Hi all,

I've been doing PA/SA for a while, but just adopted WebPA this semester. 

" In terms of allowing students to provide written feedback I find this useful as students appreciate the opportunity to justify the marks they give and I can use the information *if* I need to arbitrate  - which is very, very rare. A counter issue however is if I try to collate the feedback and present it back to students. Even though it is electronic students can often guess who wrote what and this can cause problems of its own."

For me, the main point of the PA is the peer-to-peer feedback. My whole course is built around the premise so I'm currently distributing the written comments manually upon request (uptake numbers are interesting). An automatic way of allowing students to view this written information would be exceptionally useful.

In terms of worrying what they write... I make it very clear that their comments will be visible and I also dedicate some time to explain what constructive feedback is. At that point, if they don't think about the comments they write and and leave statements such as "I worked on this smaller task within the group and they were awful" then it's the authors problem. 

I've been giving back peer-to-peer feedback for about 3 years without one single complaint - I would strongly support an automatic way of doing this.

Many thanks

James

----------------------------------------
Dr James W. Gaynor
Lecturer
Department of Chemistry
University of Liverpool
Crown Street
Liverpool
Merseyside
L69 7ZD
 
Phone: 0151 794 3498
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
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-----Original Message-----
From: WebPA [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Turner, James
Sent: 03 December 2014 12:03
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Student feedback issue

Hi
We did what Paul decribes last year using the data from the xls outputs from webpa, over a series of formative webpa assessment It took a lot of extra sorting after each round of webpa assessment, so it was unsustainable. But as Paul says getting the ground rules in, and working with the lecturers as well. They then could meet the teams with a degree of insider knowledge of how well it was progressing Jim



-----Original Message-----
From: WebPA [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Paul A Chin
Sent: 03 December 2014 11:40 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Student feedback issue

Hi Malcolm, Roger,

Yes, I think the feedback simply 'scores' their average against their other group members. There were good reasons for this approach early on but my personal view is that this feedback isn't that informative. In terms of allowing students to provide written feedback I find this useful as students appreciate the opportunity to justify the marks they give and I can use the information *if* I need to arbitrate  - which is very, very rare. A counter issue however is if I try to collate the feedback and present it back to students. Even though it is electronic students can often guess who wrote what and this can cause problems of its own. So if you do this, you also need to set ground rules about only providing constructive feedback - and I have seen other systems i.e. not WebPA, where students get penalised for negative comments.

Regards

Paul


-----Original Message-----
From: WebPA [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of MURRAY M.R.
Sent: 03 December 2014 11:26
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Student feedback issue

Roger,

We have only just started using WebPA but have seen similar feedback when testing it with small groups of students who provide similar ratings throughout. In essence I think the feedback is showing that the students scored evenly across all areas and so has selected columns as the highest and lowest scores, not realising that they are the same. Would others concur?

Malcolm


Dr Malcolm Murray
e-Learning Manager
Durham University

> On 2 Dec 2014, at 11:48 pm, Roger Funk <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> Hi all
>
> I have been testing WebPA on my local PC (through XAMPP) as I am working on a project where we use self and peer assessment. I have tested a number of other systems and am finding WebPA may suit our needs.
>
> Student feedback is important to us but I have run into an issue and am wondering if anyone has had this issue or can provide me some advice.
>
> My test involves 4 students. They complete a self and peer review (likert scale 1 to 5) against 4 criteria. This all works fine.
> the 4 criteria are :
> 1. Contributes to the work of an interprofessional team 2. Contributes 
> to discussion within the interprofessional team 3. Understands the 
> roles of the professions involved 4. Uses feedback to improve own 
> performance
>
> The tutor marks the group work and creates a mark sheet. For this test I have set the parameters to PA weighting 50%, 0% non-completion penalty, grading type percentage grades and WebPA algorithm. In the feedback/justification area I have allowed students to view feedback but not allowed students to enter feedback/justification for the assessment.
>
> The feedback returned to the 4 students is odd and not presented the same to students. As you can see some students get just 1 response (area  to develop) and some students get 2 but the criteria is the same for the area they could both develop and the one they are the strongest on.
>
> I have included the responses for the 4 students below:
>
> Student 1
>
> An area you may wish to develop is your contribution to:
> - Contributes to discussion within the interprofessional team
>
> Student 2
>
> Your strongest contribution within this project was rated by your group as:
> - Contributes to discussion within the interprofessional team
>
> An area you may wish to develop is your contribution to:
> - Contributes to discussion within the interprofessional team
>
> Student 3
>
> Your strongest contribution within this project was rated by your group as:
> - Understands the roles of the professions involved
>
> An area you may wish to develop is your contribution to:
> - Understands the roles of the professions involved
>
> Student 4
>
> An area you may wish to develop is your contribution to:
> - Understands the roles of the professions involved
>
> Any suggestions or advice would be appreciated.
>
> Thanks
> Roger (Victoria University)
>
>
>

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