Expert Project Description:
Title: Implementing peer feedback best practices through a technological platform, looking at the impacts on student outcomes.
My expert project will explore the use of peer feedback via a platform called Canvas. Canvas is a learning management system that all my students use. The specific Canvas function I will be working with is the peer review function that enables the students to view and comment on each other’s work. I want to implement peer feedback best practices though this technology to increase the student’s engagement with assignments and reflection on there own written work. Written work will include lab reports, essay question and analysis questions. I want to explore how the method(s) impact their ability to elaborate and to support claims with evidence. I am planning on actively experimenting with this as I learn about peer feedback best practices and as I adapt those practices to Canvas. I plan to collect student work and student views on the process and I will incorporate these outcomes into the exhibit portion of this project.
My expert project will explore the use of peer feedback via a platform called Canvas. Canvas is a learning management system that all my students use. The specific Canvas function I will be working with is the peer review function that enables the students to view and comment on each other’s work. I want to implement peer feedback best practices though this technology to increase the student’s engagement with assignments and reflection on there own written work. Written work will include lab reports, essay question and analysis questions. I want to explore how the method(s) impact their ability to elaborate and to support claims with evidence. I am planning on actively experimenting with this as I learn about peer feedback best practices and as I adapt those practices to Canvas. I plan to collect student work and student views on the process and I will incorporate these outcomes into the exhibit portion of this project.
Population Description and Context
The exploration of this project is related to my continued growth on the use of technology in the classroom. I am looking closely at a specific component of a technology, Canvas, that many in my high school have adopted. Canvas is a learning management system that is used at varying degrees by the teacher at Brookline High School. I have started to use Canvas to deliver some course content, point students to web based resources that relate to the class work, post all files, communicate with students, receive student work and grade student work. The peer review function is an option for any submitted assignment on Canvas. The peer review function intrigued me because it is a method of getting the students to interact with each other through Canvas. Peer feedback also is an exercise that when completed in class can take a lot of class time and requires the students to stay very focused on the work. The students are juniors in high school and the class is first year honor level Biology. The majority of class time is reserved for content and for lab experiences. There is an increased emphasis on subject area literacy as education is coming to grips with the Common Core era. This project is an exploration into a more deliberate approach to teaching content are writing using peer feedback as a teaching tool and enabling this efficiently and comprehensively through technology. One measure of success will be if the process improves overall as a result of using technology. The following is a visualization of the various elements of my expert project.
Implementation and Student Outcomes
The project involved testing of the various methods. The following two links will take you to detailed accounts two assignments that I used peer feedback. The exhibits will also outline examples of what the technology 'looks' like and how it was adapted to each assignment. Examples of student feedback are included.
Technological Platform - Canvas
Below is a video that illustrates the functionality of peer review in Canvas.
|
Canvas is a learning management system with a wide array of functions. The image to the left shows my home page for one of the classes that I have implemented peer feedback. Instructors have the option of requiring peer review for submitted assignments. Shown below is a an example of a rubric developed in Canvas that students used to give feedback on peer work. Students also could comment directly on the submitted documents. Details of how students used these functions can be found in the exhibits.
|
Peer Feedback Best Practices
I collected best practices by looking at my previous methods and conducting research. The following is a break down of what I found in this research.
Previous methods
Past methods have successfully engaged students in a process of review and revision. The process was a small group "speed" peer review process that also had students use an edited version of the grading rubrics. The past practices were influenced from by the following handout and the embedded video. Both are more geared towards creative and persuasive writing but provided good context for the students around the principles of constructive critique.
Previous methods
Past methods have successfully engaged students in a process of review and revision. The process was a small group "speed" peer review process that also had students use an edited version of the grading rubrics. The past practices were influenced from by the following handout and the embedded video. Both are more geared towards creative and persuasive writing but provided good context for the students around the principles of constructive critique.
Expert Project Research
The following is a compilation of the research along with references to sections of the articles that drove my thinking.
Designing Peer Review for Pedagogical Success: What Can We Learn form Professional Science? By: Nancy Trautmann
(Full text article below)
This article articulates the motivations for using peer review in a school setting by comparing and contrasting the process as it exists in the professional world to how it exists in schools. This article offered insights on how to design the method for my classes and with my technological format. The article is not specific to using technology as a the mode of giving feedback but well establishes its value as a class exercise.
"A common reason for engaging students in peer review is to help them gain understandings about how scientists interact to construct and refine scientific knowledge." (pg. 15) One of the primary goals of written work and lab work in science classrooms is to reflect what occurs in the scientific community. To often this stops at the scientific method and does not extend to the expression of the findings and rarely is the parallel drawn to the peer review in the scientific community.
The following is a compilation of the research along with references to sections of the articles that drove my thinking.
Designing Peer Review for Pedagogical Success: What Can We Learn form Professional Science? By: Nancy Trautmann
(Full text article below)
This article articulates the motivations for using peer review in a school setting by comparing and contrasting the process as it exists in the professional world to how it exists in schools. This article offered insights on how to design the method for my classes and with my technological format. The article is not specific to using technology as a the mode of giving feedback but well establishes its value as a class exercise.
