Session 8

The final activity is to summarise what learners have gained from completing this course. Carers can do this as an individual activity using their Reflection Log or this can be done as a final group session and evaluation. You can use creative evaluation methods, such as creating a Learning Tree or other image that learners can add their thoughts to.

Ask the group to think about:

• What have you learned about yourself, your experiences and your hopes for the future?

Ask each learner to make a note on a post-it of what they have learned from the course. They can also write down anything else they have achieved from the course, such as making some new friends, realising that there are other people in similar caring roles, or that everyone’s caring role is different. Add each post-it to your Learning Tree (or whatever method you are using). Don’t forget to take a photo!

To guide the evaluation, here are the learning outcomes that we listed in the introduction:

• a clearer understanding of the experiences that carers could reflect on, including their roles, actions and decisions
• an understanding of the various skills that could be developed within a caring role, and how some of these are transferable to other contexts
• an appreciation of personal qualities developed through a caring role
• an idea of the directions carers might like to go in
• an idea of what it is possible for carers to achieve in their immediate future
• an understanding of the learning options open to carers
• an idea, or ideas, about possible learning paths
• as a learner, how to go about finding out what you need to know
• the ability to use information technology (IT) to carry out reflective activities in writing and communicating
• the ability to use the internet to find information useful to you
• the ability to explore and use new ways of expressing ideas.