Using WebPA to assess group work

1. Tim Davis Head of Civil EngineeringArchitecture and Building t.davis@coventry.ac.uk Steve Austin • Associate Head of Civil EngineeringArchitecture and Building • s.austin@coventry.ac.uk Using WebPA to assess group work

2. Altruistic reasons: • Improve generic skills • Encourage peer learning • Employers value teamwork and other generic skills that working in groups develops • Other reasons: • Less work in assessment ? • Improves student engagement and retention • Increased complexity of tasks • It’s more interesting than … Why do group work? 2

3. Student reasons not to: • It takes too much time • It’s more trouble than it’s worth • Real life can wait • I end up doing all the work • It’s not fairly assessed • Staff reasons not to: • Inefficient contact hours • Confidence in (peer) assessment • Acrimonious disputes • Encourages freeloading • Difficult to assess fairly Why (not to) do group work? 3

4. “Allocating a single group mark to all members of a group rarely leads to appropriate student learning behaviour, frequently leads to freeloading, and so the potential learning benefits of group work are likely to be lost, and in addition students may, quite reasonably, perceive their marks as unfair.” Gibbs (2009) Assessment methods 4

5. Summary of Gibbs (2009) review of the literature on assessing group work: • Large groups don’t work - too difficult to manage? • Strong groups do well, weak groups do badly- is mixed ability the answer? • Group work often produces high average, low variability marks- peer assessment marks are more reliable/variable if anonymous • Students may have little experience of assessed group work- how do they learn to become effective group workers? Assessment methods 5

6. Assessment methods to reduce freeloading: • reduce weighting of group mark • assess individual contribution • pre-divide and allocate tasks • use individual assignments and/or examinations • staff moderate mark based on reflective project log/journal • students moderate marks (peer assessment) Assessment methods 6

7. Comments on Peer Assessment: • student peer marks aren’t that reliable- but they’re only slightly more unreliable than staff marks • students are better at making a holistic assessment underpinned by criteria rather than against specific criteria • familiarity & “ownership” of the criteria improves the reliability of student’s judgment • anonymous peer assessment is more reliable • students are usually worried about bias and fairness • it promotes learning (about oneself) in its own right Assessment methods 7

8. All group-based project work is peer assessed (WebPA) • Staff assess output, students assess process • Development of the individual is an explicit learning outcome • Integrated group-projects in each year of course: • 200-300 students working in single-/multi-disciplinary teams What we do at Coventry 8

9. Final year integrated group-project (2011-12):250 students working in multi-disciplinary teams of 8 • Students identify assessment criteria with definitions:- • Attendance/reliability/punctuality at company meetings • Communication within meetings and externally • Teamwork - • This section covers how well individuals integrate with others and how they accommodate and incorporate information and ideas from other team members. Additionally, willingness to accommodate others abilities within the group and acting in such a way as to minimize conflicts within the group. • Quality and presentation of work • Knowledge and technical ability demonstrated • Effort and enthusiasm during the project relating to set tasks, presentations and meetings • Leadership skills when managing the company team What we do at Coventry 9

10. Peer assessment is done twice throughout module, becomingly increasingly significant (25 - 75%) • Feedback from the peer assessment was used to influence behaviour • Students reflect on own performance and contribution • “I have been recommended to improve my effort and enthusiasm during weekly meetings. I am going to do this by actively ensuring that I bring at least one discussion to the group”. • “I plan to use the feedback received as constructive criticism and a way forward to develop and make positive steps in improving my weaknesses”. What we do at Coventry 10

11. Group work can improve student engagement and learning • Assessment needs to reward individual effort & contribution • Peer assessment is only slightly more unreliable than our own, especially of the group working process • Group work needs managing and planning to do well – don’t overuse it, teach students how to participate • Future changes in student expectations and appeals raises uncertainties in the use of assessed group work • Collaborative STEM project to assess success of group work and skills development interventions Conclusions 11

12. Centre for the Study of Higher Education (2002) A practical guide to assessing group work [online] available from < www.cshe.unimelb.edu.au/assessinglearning/03/group.html > [28 October 2011] Gibbs G. (2009) ‘The assessment of group work: lessons from the literature’ Available from < www.brookes.ac.uk/aske/documents/Brookes groupwork Gibbs Dec 09.pdf > [28 October 2011] WebPA Peer assessment software http://webpaproject.lboro.ac.uk/ The Higher Education Academy (2010) The adoption of WebPA within the Department of the Built Environment at Coventry University [online] Available from < http://www.engsc.ac.uk/webpa-coventry > [31 October 2011] Outcomes from the above project can be obtained by emailing t.davis@coventry.ac.uk Further Information