Abstract:

Project-Based Learning (PjBL) is widely recognized as a student-centred method, through hands-on problem solving activities, that promotes active knowledge construction. The advantages of this learning method have been especially highlighted in the context of adult students and online environments (Webb & Moallem, 2016).

In this context, communication – feedback – is fundamental along the development of the project to keep students engaged in the learning process. Previous researches have explored the impact and challenges of including Peer Feedback activities in a course based in PjBL (Liu & Carless, 2006).

In this paper we study the case of an online master course applying PjBL methodology and in which students gave feedback to their peers in different stages of their projects.

It was a Research Methodologies course, area of social sciences, and included 3 components:
A) Analysis of a published research paper published and chosen by the student – observing;
B) Project (development of a Research Project in a topic chosen by the student) - doing;
C) Peer feedback (providing feedback to the Research Project of a colleague) - teaching.

All these 3 components were divided in the same 3 stages:
1) Formulation of the research problem, identification of the population and variables, defining objectives and formulation of hypotheses;
2) Preparation of data collection process: instruments and sampling methods;
3) Final report (including all the previous ones).

When the Research Project activities included, for example, the preparation of a questionnaire that could be used in the proposed research (doing), there would be a pre activity of analysing the data collection instrument of a published research work (observing an expert) and a post activity of critically analysing and providing constructive feedback to a peer’s questionnaire (teaching).

Guideline questions and a qualitative classification system were given to help students understanding what was expected from them as feedback providers. Peer feedback was organised trying to recreate the peer blinded review system and, so, no names were presented (project’s author and feedback’s author). Besides the feedback by a peer, students received detailed feedback provided by the instructor. The Research Project was an iterative process, being changed, if needed, after receiving feedback.

In this work, we analyse students’ opinions about how providing and receiving peer feedback contributed for their learning and for the quality of their own research projects. After each stage, students were invited to answer a survey questionnaire about their concerns and perceptions of learning when providing and receiving feedback.

Preliminary results indicate that students were comfortable providing feedback to their peers and that they strived to be positive in their comments. The activity of providing peer feedback made most of students rethink about their own works and aspects to be improved – made them learn. They consider valuable to receive feedback on their project not only by the instructors but also by someone at their level, adding value to their research projects.

References:
[1] Liu, N. -F., & Carless, D. (2006). Peer feedback: The learning element of peer assessment. Teaching in Higher Education, 11(3), 279-290.
[2] Webb, A. & Moallem, M (2016). Feedback and feed-forward for promoting problem-based learning in online learning environments. Malaysian Journal of Learning and Instruction, 13(2), 1-41.

Keywords:

Project-based learning, peer feedback, online.