Educational Leadership - November 2009

“Your point didn’t really come across.” I needed to prompt students to provide concrete examples of what they meant.

Only one semester later, as the same students again began to formally share a recently completed project, the picture was quite different. The minute I asked who wanted to share first, every hand was raised high. Students rose out of their seats, begging to go first. When the presenter had finished, students eagerly offered helpful praise and criticism.

Using peer critiques to evaluate and
improve student work is a natural
outgrowth of authentic assessment.

own professional judgment) when deciding which activities to alter, add, or delete from a unit, and I let students know that I use their feedback for this purpose.

Create a Trusting Community To go from fear to eagerness, students need an environment of trust and caring (Noddings, 2009). I purposefully try to make all students feel like valued members of the learning community in large and small ways. I remark on new haircuts, ask about vacation plans, and commiserate over upcoming tests. I keep a wall calendar noting student birthdays and carry a pad of sticky notes to write down specific questions students ask that I cannot immediately answer. There is no one best way to create a trusting community; your own methods must reflect your personality and that of your students.

Model Acceptance of Criticism

When students alert me to errors I make in writing, speaking, grading, and so forth, I try to model mature acceptance of critical feedback. I openly thank them and remark that everyone makes mistakes and that we all need our fellow learners’ help to improve.

I also solicit feedback. At the end of any unit or project, I ask students for specific comments about individual activities. I often distribute a form that lists the different activities we did accompanied by the following questions:

; What activity do you wish we could have spent more time on? Why?

; What activity should next year’s class skip altogether? Why?

; What activity would you add to this unit? Be as specific as possible.

I use this information (along with my

Train Students to Take the Lead

The student whose work is being critiqued should stand at the front of the room so that the entire audience can clearly view the project under discussion. This arrangement also makes the critique less personal, with comments and suggestions that classmates offer pertaining to the work itself, not the student as a person.

I usually stand to the side of the room so that all comments travel directly from student to student. Because the goal is to make the teacher simply a fellow member of the discussion, the student presenter should call on his or her peers as they raise a hand to comment. It takes a while for student ownership to become ingrained. At first, students try to address their comments to me and look at me for confirmation. But when the shift finally occurs, and the presenter smiles, ignores my raised hand, and calls first on a peer, it’s amazing.

I take brief notes during the critique to give to the student receiving the feed-back—or I rotate this role among students. No one can present articulately, field comments and concerns, and look at the audience while also remembering verbal comments.

ment with the format until you feel confident that your students are learning from critiques. I recommend using peer critiques during the creation of a project rather than just at the end; I have seen definite improvement in the quality of student work when students get feedback along the way.

Peer critiques work in a wide variety of settings. Students can watch a video of the previous evening’s music concert and offer evaluations of their own band or choir performance. Students can share different methods of solving the same math problem, examine blueprints for house designs, or offer feedback on science fair proposals.

Although peer critiques improve students’ critical-thinking ability and provide them with a broader spectrum of evaluation, the less obvious benefit is motivational. Students love to offer their opinions. As they share what they think, they take genuine pleasure in seeing— and contributing to—the work their peers have created. EL

References

Ede, L. (1984). Audience: An introduction to research. College Composition and Communication, 35( 2), 140–154.

Henderson, P., & Karr-Kidwell, P. J. (1998). Authentic assessment: An extensive literary review and recommendations for administrators. Retrieved from ERIC Database ED41840.

Noddings, N. (2009). Teaching themes of care. In Allan C. Ornstein, Edward F. Pajak, & Stacey B. Ornstein (Eds), Contemporary Issues in Curriculum (pp. 64–70). Boston: Pearson Education.

Experiment with Format There is no one best method to use for peer critiques. The process should be individualized to fit the kind of work being examined, the time constraints of the class, and students’ ages. Experi-