GOALs Page
What is a GOALS PAGE?
Your goals page is where you will outline your own personal goals for GDES 120 Intro to Digital Art,
as well as, your intent for each of your five projects.
Writing Course Goal Statements
We will start the course and our E-Portfolios with a COURSE GOAL STATEMENT.
What is a goal statement?
Goal statements are assessment tools. They help us examine a situation or concept and determine
what we want to get out of that situation or concept.
The purpose of a GOAL STATEMENT is to help you determine what you want to get out of this class
or, when it comes to individual projects, what you want to get out of that project. Knowing what you
want is the first step in directing HOW you will achieve what it is you are aiming for. The idea here is
to help you get the most out of this course by finding a way for you to personally connect to the
material.
Goal statements allow us to determine a WHAT (what we want). The HOW (how we achieve what it is
we want) is realized when we examine what we want and understand WHY we want it.
As your instructor, I am here to guide you throughout the learning and creative process. I will help
you assess the WHAT and WHY of your goals and demonstrate steps (the HOW) that we can take to
reach your goals.
The course goal statement is the first step in finding and fostering a connection to this course. We
will reflect upon and update your course goal statement at mid-term and once again during finals.
Your goals page is where you will outline your own personal goals for GDES 120 Intro to Digital Art,
as well as, your intent for each of your five projects.
Writing Course Goal Statements
We will start the course and our E-Portfolios with a COURSE GOAL STATEMENT.
What is a goal statement?
Goal statements are assessment tools. They help us examine a situation or concept and determine
what we want to get out of that situation or concept.
The purpose of a GOAL STATEMENT is to help you determine what you want to get out of this class
or, when it comes to individual projects, what you want to get out of that project. Knowing what you
want is the first step in directing HOW you will achieve what it is you are aiming for. The idea here is
to help you get the most out of this course by finding a way for you to personally connect to the
material.
Goal statements allow us to determine a WHAT (what we want). The HOW (how we achieve what it is
we want) is realized when we examine what we want and understand WHY we want it.
As your instructor, I am here to guide you throughout the learning and creative process. I will help
you assess the WHAT and WHY of your goals and demonstrate steps (the HOW) that we can take to
reach your goals.
The course goal statement is the first step in finding and fostering a connection to this course. We
will reflect upon and update your course goal statement at mid-term and once again during finals.
Where do I post my Course Goal Statement?
You will post your Course Goal Statement on your GOALS page.
We will initially create a Course Goal Statement at the beginning of the semester, we will reflect on
our statement and update it at midterms, and at finals, we will update it one last time based on our
complete experience of the course.
Developing your goal statement.
Reflect on WHY you chose to take this class. Go beyond stating that you simply need credit for an art
course.
Some reasons WHY to start with could be:
“I’ve always wanted to take an art course but never got the opportunity. This semester I have
the chance to explore the world of art.”
This could work well as a first step in determining WHY. Perhaps something like the following would
fit closer to your reasons:
“Art is a way I can express myself. I want to discover new ways of communicating and
connecting to the world through art."
Or
“I don’t consider myself an artist and want to see if I can build some new skills. Art might
become a hobby of mine, and I would like to see if art is a viable career path if it is something
that clicks for me."
Because we are just getting started, your course goal statement will begin quite broad. Moving
forward into the semester you will be able to better determine what this course has to offer and
what you are taking away from lessons, discussions, and studio time.
Your COURSE GOAL STATEMENT is meant to evolve. Making the information of this course relevant
to you personally will help you to better understand the information and retain the knowledge and
skills. You will look at how much you have progressed, the direction in which you moved forward,
and what you still want to learn when we update our COURSE GOAL STATEMENT at midterm and
during finals.
You will post your Course Goal Statement on your GOALS page.
We will initially create a Course Goal Statement at the beginning of the semester, we will reflect on
our statement and update it at midterms, and at finals, we will update it one last time based on our
complete experience of the course.
Developing your goal statement.
Reflect on WHY you chose to take this class. Go beyond stating that you simply need credit for an art
course.
Some reasons WHY to start with could be:
“I’ve always wanted to take an art course but never got the opportunity. This semester I have
the chance to explore the world of art.”
