What: Explicitly asking students what their academic and personal goals are for the semester. This relates to the previous suggestion of understanding why students are taking the class, but asking for students' goals is important in addition to that.

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How: While asking for students' goals, you might also want to ask students to share anything they might want you to know about their learning style, or access needs. This is an opportunity to hear from students what their goals are, and how you as the professor can help them achieve those goals. This information can be collected on notecards, or through a private Moodle post or submission.

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Why: This is a helpful task for students to be clear on their goals, and for you to help students meet those goals. These goals can also be revisited at the end of the semester to help you and the students see the progress on reaching those goals.