Abstract:

Perusall presents an opportunity for students to be motivated to read as they engage with peers acting as resources for one another in sharing their knowledge. The teacher has access to students’ knowledge, which can be used in making instructional decisions to enhance learning.

Instructors all around the world are excited about the benefits of Perusall in engaging students in reading prior to class. However, another benefit of Perusall is in its ability to enhance formative assessment: A planned ongoing process used by all students and teachers during learning and teaching to elicit and use evidence of student learning to improve student understanding of intended disciplinary learning outcomes and support students to become self-directed learners (Heritage & Wylie, 2020). From this definition it is clear that by eliciting student knowledge Perusall is contributing to the formative assessment process.

Teachers are generally challenged in eliciting students’ knowledge and understanding towards formative assessment. In general, the elicited evidence of students’ knowledge that teachers use in making instructional decisions are not representative of students’ conceptual understanding (Ateh, 2015). This is because teachers have the tendency to engage in superficial questioning that defines the convergent formative assessment model. Perusall presents an opportunity for teachers to access students’ conceptual understanding as they engage with their peers on the social platform in sharing and commenting on multiple ideas that reveal their knowledge defined in divergent formative assessment. Within this divergent model, teachers are more likely to make instructional decisions based on students’ genuine knowledge shared on the Perusall platform that will result in effective learning.

Perusall aims at shifting the nature of reading from the traditional solitary experience to an engaging and collective one through its social platform. This aligns with the underlying principles of learning theories that emphasize learning as a social activity involving interaction with others rather than an abstract concept. Perusall presents an opportunity for students to act as resources for each other developing broader perspectives of the worldview in reconstructing their ideas and knowledge. Students sharing their knowledge through annotations enhance the teacher’s ability to determine misconceptions and/or challenges in their knowledge that must be addressed to enhance learning.

Wiliam and Thompson (2007) defined major strategies in formative assessment that include engineering effective classroom discussions and other learning tasks that elicit evidence of student understanding, providing feedback that moves learners forward, activating students as instructional resources for one another, and activating students as the owners of their own learning. I will focus on strategies that involve eliciting evidence of students’ understanding in discussing how Perusall enhances formative assessment to contribute to effective teaching and learning. Perusall is not only a platform that enhances reading prior to class meetings but it also enhances formative assessment, which is one of the single most important elements that significantly enhances learning especially for students who are continually challenged in school.

Keywords:

Motivation, engagement, e-reading, online teaching, formative assessment, learning, teaching.