GROUP QUIZZES AS A LEARNING EXPERIENCE IN AN INTRODUCTORY LAB

In most classrooms, quizzes and exams are used primarily as summative assessments, which do not provide prompt feedback to the student. In an introductory lab course, we instituted a start-of-class quiz structure in which students write a quiz individually, then immediately retake the same quiz as part of a group of 3-4 students. They then mark each others’ quizzes. Ideally, this structure provides immediate peer feedback, promotes discussion within groups, and helps all students be better prepared for the upcoming lab activities. Participation in the quizzes becomes part of the learning, rather than only assessment. We analyzed quiz results, group behavior based on matched individual and group scores, and student surveys to (1) investigate whether students are learning from the group quiz experience, and (2) learn how to improve the quizzes.

Of students who miss at least one question on the individual quiz, about 50% report having learned something new in the group quiz process. 15% of those who answered all the questions correctly as individuals also report learning something new. The student-reported behavior most highly correlated with “learning something new” is “someone explained why they thought an answer was correct/incorrect” (r=0.6). Groups tend to self-correct. They more often choose the answer of a correct minority than of an incorrect majority, implying that the minority is sufficiently persuasive in discussion. In 60% of cases, group marks exceeded individual marks. Surprisingly, 7% of individuals earned higher scores than their group, different from the typical outcome in team-based learning settings. This may be due to the small number of questions on our quizzes (6), a fairly high average individual score (4.5/6), and/or a high percentage of individuals scoring 6/6 (24%). These scores suggest that the quizzes may not be sufficiently difficult to provide a learning experience for all students. However, questions that are discriminating based on item response analysis are also those in which groups most often went with the answer of a correct minority, or chose the correct answer after all group members answered incorrectly on the individual quiz. Future quizzes will be improved by ensuring that each quiz has at least 2 highly discriminating questions that are likely to promote peer discussion.