The effect of changing grading criteria on student writing.

Abstract

Students enrolled in a senior-level psychology course used a computer-aided personalized system of instruction (CAPSI) to write tests, and give and receive feedback on their writing at a mastery level. Weekly measures of the number of unit tests requested, the number of unit tests cancelled, and informal student feedback all indicate that a change in the feedback to allow revision of answers increased student persistence and activity in CAPSI. Keywords: Writing, Computer-aided PSI (CAPSI), student persistence and activity ********** In Spring 2004, Delta State University surveyed freshmen and seniors using the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE, 2000; see Bridges & Kuh, 2004). The results of the NSSE report indicated many significant strengths of Delta State, including high levels of student-student and student-faculty interaction and many positive aspects of writing (e.g., preparing several drafts, and receiving prompt feedback). However, the NSSE results did indicate that students at Delta State engage in less writing than students at comparable institutions. As suggested by Tierney and Shanahan (1991), there is a strong link between writing and thinking. Thus, one area that Delta State has targeted is to increase is the amount of writing that students produce during their four-year undergraduate degrees. The current study began as a way to increase student reading and writing skills within an upper-level psychology course at Delta State University. This course incorporates stress on the written word through use of a computer-aided personalized system of instruction (CAPSI, see Pear & Crone-Todd, 1999). With its basis in Keller's (1968) personalized system of instruction (PSI), CAPSI incorporates many of the features of the original system (Grant & Spencer, 2003), including: (a) the written word as the main means of learning the material; (b) mastery criteria for passing unit tests prior to continuing on in the testing; (c) self-paced method for students to progress at their own speed; (d) use of proctors, tutors, or peer reviewers to provide feedback and help administer the program; (e) lectures as motivational aids, rather than as the main means of transmitting information. The growth of PSI-taught courses coincided with research indicating its clear effectiveness as a pedagogical tool that increased performance well over the previous gains using lecture or discussion-based learning (Buskist, Cush, & DeGrandpre, 1991; Johnson & Ruskin, 1977; Kulik, Kulik, & Cohen, 1979). This work showed that PSI students learned more than students taught using conventional methods. When compared with other methods, PSI courses were perceived by students as more demanding, yet were also rated as more favorable in quality and enjoyment. Despite this early advantage for PSI, the system fell out of favor for a variety of reasons. One of the key reasons was due to the amount of time for instructors to set up and administer these courses (Buskist et al, 1991). However, recent advances in technology have resurrected an interest in the PSI methodology. In particular, CAPSI (Pear & Crone-Todd, 1999; Pear & Kinsner, 1988) has been used for the last few decades at the University of Manitoba to teach several undergraduate courses in psychology, and is now being made available through the internet to serve locations throughout Canada and the United States. CAPSI incorporates the principles of PSI by focusing on small units of study. The students are provided with open-ended study questions that correspond to each unit. Students are allowed to proceed at their own pace to master the units on tests based on these study questions. These unit tests are reviewed by the instructor or two peer-reviewers to determine if mastery is met. Feedback on each question is provided, and if the answers to all questions meet mastery criteria, the test is evaluated as a pass. …