Case Study: Peer Reviews and Reflective Discussion Boards

Keeping it short and sweet in webinars to hold the students’ attention in Forensic Psychology.

Peer Reviews and Reflective Discussion Boards

Date: 23/11/20

Clare Horrocks

Staff Profile

Summary

Clare used a mixture of discussion boards peer review and quizzes to engage her students in reflection of their own and others learning.   

Further Information:

Subject Area:

Social Science

Level: 5

Class Size: 40

Keywords

Assessment, Discussions, Feedback, Formative, Peer Learning, Quizzes, Student Engagement

Case Study:

Details of Process 

Clare is the module leader for a Research Methods moduleShe's been using a variety of technologies and media to reach out to students and engage them. These include discussion boards quizzes and an activity using a system built into canvas called peer reviewThis short write up will concentrate on the peer review and the discussion board activities.

The Peer Review Activity 

This was a formative task and it was completely up to the students as to whether they wanted to take part or notClare promotethe ideas and benefits of peer review particularly as a transferable skill for employmentShe also provided some links to resources that would help students understand this processShe also highlighted how this task would help them read more efficiently and effectivelyHowever, she did note that a number of students were underconfident about their abilities to complete this task and did not undertake it 

The peer review activity was a real time live session where she asked the students to read the same article and write up a short paragraph that summarised it within an hour as an individual taskThe students then submitted this to canvas and Clare used canvas to organise the distribution of those submissions so that every student had two submissions to peer review 

The article was of a generic nature talking about how researchers approach the idea of cultureShe selected that article because she didn't wanto exclude any students that may have less knowledge of the wider curriculum she was teaching and which linked to their forthcoming assessmentThe students were encouraged to leave annotations on the paper and comments using the actual marking criteria for the module assessment. All feedback was anonymized although the tutor did have an overview of who had written what for whomClare followed up the activity by providing feedback via Canvas for all those involved which included helping the students to understand the students commentsThe students comments were overwhelmingly positive but many of them found suggestions to help their peers improved their own writing 

Feedback from the students highlighted how they found this useful in understanding the process of markingthus giving them a better understanding of this process and their role within it. The feedback from the process also included comments about how daunting it was for students and how some of them found that this put them in a position of power which some found difficult as they believed that they were not worthy of passing comment on another students workAll the students agreed that this had changed their viewpoint on the assignment processThey enjoyed the challenge of being asked to write academically early on in the semesterSo, they appreciated it but also hated being put on the spot. The students that took part would like more of these activities and Clare is already working on an idea for an annotated bibliography task in a similar way 

Reflecting on this Clare believes that what can help improve this is for the students to know each other better and form greater levels of trustproviding more information for the students to highlight the benefits that this could bring them and reduce the anxiety it may be causing them.

Discussion boards

Clare has used a number of discussion board activities so far on this module, these tend to be tied to some type of activity around the theme for the lecture that week. The resources she offers the students to interact with are carefully selected to include something to read, something to listen to and something to watch. This is to maximise the medium by which the students can gain an understanding of the topic. They are not expected to engage with all of the resources but to pick the one which will help them the most.

An example of this would be a podcast she shared with students around building a research project. The students listened to somebody describe their research project design and were encouraged to discuss in the discussion board what questions they would ask this particular person. Students offered up questions, and this generated wider discussion with many students posting to each other.

Clare uses the discussion board setting that prevents students from reading the posts without first making a contribution. However, she did find that some students got around this system and didn't write more than a single word. Having said that it is still encouraging that students wanted to read each others’ contributions.

Clare spends a small amount of time each week following up on these tasks dipping in and out to offer up comments and encouragement. She finds now that she is used to the system that this is not over burdensome, as it helps her get an idea of how her students are doing and to make improvements to the sessions that follow each activity. Clare recommends talking to the skills@ljmu team, as they have many useful resources that can help the students improve their learning. Clare would like to continue with this process and improve it and has seen the possibility of offering a variety of methods for students to engage in the course as helping everyone.

Guides

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Assignments

Create an Assignment Task for your Students

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Discussions

Discuss a topic in your course.

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Quizzes

Create and develop online quizzes

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Peerwise

Student Multiple Choice Question Repository

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