This could work well as a first step in determining WHY. Perhaps something like the following would
fit closer to your reasons:
“Art is a way I can express myself. I want to discover new ways of communicating and
connecting to the world through art."
Or
“I don’t consider myself an artist and want to see if I can build some new skills. Art might
become a hobby of mine, and I would like to see if art is a viable career path if it is something
that clicks for me."
Because we are just getting started, your course goal statement will begin quite broad. Moving
forward into the semester you will be able to better determine what this course has to offer and
what you are taking away from lessons, discussions, and studio time.
Your COURSE GOAL STATEMENT is meant to evolve. Making the information of this course relevant
to you personally will help you to better understand the information and retain the knowledge and
skills. You will look at how much you have progressed, the direction in which you moved forward,
and what you still want to learn when we update our COURSE GOAL STATEMENT at midterm and
during finals.
Expanding our goal statements
Determining what you want from a 15-week course just as you’ve entered the classroom can be quite
overwhelming, especially if you have never heard of Adobe Photoshop or Illustrator or taken an art course.
Therefore, how can you hope to know what to expect?
You’ve examined your reasons for taking this course, now lets expand that statement to include something
more. Now that you know what the class has to offer, choose a skill that the course teaches or an aspect of the
course that you think will be of the most benefit to you.
Skills GDES 120 offers (from the Welcome page):
1. Improved communication skills that will allow you to not only better transfer ideas to someone else, but also to
better understand what is being presented to you. Whether you apply this skill in the classroom, to enhance
personal relationships, or apply it to how you approach a work situation, improving communication skills
enhances you abilities in any field from art to business to science.
2. Better visual presentations/illustrations also bolster our ability to better communicate. In a work situation,
where it is your jobs to relate information to your colleagues, your colleagues are not only more likely to pay
attention to a visual, but also, most often, will be better able to interpret the information if there is a visual aid.
Presentations need not always be confined to formal situations. When you go to buy something online, how
often do your purchase a product without being able to see an image to show you what it looks like? Not very
often. Presentations are just a directed form of communication. Being able to visually present or interpret an
idea is critical in almost every life situation.
3. Improved critical thinking skills. Making ideas that float around in our heads concrete and defined visually
breathes life into our inner worlds and thoughts. Learning this skill forces you to examine how you
communicate an idea in general, whether it starts written drawn out or doodled. As we build our skill sets we
will be able to translate complex ideas into a visual format.
Brainstorming to find an idea, further development to form that idea, and then cementing that idea, in this
case, in a visual format, truly brings ideas to life. Developing an idea and successfully communicating it is a
key critical thinking skill that can as easily be applied to a math class as it could a science or psychology class.
4. Better understanding of the world of art and what art means to you on a personal level is a crucial aspect of
this course as “Art” should not remain an abstract. Art encompasses so many folds of life, yet at its heart, art is
communication. Art can communicate exactly what we see, as in a photograph, or it can communicate a story
of another reality such as in a film, comic, or video game.
Sample Course Goal Statements
After you have identified and written down why you chose to take this class, read over some of the
sample goal statements below:
“I’ve always wanted to take an art course but never got the opportunity. This semester I have the chance
to explore the world of art.My goal is to gain a better understanding of what art can do for me
personally. I want to be able to express my ideas in a visual format. I hope to be able to build technical
skills that best allow me to better express myself."
“I don’t consider myself an artist and want to see if I can build some new skills. Art might become a
hobby of mine, so I would like to develop better technical skills so I can see if art is a viable career path,
if art is something that ends up clicking for me.
"I have lots of ideas in my head of what I want to create visually, but I don't know how to realize them
right now. My goal is to build better critical thinking/brainstorming and illustration skills. My hope is
that in developing better critical thinking skills I will be able to tackle a problem from a variety of angles
so I won't get stuck when I can't do it the way I initially wanted to. Having better illustration or drawing
skills will allow me to create the pictures I have in my head, once I have figured out how I want to
create them."
“Art is a way I can express myself. I want to discover new ways of communicating and connecting to the
world through art. My goal is to be able to relate the "world of art" to myself and make a personal
connection to what I am creating. In making this connection, my desire is to be able to take something
from this art class that I can use in other classes as well. Right now art is a hobby, so if I can improve
my critical thinking and problem solving skills so I can use them in other classes, that would be great."
