Journal of Research in Innovative Teaching - National University

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An examination of the peer-comment element of the discussion board in light of the foregoing review of universally accepted criteria for effective teaching, and in particular for teaching online, reveals that the entire concept of peer comments needs revitalizing. All too often, peer comments end up being polite but relatively insubstantial remarks that are usually positive evaluations that do no more than acknowledge the commenting student’s agreement with what a peer said in her or his post. Here is the language I used in some recent courses to explain the peer-comment portion of the discussion-board assignment: After you have posted your main response to the discussion-board questions, comment on at least two of your peers’ responses to the questions addressed in this discussion. Your peer comments should be more substantive than just saying, “Good post,” or “I enjoyed reading your response.” Such comments should include supporting statements, i.e., reasons why you find the comment interesting or insightful, puzzling or mistaken, etc. You may also want to ask specific questions or follow up particular points raised by other students in the class. Peer comments should contain original analysis and supported evaluation. Despite such explicit instructions, peer comments in my courses continued to be generally lacking in content, genuine critical analysis, or consequential evaluation; in course after course, peer comments remained, in sum and substance, politically correct “pats on the back.” Informal discussions about teaching and student performance with colleagues have only confirmed my observations: despite constant encouragement to make peer comments substantive and critical, student performance on this assignment is poor. What should be critically astute comments, or at least meaningful questions, are instead haphazard, off-the-cuff remarks that are little more than empty compliments. It is difficult to make the peer-comment assignment really useful or consequential; yet research shows that generating interaction among students in the online environment is crucial. In an attempt to better achieve the purpose of the peer-comment element of the discussion board, I developed the “Q&A Forum,” a new kind of learning tool that, while relating back to the topics and student posts of a particular discussion-board forum, is a separate assignment from the discussion board. It can be treated as a follow-up to the previous interactive discussion, or it can be a place to add new material and commentary to the same set of topics. There is also the opportunity to build into the Q&A Forum a venue for audio clips or audio-enhanced images as well as video clips. Here is how the Q&A Forum works within a four-week, accelerated-pace, online-course format: The day after discussion-board posts are submitted, students are asked to post an original question related to the content for the unit (i.e., what was covered in the most recent discussion thread) that, ideally, incorporates a critical response or inquiry directed at a peer’s recent discussion-board post. Here, in the “question” section of the assignment, each student must think of his or her own question and, if possible, tie that question to a response or responses to the instructor’s content-related prompts in the previous discussion board. The specific content of the question is left open: A student may relate another student's discussion-board post to an issue not mentioned in that discussion but that the student considers interesting or important, or a student may, in referring to another student’s post, critically question the instructor’s rationale for posing a particular issue or for placing emphasis on one topic rather than another. Or, a student may 165
introduce a completely new subtopic or side issue related to the general topic that has not been addressed at all. Allowing students to come up with their own questions and challenging them to be thoughtful and original while also remaining on topic has the desirable effect of bringing the students into broader and deeper consideration of the topics at hand without overloading them with excessive reading and writing assignments. In a four-week course, for example, realistic expectations about how much a student can read, comprehend, and begin to master must be kept in mind. Instructors are well aware of the dangers of work overload, especially in abbreviatedlearning formats and online courses, which are often populated by a majority of students who work at full-time jobs and are busy raising families and conducting adult lives. Instead of adding to the number of discussion-board questions that must be answered by every student, often in what turns out to be rote reporting from textual materials or other reference sources, the questions in the Q&A are a way of opening up the topics to a variety of perspectives as well as bringing in relevant issues and considerations that may have been glossed over in the discussionboard assignment or not adequately addressed simply because of lack of time and the need to move on to new material. For the “answer” part of the assignment, each student must respond to a peer question within 48 hours. (Timing of the connected assignments can be adjusted according to the overall time frame of the particular course.) Students must not answer their own question, and each question will receive a single answer: once a question has been answered, it is to be considered “off the table.” Students looking for a question must move on to one that has not been answered. The guidelines for the Q&A answer are designed with two specific purposes in mind: (1) Increased engagement is fostered because the time frame for completing the assignment is relatively short, and students must be on their toes and tied into unfolding events (i.e., the posting of the questions) within the course to choose a question they find interesting. Moreover, they must check back into the course frequently to find the right balance between waiting until all students have asked their questions, surveying them for what they deem to be a good question, and postponing participation too long and missing the chance to answer a question they like or feel prepared to answer. (2) Beneficial competition is sparked by the one-answer-per-question rule; students are anxious to find a good question, and they are motivated to respond before someone else takes it. Also, because the students have (it is hoped) become familiar with the list of original questions, some of which they may have felt unprepared or even challenged to answer, others of which they found easy to answer or perhaps overly simplistic, they will be interested to see how others have answered them. Knowing that the class is engaged with the assignment, students will also be encouraged to write original, on-point, and thoughtful responses. This question-and-answer thread takes the place of the peer comments that are usually required in discussion boards and is reviewed and scored or graded separately from the discussion-board responses. In all four of the courses in which I have implemented it, the Q&A Forum was much more effective than the peer-comment assignment in getting students to actually engage in some sort of content-driven and critically astute dialogue. I was often pleasantly surprised by the high quality and originality of the work submitted. The results of an informal survey of students in two courses in which I used the Q&A Forum show student opinion to be overwhelmingly positive. I chose to give individual feedback to students when I graded this assignment, but it may be advantageous, as one student suggested, for the instructor to make his or her comments to the Q&A Forum posts public. (See Appendix A for the specific 166
