Peer Assessment in Maths Higher using Discussion Boards
Overview
The Maths Higher Glow Group pages
Colette Agnew is a Maths Teacher at Chryston High School in North Lanarkshire. She was trained as a Glow Mentor in January of 2009. She began to set up Glow Groups within the department which would support pupils at different levels. In 2009/2010 Colette set up a Glow Group to support pupils across the yeargroup studying Higher Maths.
Although there is a wealth of material available to focus on in Colette’s Glow Group, in this Cookbook we will look at some of the background behind the decisions Colette took in structuring the Maths Higher Glow Group and in particular what she has done with Discussion Boards to enable peer assessment. Another Cookbook on the school will focus on how Colette customized Document Libraries to support pupils by sharing resources. Please note that a lot of the general information available here is repeated in the other Glow Cookbook on the Group.
In this cookbook, we will find out:
- What the Chryston Maths Higher Glow Group looks like
- Why Colette structured it in this way
- How Colette has customised discussion boards for use in peer assessment
- What the pupils themselves feel the impact of this has been
Context
When Colette first started thinking about what she wanted to do with her Higher class she knew one of the main aspects she wanted to focus on was the use of the Discussion Boards. She is very interested in finding ways to employ formative assessment but notes that it is very difficult to take time out of the higher course to make room for peer assessment. Doing this on Glow gives her an option for including this. The Discussion board for the peer assessment has been customised by Colette, she added extra columns to make it very clear to them exactly what was expected when reviewing a piece of work.
SuperBilly
The Maths Higher Group is open to all 3 Maths Higher classes. Colette made the decision early on not to create separate groups for each class as she wanted to be able to allow for discussion with the pupils across all classes. She didn’t want to have to set up access to central resources several times for each class. Her way around this issue was to have different pages within the group to cater to individual class announcements as and when this is required.
The following is a quick review of what is available on each page of the Glow Group:
Noticeboard Page
The Chat room on the Noticeboard page is always teacher moderated and only usually open the night before a big exam. General what’s on and General web links web parts can be found here – more detailed web links are available on other pages in the group. The SuperBilly image is a bit of a mascot for Colette’s class, he features on PowerPoints and other materials and was designed by Colette’s husband who is also a Maths Teacher.
General Discussions Page
Pupils know that help with anything is available here. It is designed for pupils to help each other as well as getting help from the staff. The web part goes through periods of higher and lower usage depending upon the level of work being asked from the pupils in class. There is always high usage of it before an exam.
Documents Page
Previously, before using Glow, the worked solutions found in here would have to printed off and photocopied for pupils. They often comprise materials which need to be made available to the pupils to be worked through at home as there often isn’t enough time in class to go through them. Pupils who don’t get access to Glow will still be able to get access to them in this way but access to machines is offered to the pupils during lunch and after school.
Peer Assessment Page
Peer Assessment Instructions
Colette was looking for a way to use Glow that was other than just storing materials initially and she was keen to use it for peer assessment. The pupils are encouraged to do this at home. If they don’t have access at home then they are asked to do it in school at lunch time. Colette scans in samples from jotters which can often only be a part of an exercise. These are anonymous when they’re placed up into Glow.
Colette deliberately picked pieces of pupil work to scan in which would allow her to make an example of teaching points she wanted the pupils to pick out themselves. She didn’t ever put a piece of work on in which everything was wrong or something which was perfect because she always wanted them to be able to spot something to make the piece of work better. Colette wanted to leave on the time and date column so that she could speak to them about doing it last thing at night or at the last minute before it was due etc.
She was very clear with them about respecting each other and being positive about what they were saying. The pupils, although some were initially reluctant, did get very motivated and stuck into the peer assessment. They also felt very good and thought it looked very official when it was their work which was chosen to go up onto Glow. Colette got positive comments back from parents about this. Colette feels pupils will be more into the way of doing peer assessment in Glow when they start it lower down in the school and working in this way will just become second nature to them.
Peer Assessment Document Samples and Discussion Board
Colette noted that it was difficult to get some of the pupils motivated to do this. She has a lot of very able mathematicians in her class and they felt that if they already knew how to do something then why should they spend time supporting other pupils who didn’t. To direct them better and encourage them here Colette made sure that she had put very clear instructions for them on the Peer Assessment page so they were in no doubt about what they had to do. She had to get the PT to refocus a few of them and get them to take the peer assessment seriously and put work and effort into looking at others work.
