Physics Education Research The University of Edinburgh Students as co-creators: The development of student learning networks Alison E. Kay and Judy Hardy

Physics Education ResearchThe University of Edinburgh

Students as co-creators: The development of student

learning networks

Alison E. Kay and Judy Hardy

HEA STEM Annual Conference, Birmingham, 17 April 2013

2

PeerWise: Brief Outline


Create multiple choice questions

Provide and explain solutions

Answer other students’ questions

Rate and comment on other students’ questions

Follow favourite authors

Retain complete anonymity


The PeerWise Interface

PeerWise in Physics 1A 2012/13


Write 1 questionAnswer 5 questionsRate and comment on 3 questions

2 assessments – 3 tasks in each

Total Contributions by end of the course from 276 students

630 questions7156 answers4025 comments


Benefits of PeerWise for students

Promotion of deeper learning: question writing and explaining answers imposes a high cognitive load

Creation of a bank of questions to test knowledge and understanding

Opportunity to engage with a wider network than in traditional offline academic settings.

6

Network Analysis: A Novel Approach


Visualise and describe the network

Metrics NOT available using traditional analysis

New way of thinking about HOW PeerWise is being used and how to exploit relationships

1 1 0 1

1 1 1 1

1 0 1 0

7HEA STEM Annual Conference, Birmingham, 17 April 2013

Network Analysis: 2 Mode Network

Questions

Stu

den

ts

1

C

A

B

2 3 4

8

2 Mode Questions and Answers Network


Question Ego-network 1EASY QUESTION

17 students (A)

DIFFICULT QUESTION

17 students (B)

EASY QUESTION

17 students (A) answered 268 other questions

Other questions seem less difficult: green squares generally smaller

DIFFICULT QUESTION

17 students (B) answered 420 other questions

Other questions seem more difficult: green squares generally bigger

Question Ego-network 2


Student Answering Patterns

LOWEST PERFORMING STUDENT

35% for final exam

Answered 7 questions

MEDIUM PERFORMING STUDENT

68% for final exam


HIGHEST PERFORMING STUDENT

97% for final exam


- 1 0

1 - 1

1 0 -


Network Analysis: 1 Mode Network

Students

Stu

den

ts

B

C

B

A

CA


1 Mode Student Answers and Comments

Density: 57% (100)Diameter: 2 (255)


Student ego-networks – answers and comments


35% for final exam


118 students with one question in common (43%)


68% for final exam




97% for final exam



Degree Centrality: 43%

Betweenness 0.000


Betweenness: 0.001


Betweenness: 0.007


1 Mode Comments Only Network

Density: 28% (100)Diameter: 3 (255)


Student ego-networks – comments


35% for final exam

Wrote 3 comments

25 students with at least question in common (10%)


68% for final exam

Wrote 5 comments



97% for final exam

Wrote 24 comments



Betweenness0.000


Betweenness: 0.000


Betweenness: 0.003


Conclusions

Initial results show both networks to be equitable

Clear differences between the comment only network and the comment and answer network

Network analysis provides rich, qualitative data

Complements traditional statistical analysis of performance and usage data


Next Steps?

Replicate analyses whilst normalising data to account for number of questions answered or number of times question answered.

Incorporate network metrics with more traditional analyses

Characterise the nature of the interactions between students – qualitative analysis of comments

School of Physics and Astronomy

Acknowledgements

All participating students

Judy Hardy, Ross Galloway


Paul Denny

Documents

Physics Education Research The University of Edinburgh Students as co-creators: The development of student learning networks Alison E. Kay and Judy Hardy