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Journal of Research in Innovative T
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Table of Contents Editor’s Column
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Editor’s Column National Universi
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training-based method for integrati
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The Editorial Board invites the rea
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The Influence of Social Worlds on E
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experience in a strong group settin
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Table 1 Example Scenario of a Burea
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hierarchy ensures a social position
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(see Figure 5). Each member is affo
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through four types of instructional
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Hierarchic (high grid, strong Group
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Figure 10. Didactic Task Structure
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Stansberry, S., & Harris, E. (2005)
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Utilizing current research-based co
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teachers. The instructor kept a mas
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References Coburn, C. E. (2001). Co
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Organizing for Instruction Carefull
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Accelerated Learning 33
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the learning process but rather to
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Csikszentmihalyi (1982) has written
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term (intersession) gets its name b
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Some Important Issues Scott and Con
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esponsibilities). A higher percenta
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them in such a way that the likelih
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makes a valuable contribution to ou
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North American Association of Summe
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E-learning 51
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Academic Learning Today Academic in
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In the original publication by the
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• Individual (1) — Group (2) co
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Challenges and Opportunities From t
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About the Authors Cynthia (Cindy) L
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AGILE TEACHING: A CASE STUDY OF USI
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the scope-by-name feature of Ruby e
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need to deal with. Students learned
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experiment with different options f
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the students evaluate the optimum s
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Using Bibliotherapy as a Tool for C
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different clients and their present
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supervisees with a brief synopsis o
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Stick Figure, by Lori Gottlieb As t
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psychological awareness to encourag
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on the Internet. To keep the classr
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The third portion of the discussion
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Henry, S. (2005). A different appro
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elementary-age students. Linked wit
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considered in multicultural literat
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In Finding One, the conclusion was
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Stephanie: “I learned that some p
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importance in society and in school
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published in the United States. Ret
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Reading Practices in Elementary Sch
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groups of students reading by apply
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Table 2 Participant-Reported Teachi
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Table 5A Teachers’ Reading Task P
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Because electronic texts are increa
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Conclusion As teachers work to impr
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Bilingual Education and Second Lang
Page 120 and 121: successful in hiring enough qualifi
Page 122 and 123: Five Innovative Strategies That Wor
Page 124 and 125: The third strategy is “Determinin
Page 126 and 127: the categories, synthesized and def
Page 128 and 129: Fereshteh, M. H. (1995). Multicultu
Page 130 and 131: Can Balanced Bilingualism Be Achiev
Page 132 and 133: As may be seen from this discussion
Page 134 and 135: Alternatives to Current Methodologi
Page 136 and 137: education when students are isolate
Page 138 and 139: Conclusion SL learning must be a tw
Page 140 and 141: Language as Tool for a Global Educa
Page 142 and 143: encouraging passive learning. Such
Page 144 and 145: Similarly, their actions or what go
Page 146 and 147: should therefore not be glued to th
Page 148 and 149: Supplementary Reading Since there i
Page 150 and 151: Bruce, M. G., Podemski, R. S., & An
Page 152 and 153: • Sentence combination (using con
Page 154 and 155: The Motivational and Attitudinal Ch
Page 156 and 157: Other researchers have challenged t
Page 158 and 159: education classes were taught in Ru
Page 160 and 161: Participants also described how the
Page 162 and 163: Implications and Suggestions for Fu
Page 164 and 165: National University Carlsbad, CA Em
Page 166 and 167: Assessment and Evaluation 161
Page 168 and 169: affordance of opportunities for sel
Page 172 and 173: language used in the description an
Page 174 and 175: promotes self-discovery (Saulnier e
Page 176 and 177: Appendix A Sample Language from an
Page 178 and 179: Student Evaluations of Courses and
Page 180 and 181: that there is a consistent positive
Page 182 and 183: (teaching) for all classes (11 item
Page 184 and 185: Figure 1. The Nonlinear Relationshi
Page 186 and 187: About the Authors Nataliya Serdyuko
Page 188 and 189: Best Practices 183
Page 190 and 191: The Textbook Elementary Statistics
Page 192 and 193: If the mean number of visits was as
Page 194 and 195: discussion in such courses is slow;
Page 196 and 197: Table 1. A grade list for a class o
Page 198 and 199: Sloboda, B. W. (2005). Improving th
Page 200 and 201: The Journal of Research in Innovati
Page 202: About the Author In the end of your
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Journal of Research in Innovative Teaching - National University

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