“It is clear from the literature that feedback is potentially the most powerful and potent part of the assessment cycle when it comes to improving further student learning” (O’Donovan, Rust & Price, 2015). However, giving feedback does not have to be an activity undertaken by lecturers exclusively. There’s a huge amount of value to be had in engaging your students in the assessment and feedback process and embedding peer feedback as an integral part of the learning process. Through this process of learning how to provide others with critical constructive feedback, students’ own writing skills improve and they learn how to reflect critically on their own work and begin, over time, to self-edit.

Moore and Tether (2014) undertook research in this area, embedding peer feedback in a third year social studies unit and explored how it affected “their learning, their capacity to direct their learning, and their self-efficacy in relation to academic and real-world tasks”. They concluded that providing peer feedback was of great benefit to the students and was an effective learning tool, and also assisted in the development of diverse skills that would be of value in their future careers.

This course focuses on tools and technologies that will help students present their work to each other and facilitate giving peer feedback in the live online environment (synchronous presentation and feedback)

To take this course online, click the Start Course button in the top right of the screen.

References

Berry O’Donovan, Chris Rust & Margaret Price (2015): A scholarly approach to solving the feedback dilemma in practice, Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, DOI: 10.1080/02602938.2015.1052774

Moore, C. & Teather, S. (2013). Engaging students in peer review: Feedback as learning. In Special issue: Teaching and learning in higher education: Western Australia’s TL Forum. Issues in Educational Research, 23(2), 196-211. http://www.iier.org.au/iier23/moore.html