to learn the subject. If the indicators are very low or high, this means that the backgrounds of students are not taken into account.

1. Remember to separate the teacher’s grades from the course grades. You are not only the author of the course, you are also the first person who helps students to learn new things. Therefore, every part of your work is important, whether it is organizing assessment elements or your teaching methods. Thus, try to separate the feedback on the subject and on your personal work, as this will help you understand your strengths and weaknesses.

2. Pay special attention to the communication criteria and students' comments on them. Not only do students evaluate the content of the material, but also how you delivered it. This means that sometimes it’s more important how you explain the criteria for assignments or answer questions during the classes. Working with communication criteria is important for your future relations with students, their understanding of the material and your own personal development. 

3. Do not be ashamed of sharing positive experiences. Students provide feedback not only about the bad parts of the course, but also about the advantages of the teacher or the course. Comments on successful teaching practices, interesting control elements or a convenient course structure will help you to understand that you are doing everything right.

1. ​If a blended teaching format is applied, think about how the online course has helped students develop course topics Online courses can supplement information taught in regular classes or offer something new. Therefore, students’ grades will show how the e-course helped them to broaden their knowledge and obtain new skills. Thus, you will understand whether the course was generally useful and whether it is worth offering it to students in the future.