Unit Pages
Colette has split pages into her group for the 3 units in the Higher course as she wanted to make the delineation clearer for the pupils. She feels this made it easier for them to find the materials they needed to use to prepare for the NAB. Each page starts by listing the Learning Outcomes for each NAB which comprises the topics they cover in class. This makes it easier for the pupils as in class they don’t always cover things in this order. When the pupils are coming to use the materials for studying then having the Learning Outcomes at the top reminds them which area something is part of when they’re looking for references to it in websites etc. The school is very lucky to have a wealth of resources to support the teaching in the classroom. As has previously been mentioned Colette feels that Glow has allowed her a way to make the online materials available in a very accessible format.
Unit 2 page
In addition, within the document libraries, Colette will put up more complex worked examples. This is to enable the more able pupils to work their way through these as Colette wouldn’t necessarily have time to run all the way through these in class. For speed these would often be hand-written examples which she could scan in and get up there quickly without using equation editors.
The weblinks web parts on these pages mainly contain links to Scholar as Colette feels it can be difficult for the pupils to navigate their way around Scholar to get to the appropriate sections. She has provided web links which take the pupils to specific points for the topics they are covering.
The school also has a subscription for SuperMaths World and Colette has made available links to this. This programme has materials to support Maths from pre-school all the way up to Advanced Higher and it can be particularly important here to minimise how long pupils have to spend finding appropriate resources. To get around this, links suggested by Colette take them to exactly the correct point. She feels it is very useful to direct them to these materials because they complement the Boardworks and Scholar materials by being a bit more light-hearted in terms of providing materials in a games-based format. Colette has displayed notes in the web links web part to the pupils of log-in details for these resources. There is another Glow Cookbook available which investigates more fully how Colette has done this and a link to this Cookbook is available at the bottom of this Cookbook.
Pages for each Higher Class
Because there are 3 Higher classes Colette has made a page for each class. This allows them to make announcements pertinent to a particular class, without having to replicate the links for all the materials across 3 separate groups. As an example here you will notice that Colette was able to use the announcements web part to leave information for a particular pupil who was absent but whose parent had requested additional work. On these pages are little reminders for the class about deadlines etc for homework and tasks.
Class Announcements
Although other teachers may be reluctant to use Glow with their Higher class the pupils are not being disadvantaged as they are still getting access to all the materials in the Glow Group and the extra support. Colette has alerts set up on all of the discussion boards for all of the classes and would therefore get an alert in her email system when a pupils in another class has asked a question. This means that for other teachers who may not be on Glow Colette can forward them the email and they can be made aware of where pupils require additional support.
There is also a survey available on each class page. This is work Colette is getting ready for the future in the group and still considering how she is structuring the survey. She wants to be able to use it to get the pupils, after their prelim exam, to identify what topics they would like her to focus on for additional support.
Credit Revision Page
This was particular aspects that Colette thought needed to be highlighted for the pupils to work on and she has made more Boardworks resources available to support the pupils here.
Study Tips page
Study Tips
Colette uses this for all years in the Maths Glow Groups. One of the biggest complaints they get from pupils is that they don’t know how to study and Colette feels it is valuable to have this available for them in the group. It is easy for her to use the same material for each different Glow Group.
Exam Success Page
This page contains more links to Scholar including a Glossary and Practice Texts. All pdfs of the past papers are also available on this page for the pupils.
Past Paper Help Page
Past Paper Help
This page contains an excellent customised Discussion Board that Colette has put together and she encourages the pupils to use the filter for the past paper they’re working on in order to be able to get help from the teachers and from each other on specific questions. The pupils, when entering a new discussion, get a choice of a drop down list for all the past papers and questions. Colette really likes the way this makes it much easier for the pupils to be able to use it.
Ingredients for the whole group
- A Glow Group for the Maths Higher
- All Higher Maths pupils set with reader with discussions membership of the group
- Teachers set with membership of the group
- A Noticeboard page containing general what’s on information, web links and a Chat Room
- A general Discussions Page
- A general Documents page
- Pages for each of the units within the Maths Higher containing text editor web parts with learning outcomes, document libraries and web links web parts
- Pages with announcements web parts and surveys for each Higher Class
- A Credit Revision page containing a Document Library
- A Study Tips page containing a text editor web part
- An Exam Success page with web links and document library web parts
- A Past Paper Help page with a customized discussion web part
Ingredients for the Peer Assessment Page
- A text editor web part to hold instructions
- A new document library with folders for the different peer assessment samples
- A new discussion board with additional fields and a customised view to allow pupils to peer assess the samples
Recipe
In this Cookbook we will focus on how Colette has set up various discussion boards through the Maths Higher Group. We will mainly focus on the Peer Assessment page but we will also have a look at how Colette has put together the discussion board on the Past Paper Help page.
