Peer Assessment Undergraduate Nursing & Midwifery Students’ Perspectives

Peer AssessmentUndergraduate Nursing & Midwifery Students’ Perspectives Rita Smith,Eimear Burke, Dr. Dympna Casey, Catherine Houghton, Lorraine Mee, Deirdre van der Putten and Hilary Bradley School of Nursing & Midwifery Studies

Presentation Overview • Study overview • Literature review • Research design • Sample • Data collection • Data analysis • Results/Findings • Reflections on process School of Nursing & Midwifery Studies

Study Overview • 2nd year undergraduate-general & midwifery student nurses (n =113) • Module-Assessing & Promoting Health • Assessment - 100% Assignment • Health Promotion intervention-smoking cessation - skills of motivational interviewing • Peer assessment introduced to promote student engagement • Marks allocated for participation in process - grading & feedback comments • Students designed an assessment framework in seminars with support of academics • Students submitted three copies of assignment / Anonymous-coding personal details removed • Marking Time frame -1 week • Internal moderation/External examiner School of Nursing & Midwifery Studies

Literature Review Increasingly peer assessment is being used in education to allow students to become involved in their learning, its evaluation, to understand what is expected of them and to enhance student engagement (Race, 2001). Self & peer assessment are essential techniques in the development of critical self directed learners (Daniels & Magarey, 2000). Important skills for graduates-professional lives (Harahan & Isaacs, 2001). Peer assessment presents an opportunity to allow students to learn (Falchikov, 2005). School of Nursing & Midwifery Studies

Literature Review Benefits of Peer Assessment Develops confidence (Daniels & Magarey, 2000); promotes learning (Morris, 2001); improves work & increases motivation (Hanrahan & Isaacs, 2001); encourages higher levels of cognitive thinking (Welsh, 2007); grounded in the philosophies of active learning and androgogy (Falchikov & Goldfinch 2000). Challenges Welsh (2007) highlights that PA can raise significant challenges for students & academic staff; difficulties with assessment criteria assessment responsibility of academics (Brindley & Scoffield, 1998); students uncomfortable critiquing peers, process is time consuming (Hanrahan & Isaacs, 2001); students lack the confidence to objectively mark their peers (Falchikov 2005).

Research Design • Qualitative interpretive descriptive study • Students informed about study & invited to participate • Focus group interviews-voluntary & written consent • Ethical approval • Focus group (Bryman, 2004) • Focus group topic guide • Digitally recorded & transcribed School of Nursing & Midwifery Studies

Sample & Demographics • Total sample (n=38) • General Nursing Students (n=32) • Midwifery Students (n=6) • Male (n=6) • Age • <23 years (n=28) • >23years (n=9) • No previous experience of peer assessment School of Nursing & Midwifery Studies

Data Analysis • Qualitative interpretive descriptive design (Thorne et al, 2004). • Thematic content analysis • Data management - QSR NVivo Package • Open coding / development of themes School of Nursing & Midwifery Studies

Study Findings-Benefits • Learning from others • ‘When I was reading mine, both my essays were very different with different points of view but it kind of opened me up to it. I hadn't even really thought of it like that. It was good that way. If I'd never read those essays, I'd probably never have thought of it’ • Confidence building • ‘It just showed a bit of confidence in us, you know. It's a bit of respect too, like. We think you’re able for this so go do it. From that point of view I thought it was good’ School of Nursing & Midwifery Studies

Study Findings-Benefits Reflective learning: ‘It wasn't like you'd done your essay and that was it, you were finished. A week or two later, you had someone else's essay and you kind of went back and thought about everything you had done. It was a better learning process because the more you do something, the better you'd remember it. So, it was good in that way…’ Self assessment/awareness: ‘You're involved more in the whole process. You're involved from getting the assignment, doing the assignment, critiquing the assignment, giving the mark. You get to see the whole process from the other side of things as well. In way, it makes you work harder the next time you have to do an assignment because you know exactly after reading someone else's, what they're looking for.’ School of Nursing & Midwifery Studies

Study Findings-Benefits Learning for Practice ‘It's good as a learning process as well, because looking back on that module, I can remember more information from that module from doing my essay and looking at two other people's essays, the different techniques about motivational interviewing and the four As and all that. Whereas if I went back to another module, I'd be drawing a blank. I'd have to think about it and go back and find my lecture notes.’ School of Nursing & Midwifery Studies

Study Findings - Challenges Fairness: Yeah, I wouldn't mind doing it again but not with the group, not marking our own peers because I think that was unfair to be asked to do that… people obviously knew who was correcting their assignments. Some people knew. Then that wasn't fair on other people who didn't and sat down and actually looked at the papers. If I knew I was correcting my friend's, you're not going to fail them Credibility as marker - confidence: ‘I just found that it was a difficult thing to be given to correct someone else's work. I didn’t think I was trained or experienced enough to correct someone else's work’ School of Nursing & Midwifery Studies

Study Findings - Challenges Peer solidarity:‘I found it kind of hard to be critical of their essays just because I kind of knew they were in my year. You know, even if I had gotten a bad one, I would have found it hard to mark it badly. Even if I thought that was fair I still would have found it hard to do because I don't like to be mean.’ Preparation - Becoming a marker: ‘If we had a seminar showing us what an A-graded essay was and a B and a C. Then a pass or a fail, it would kind of, you know, you have something to go by. Whereas you're kind of just going by your own personal opinion and it's really biased.’ School of Nursing & Midwifery Studies

Study Findings-Challenges Assessment criteria ‘We got the opportunity to develop our own feedback sheet in a seminar and we had it in our own mind how we were meant to correct the essay, but when we actually went to correct it with the feedback sheets, it was too broad, it needed to be more specific…’ Feedback ‘I've come away not knowing right this second whether my last assignment I've done I'm doing correctly because I was trying to improve on last year. Or what I should do to improve and we're going to be left hanging in the air. We haven't got a feedback sheet from our tutor.’ Follow up & support ‘We got no feedback on how we marked other people either. I’d like to know if I marked them well. I felt there was very little feedback.’ School of Nursing & Midwifery Studies

Reflection on Process • ‘It is clear that the benefits perceived by the students outweighed the negative features that may be due to inexperience with the process’ (Morris, 2001, p.508). • Student preparation is key-assessment criteria ownership, examples, tutorials, how to write feedback, debriefing session • Time consuming-administrative feature • Positive feedback external examiner • Formative/Summative assessment • Positive learning experience for all School of Nursing & Midwifery Studies

Sincere thanks to NUI Galway's Millennium Research Fund for supporting this projectThank you to CELT for opportunity to present this workThank you for listening Any Questions? School of Nursing & Midwifery Studies

Peer Assessment Undergraduate Nursing & Midwifery Students’ Perspectives