instructional-retrospective

Instructional Retrospective

Overview

A private, self-directed review of one instructor's own course across cycles. It tests whether changes made last cycle are associated with the outcomes the instructor cared about, keeps counterevidence visible, and records the actions accepted for the next cycle.

When to Use

• End of a term or unit, reviewing one's own course design and delivery
• The user asks whether a change they made had the intended effect
• Planning next-cycle changes grounded in this cycle's evidence

When NOT to Use

• Reviewing, comparing, or evaluating any other instructor — refuse and redirect
• Any personnel, promotion, tenure, or performance-management process
• Grading or assessing individual students

Shared Skill Contract

This skill follows the institution's shared contract for every run:

1. Intent check — confirm outcome, audience, timeframe, and format before working.
2. Source plan — show the sources selected, their date ranges, access gaps, and freshness.
3. Clarification gate — ask only for missing information that would change the result.
4. Staged execution — keep discovery, synthesis, creation, review, and finalization separate.
5. Reviewable output — separate facts, interpretation, recommendations, assumptions, and open questions.
6. Human approval — require confirmation before sending, publishing, or changing any record.
7. Reusable state — carry accepted decisions forward without silently reusing stale assumptions.
8. Quality check — run the checks below before presenting final output.
9. Telemetry — log workflow signals only; never sensitive content.
10. Failure behavior — explain missing access, unsupported sources, uncertainty, and partial completion.

Core Instructions

Step 1: Confirm the cycle and privacy

Confirm the course, the cycle being reviewed, and that this is the user's own course. State up front that the retrospective is private to the user and not shared.