The videos begin with a tour through Colette’s Maths Higher Glow Group. In the videos which follow we will look at rebuilding a unit page of the group and in particular at changing the columns displayed within the web parts to allow for additional information to be displayed to the pupils.
What does the Chryston Maths Higher Glow Group look like?
How to add a text editor web part to the page and use this to list the guidelines for the pupils for peer assessment
How to create a new document library and add this to the page
How to create a new discussions board and add this to the page
How to add new columns to the discussion board
How to change the view of the discussion board
How to add a customised discussion board to the Past Paper Help page
Impact
Colette began to think of using Glow for her Higher pupils initially in terms of a Discussion Board to allow them to support each other with the teachers help. However, she quickly moved on to thinking about how the Group could be set up in terms of having a page for each unit within the Higher to organise resources for the pupils. Initially there wasn’t going to be a page for every class in the Group but just the one group across all of the Higher pupils. However, Colette began to think about announcements which it would be useful to make to individual classes, for example on a second prelim which may be offered to that class only. It also became obvious that not all staff would be willing to support the work with their own class and Glow, this meant that Colette could support across all of the Higher classes just by giving them access to the joint Group. Groups for different levels such as Standard Grade are set up in a similar way for the whole yeargroup with separate pages for each class but still within the one group. It became much easier to manage access to Glow in this way. Colette will go into the other Higher classes and let them know when she’s done something to the Glow Group or made something available for them.
Colette’s head of dept is very positive about the use of Glow and has supported Colette with all her work in setting things up for the pupils using Glow. Colette will use time at Dept meetings to show other teachers what she has set up and made available in Glow and let other teachers know that if they are keen to add things that may be of use generally, across all of the classes then it would be better to place that into the unit pages for example.
In terms of impact on teacher workload, one of the things that Colette finds particularly useful about Glow is about scanning in handwritten materials and uploading these to document libraries to make them available for pupils. “Although document libraries are great for PowerPoint files and much slicker online versions of support materials etc, handwritten solutions with maths symbols can be very quickly scanned and uploaded into Glow document libraries without taking the time to use complex equation editors and formatting.”
Colette feels the impact Glow has had on pupils has varied across the classroom. This, she feels, is because she has some very able pupils who know their stuff and don’t need a lot of help or support. A lot of the impact is difficult to judge because the focus of the web links and the documents being made available is about providing resources they can access in a central location and that they can access as a cohort.
It allows the pupils to take responsibility for more self-directed learning. For Colette, it also means that once she has all of these links set up in the group, they are there to be used over with classes the following year. All she has to do is change the membership of the group and remove the discussion boards used the previous year, providing new ones for the incoming classes. It is deliberately set up in this way that would allow the group to be used as a template which could get used from year to year.
Initially she had included links to the SQA site but then wanted to go further to make it easier for the pupils and have the past papers available directly in the group. She is keen though that the pupils still have responsibility for directing their own learning within the Group but that she has made things as clear as possible for them in the way she has chosen to organise it. It is organised in a way which means the pupils get the best out of their self-directed time without having to trawl through lots of materials which are not suitable.
Her class make very good use of the group. This is the first time it’s been used for Higher classes, but her class used it last year to support them with their Credit Standard Grade. She feels they have grown in their use of Glow. Last year it was mainly the discussion boards they were making use of together but then Colette has pointed out that there weren’t as many external or support resources available to them. This year, they are making less use of the discussion boards and more use of the resources. Collette notes there is now no excuse for homework exercises being lost etc as they are always available in the document store here. “It doesn’t matter if pupil is staying at mum or dad’s or gran’s house, as long as there is a computer there or a library nearby then it can be accessed.”
For future development within the Glow Group Colette would like more of an idea of what pupils were finding useful to direct next year’s work. Was it the discussion boards, or the web links or the resources within document stores which were more widely used by the pupils? Which unit page on the Glow Group was more use made of by the pupils to direct their learning? Colette may make more use of survey web parts with the pupils to discover the answer to these questions.
What do the pupils think about using Glow for Peer Assessment?
