Group Work Dynamics Tracking

One of the challenges I have with assessment is providing accurate and supportable evaluation of learning skills. In our board, learning skills are not suppose to be assessed as part of a student's term mark. If we are assessing knowledge, that assessment should be solely based on the student's knowledge and not whether they miss the first ten minutes

of class every, single, day. The obvious issues with that aside, my department has been working on developing a method for effectively tracking one of the key learning skills; that being, a student's ability to work effectively in a group, which we assess as either excellent, good, satisfactory, or needs improvement.

The challenge is that most of our record keeping, and time, is focussed on formative and summative assessment that is used to inform a student's mark in the course. So how can we use technology to better support the learning skills evaluation and inform our teaching practices all without adding a significant amount of additional paper work?

What I have done to help is modify a chart that has been developed by my department head and department members (who borrowed the idea from somewhere long ago), over the last few years. The chart is used to identify group dynamics when working in teams.

The issue that I have had with this chart is that when a completed chart is given to students they rarely look at it and they certainly do not keep it long enough to help in their next group work situation. And to be honest, when I use the chart with the intention of keeping it as support for report cards, I have misplaced them more than once.

By creating a Google Form, I am able to fill in the chart for each group and provide them access to the results spreadsheet. This allows them to receive immediate feedback that they can then refer to either the next day or later in the semester and reflect on how they can improve. This feedback is then also available for me when I am providing comments on report cards. Not only can I provide feedback, but because Google Forms can be set to automatically collect the respondents Google Ed email address, I can have groups self-evaluate and know the source of the insights, which in turn helps me better understand the disparity between what I see and what the students think they are doing.

This Group Work Tracking form is going to be particularly useful in a new, upcoming unit in my grade 12 English course where the students will be working on a team project for four weeks while they plan a pro surfing tour stop. The groups will receive daily feedback, be given time to reflect on the feedback at the beginning of each class, and the group-assigned project manager that week will be responsible for developing feedback as well. Not only will this Google Form allow me to make more informed decisions for report cards, but it will be a useful teaching tool that allows for hands-off learning opportunities.

The Quantification of Student Through Peer Assessment

One of the advantages of a networked and digital world is a nearly endless ability to capture and save data. And it is with the processing power that we now have that we can turn large data sets into something that is manageable and insightful. My first foray into the use of data sets in my English classroom (outside of marks) is the capture of peer evaluations every time a student is in front of the class.

In the past, I have handed out slips of paper for peer evaluation, but these were never looked at beyond a cursory glance after a presentation. So I've decided to use Google forms and Spreadsheet to capture and make this data usable to my students.

First, I took an existing performance chart of presentation skills I have used in my 2D English class and turned it into a Google form that quantifies each of the skills we are focussing on developing in the class this semester.

The link to this form will be shared to the class and every time a student presents, everyone will provide anonymous feedback. Like most data sets, a one time gathering will not yield particularly insightful information, but after 5 or 6 presentations throughout the semester, some patterns will emerge.

In order to identify these patterns, students will be able to use the data collected and sorted (using filters) to create a line graph or scatter chart to see consistencies of performance, or hopefully a steady improvement. With this data set, students should be able to identify areas of weakness, strength, and inconsistency in order to target skills development. This should also help eliminate the bias we all have of focussing on the good and the bad, but never the mediocre.

I have just started this process and will provide an update when I begin to see significant enough data to develop insight.

TIPS: When you are creating the drop down menu of student names (aka Choose From List), you can just copy and paste your digital class list into the first option and Forms will automatically create a new selection option for each name. HUGE time-saver.

Also, make sure that the "Name of Presenter" question is a "Required Question" (click box at bottom of question creation) or the students may not be able to find data intended for them.

Finally, if you are using Forms as part of GAFE (Google Apps For Education), you can choose whether the data collected is anonymous or has the student's account attached. I prefer anonymous to hopefully get a more honest response.