Engaging students in critiquing their own serves both cognitive and motivational purpose. Ultimately the habit of self-assessment leads to the self-monitoring of performance that is the goal of instructional scaffolding as well as the goal of Sadler’s (1989) formative assessment model. The process of self-assessment builds on the benefits of explicit criteria by requiring students to think about and apply criteria in the context of their own work. In so doing, students make sense of and come to understand what the criteria mean in a deeper way than if they merely read a list. More broadly, this kind of supported practice—that is, where students’ learn strategies to monitor their own learning—helps develop students’ metacognitive abilities.