Peerwise Assignment: Human Body

By Pierre-Luc Grondin , Champlain Regional College

At a Glance

Discipline

Social sciences
STEM
Biology

Instructional Level

College & CEGEP

Course

Human Body

Tasks in Workflow

Social Plane(s)

Individual
Whole Class

Type of Tasks

Solving problems
Reviewing & assessing peers
Creating & designing
Taking a quiz & test

Technical Details

Useful Technologies

Peerwise
Google Forms

Class size

Small (20-49)

Time

Semester long

Instructional Purpose

Consolidation & metacognition
Assessment & knowledge refinement

Overview

The aim of this activity is for students to design high level questions related to course material as a review and application exercise. This activity benefits students as they learn question design as they review for the test. They build a pool of extra study questions designed by themselves and their peers.

It employs two Active learning Strategies, Peer Instruction and Toolkit. Students are shown how to design multiple questions through an examples and Bloom’s taxonomy. Over the course of the semester, students design three question related to course material and answer/rate/comment on 10 (for each deadline) questions submitted by their peers. Students use this compiled question bank as study material.

Instructional Objectives

Students will be able to:

Develop study techniques such as making links between concepts and identifying important material (vs. focusing on details).
Write three multiple choice questions in a format that they will be asked to answer on the test.
Answer, rate and comment on questions submitted by their peers which will allow them to review the course material.
Demonstrate how to answer multiple choice questions especially when they don’t know the answer and work backwards to eliminate wrong answers.

Workflow & Materials

Activity Workflow

View on CourseFlow

Document

MCQ Feedback

Pierre-Luc Grondin

Document

Student Instructions

Pierre-Luc Grondin

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Article

Pierre-Luc Grondin

Contributor's Notes

Benefits

This activity encourages students to learn through application of the material rather than memorization.
Students supplying an explanation for their answers shows that they can put course material in new contexts.
Designing and answering higher order questions encourages students to make links between topics and to other systems.
Students learn how to approach the material, by taking the perspective of designing questions, the student can see what information to prioritize and what parts of the material are more complex or difficult.

Challenges

It is a lot of work for both the students and the teachers. If class size is too big it becomes a lot of work for the teacher, while providing students with more questions to answer (good thing for them).
Class size can sometimes be too small to have high enough engagement in each question so find ways to add questions (pooling other sections together, or from past semesters).

Tips

Ensure all questions/comments are anonymous so that instructor feedback can be posted directly on the comment thread so everyone can benefit.
Find a balance of time management and pedagogical benefit (for instructor and students).
Weigh the questions differently to allow students to improve as they familiarize themselves with Bloom’s taxonomy for the first time
Best questions can be imported into MyDalite at the end of the semester

Applied Strategies

Peer Instruction & Think-pair-share

Communication, conceptual reasoning and reflection

Toolkit

Personalized tool and knowledge bank

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Published: 25/09/2021

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