"A common reason for engaging students in peer review is to help them gain understandings about how scientists interact to construct and refine scientific knowledge." (pg. 15) One of the primary goals of written work and lab work in science classrooms is to reflect what occurs in the scientific community. To often this stops at the scientific method and does not extend to the expression of the findings and rarely is the parallel drawn to the peer review in the scientific community.
The table to the right is taken from pg 15 of Trautmanns work. The peer review functions in school science column contributed to identifying the goals that I set forth as I designed the process for my students.
"A major challenge in face-to-face or signed peer review among students is the likelihood that peer pressure will sway the review process." (pg. 17) |
This point in Trautmann's article was instrumental in how I designed the peer feedback on the Canvas platform. I did not make my reviewers anonymous but I am wondering if the online format provides a layer of between writer and reviewer. This happens all the time in the opposite direction when someone texts/emails/posts comments that they would never say to another persons face. I am hoping this phenomenon works in favor of freeing people to deliver more honest feedback.
"Perhaps the most important variable affecting learning gains through peer review is the extent to which students apply time, effort, and critical thinking in all steps of the process—reviewing other students’ reports, responding to suggestions received from reviewers, and reflecting on what they have learned. Instructors typically grade the quality of final manuscripts, with credit but no grades assigned to reviews written or to critical reflection about reviews received. Students might be prompted to apply greater levels of critical thinking in writing or reacting to reviews if these aspects of the peer review process were graded." (pg. 18) This rather lengthy point is drove me to find a middle ground for trying to get students to engage honestly with giving feedback. The design of my method incorporates a scoring rubric that gives students to give feedback by essentially grading their peer. Students to receive credit for doing the reviews but it is not based on the this rubric but an assessment, by me, of the level of specificity in the feedback.
"Perhaps the most important variable affecting learning gains through peer review is the extent to which students apply time, effort, and critical thinking in all steps of the process—reviewing other students’ reports, responding to suggestions received from reviewers, and reflecting on what they have learned. Instructors typically grade the quality of final manuscripts, with credit but no grades assigned to reviews written or to critical reflection about reviews received. Students might be prompted to apply greater levels of critical thinking in writing or reacting to reviews if these aspects of the peer review process were graded." (pg. 18) This rather lengthy point is drove me to find a middle ground for trying to get students to engage honestly with giving feedback. The design of my method incorporates a scoring rubric that gives students to give feedback by essentially grading their peer. Students to receive credit for doing the reviews but it is not based on the this rubric but an assessment, by me, of the level of specificity in the feedback.
The nature, reception, and use of online peer feedback in higher education. By: J. van der Pol, B.A.M. van den Berg, W.F. Admiraal, P.R.J. Simons. (full text below)
This article which is specific to online feedback helped me understand the implications of how students deliever feedback. The following quote sums it up well.... "different tools for peer feedback evoke differences in the nature, reception and use of feedback. In study 2, we found two interesting differences between the Annotation system and Blackboard. When used side-by-side in the same course, Blackboard proved to elicit more evaluative feedback remarks, whereas the Annotation system produced more suggestions for revision." (pg. 1851) I my design I attempt to parallel the Blackboard method with the commenting function that is embedded in the rubric. The annotation method is accomplished on Canvas using crocodocs.
This article which is specific to online feedback helped me understand the implications of how students deliever feedback. The following quote sums it up well.... "different tools for peer feedback evoke differences in the nature, reception and use of feedback. In study 2, we found two interesting differences between the Annotation system and Blackboard. When used side-by-side in the same course, Blackboard proved to elicit more evaluative feedback remarks, whereas the Annotation system produced more suggestions for revision." (pg. 1851) I my design I attempt to parallel the Blackboard method with the commenting function that is embedded in the rubric. The annotation method is accomplished on Canvas using crocodocs.
Using Writing Assignments with Calibrated Peer Review to Increase Engagement and Improve Learning in an Undergraduate Environmental Science Course. By: Dana Ruggiero and Jon Harbor (Full Text below)
This study analyzed student perspectives on a particular technique of peer review and peer assessment in a science education environment. The article outlines a process (and product) called Calibrated Peer Review (CPR) that requires students to evaluate writings of different caliber to teach students what good writing looks like. This process scaffolds the students thinking about the writing 'calibrates' the students toward giving quality feedback on actual peer work. In this example students are also grading each others work. The article mostly drove my thinking around the question...How do I ensure that there is a standard level of feedback across my classes? The calibration step is intriguing but did not seem tenable given the scope of my assessments and the time available. Additionally the student perceptions about the process was mixed on the assessment side of the CPR.
This study analyzed student perspectives on a particular technique of peer review and peer assessment in a science education environment. The article outlines a process (and product) called Calibrated Peer Review (CPR) that requires students to evaluate writings of different caliber to teach students what good writing looks like. This process scaffolds the students thinking about the writing 'calibrates' the students toward giving quality feedback on actual peer work. In this example students are also grading each others work. The article mostly drove my thinking around the question...How do I ensure that there is a standard level of feedback across my classes? The calibration step is intriguing but did not seem tenable given the scope of my assessments and the time available. Additionally the student perceptions about the process was mixed on the assessment side of the CPR.