44,751 research outputs found
Peer assessment as collaborative learning
Peer assessment is an important component of a more participatory culture of learning. The articles collected in this special issue constitute a representative kaleidoscope of current research on peer assessment. In this commentary, we argue that research on peer assessment is currently in a stage of adolescence, grappling with the developmental tasks of identity formation and affiliation. Identity formation may be achieved by efforts towards a shared terminology and joint theory building, whereas affiliation may be reached by a more systematic consideration of research in related fields. To reach identity formation and affiliation, preliminary ideas for a cognitively toned, process-related model of peer assessment and links to related research fields, especially to research on collaborative learning, are presented
Assessment worlds colliding? Negotiating between discourses of assessment on an online open course
Using the badged open course, Taking your first steps into Higher Education, this case study examines how assessment on online open courses draws on concepts of assessment used within formal and informal learning. Our experience was that assessment used within open courses, such as massive open online courses, is primarily determined by the requirements of quality assurance processes to award a digital badge or statement of participation as well as what is technologically possible. However, this disregards much recent work in universities that use assessment in support of learning. We suggest that designers of online open courses should pay greater attention to the relationship of assessment and learning to improve participant course completion
'Now you know what youâre doing right and wrong!' Peer feedback quality in synchronous peer assessment in secondary education
This study explores the effects of peer assessment (PA) practice on peer feedback
(PF) quality of 11th grade secondary education students (N= 36). The PA setting was
synchronous: anonymous assessors gave immediate PF using mobile response technology
during 10 feedback occasions. The design was quasi-experimental (experimental vs. control
condition) in which students in one condition received a scaffold to filter out relevant
information they received. It was expected that this filter-out scaffold would influence PF
quality in subsequent tasks in which they were assessors. PF content analysis showed that
offering multiple PF occasions improved PF quality: messages contained more negative
verifications and informative and suggestive elaborations after the intervention. However, no
effects were found of filtering out relevant information on PF quality. Moreover, studentsâ
perceived peer feedback skills improved which was in correspondence with their actual quality
improvement over time. Additionally, the perceived usefulness of the received feedback was
rated high by all participants
Student engagement and the role of feedback in learning
Using an historical approach the intention of this paper is to identify from the literature better practice in feedback. Assessment is an essential element in the learning cycle, and is central to an understanding of how learning outcomes are achieved. It is through their assessments that we come to know our students, if our teaching has been successful and plays a significant role in determining the students' success. However, unlike the teaching process, assessment does not have the same dialogic element that learning and teaching now has. While feedback is a key element in formative assessment, we do not know how our feedback is understood by the learner, or what meaning they make of it. What makes good feedback, and how do we ensure that learners can understand and act upon it? The current language of learning and teaching is underscored with the concept of student engagement with the curriculum. However, the language of assessment often remains in the realm of judgement and the way it is conveyed is clearly in the transmission model of teaching where rigidity, standards and rules stand in place of dialogue, flexibility and learner centeredness
A double-edged sword: Use of computer algebra systems in first-year Engineering Mathematics and Mechanics courses
Many secondary-level mathematics students have experience with graphical calculators from high school. For the purposes of this paper we define graphical calculators as those able to perform rudimentary symbolic manipulation and solve complicated equations requiring very modest user knowledge. The use of more advanced computer algebra systems e.g. Maple, Mathematica, Mathcad, Matlab/MuPad is becoming more prevalent in tertiary-level courses.
This paper explores our studentsâ experience using one such system (MuPad) in first-year tertiary Engineering Mathematics and Mechanics courses.
The effectiveness of graphical calculators and computer algebra systems in mathematical pedagogy has been investigated by a multitude of educational researchers (e.g. Ravaglia et al. 1998). Most of these studies found very small or no correlation between student use of
graphical calculators or exposure to computer algebra systems with future achievement in mathematics courses (Buteau et al. 2010).
In this paper we focus instead on studentsâ attitude towards a more advanced standalone computer algebra system (MuPad), and whether studentsâ inclination to use the system is indicative of their mathematical understanding.
Paper describing some preliminary research into use of computer algebra systems for teaching engineering mathematics
Managing affect in learners' questions in undergraduate science
This is the author's accepted manuscript. The final published article is available from the link below. Copyright @ 2012 Society for Research into Higher Education.This article aims to position students' classroom questioning within the literature surrounding affect and its impact on learning. The article consists of two main sections. First, the act of questioning is discussed in order to highlight how affect shapes the process of questioning, and a four-part genesis to question-asking that we call CARE is described: the construction, asking, reception and evaluation of a learner's question. This work is contextualised through studies in science education and through our work with university students in undergraduate chemistry, although conducted in the firm belief that it has more general application. The second section focuses on teaching strategies to encourage and manage learners' questions, based here upon the conviction that university students in this case learn through questioning, and that an inquiry-based environment promotes better learning than a simple âtransmissionâ setting. Seven teaching strategies developed from the authors' work are described, where university teachers âscaffoldâ learning through supporting learners' questions, and working with these to structure and organise the content and the shape of their teaching. The article concludes with a summary of the main issues, highlighting the impact of the affective dimension of learning through questioning, and a discussion of the implications for future research
Teaching and learning in virtual worlds: is it worth the effort?
Educators have been quick to spot the enormous potential afforded by virtual worlds for situated and authentic learning, practising tasks with potentially serious consequences in the real world and for bringing geographically dispersed faculty and students together in the same space (Gee, 2007; Johnson and Levine, 2008). Though this potential has largely been realised, it generally isnât without cost in terms of lack of institutional buy-in, steep learning curves for all participants, and lack of a sound theoretical framework to
support learning activities (Campbell, 2009; Cheal, 2007; Kluge & Riley, 2008). This symposium will explore the affordances and issues associated with teaching and learning in virtual worlds, all the time considering the
question: is it worth the effort
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