Can peer assessors identify problems accurately and provide helpful feedback?

What is it about?

The students who are asked to evaluate their peer’s documents (called assessors here) will vary in their own writing performance. Many students and instructors have wondered whether it is useful to have students whose own writing is relatively weak identify problems and give suggestions to their peers. We found that it is more useful to focus on the more specific strengths and weaknesses that each assessor has. It didn’t matter whether a student was overall more or less successful in their own writing performance. Rather, it mattered whether they had mastered the specific issue they were being asked to evaluate. When their own writing had the specific problem that the document they were asked to evaluate had, they provided less useful feedback. Interestingly, however, they were just as able to identify whether there was a problem in the writing; the only effect was on whether they could provide useful advice.

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Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash

Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash

Why is it important?

Concerns about the capabilities of students as assessors can influence both instructors and students’ willingness to make use of peer feedback. The current study helps to identify the very specific weaknesses that peers will have, showing that there is some foundation to common concerns. However, it also shows that such effects are quite limited; even relatively weak writers can generally provide useful advice to their peers.

Perspectives