TABLE OF CONTENTS

• About Peer Review
• Available Software Options 
  • Peer Assessment in Blackboard Ultra 
  • Blackboard Discussions 
  • VoiceThread 
• Comparing Features 
  • Overall Features
  • Work Submitted for Assessment
  • Assessment Feedback Types

About Peer Review

Peer review is a student-led process during which learners provide and receive constructive feedback, reflect on that feedback, and revise their work in response to the feedback. This growth-oriented process improves students’ work and understanding of academic concepts and develops their self-evaluative, collaborative, and practical workplace skills. 

Available Software Options 

There are lots of software options available that can be used to facilitate peer review. Below is a list of tools supported by Lesley University. 

Peer Assessment in Blackboard Ultra 

You can enable Peer Assessment from within the Assignment tool in Blackboard Ultra. After a student submits work, they are prompted to review their peers' work with a set deadline and number of reviewers.

Features and Considerations: 

• The Peer Review feature is integrated into Blackboard Ultra's Assignment tool. The entire process of submitting and reviewing peers' work is done within myLesley. 
• The tool features an instructor dashboard that allows you to see the progress of the submissions and peer reviews.
• Just like any assignment, there is also a field where faculty can enter a grade and feedback. 
• When creating the Assignment, the instructor can set the number of reviewers, Assessment Due Date, and Peer Review Due Date.
• Students will not see the names of the students they are reviewing or the names of the students who have reviewed their work. However, the instructor will be able to see the names of the reviewers.
• This is a great option for reviewing written assignments. You can also submit other media formats for review, but there are limits to how you can provide feedback on video and audio files.

For more information, refer to the Self and Peer Assessment in Blackboard Ultra support article or watch the Peer Assessment in Blackboard Ultra tutorial video.

Blackboard Discussions 

A Discussion is an asynchronous communication tool that allows students to collaborate with others through posting or answering questions. Students respond to a discussion by creating a post and replying to their classmates' posts. Discussions are available in both Original and Ultra courses.

Features and Considerations: 

• This tool is a good option if discussion activities are already a part of your course design and you do not need the reviewers to be anonymous. 
• Discussion posts and replies allow users to embed or attach various file types, including attaching documents and files or embedding video or audio via Kaltura Media.
• You will need to provide your students with instructions on how to conduct the review, including posting work for review and how, where, and when to provide feedback.

Find out more about Using Discussions in Ultra Course View.

Find out more about  Using Discussions in Original Course View. 

VoiceThread 

VoiceThread allows you to place collections of media like images, videos, documents, and presentations at the center of a conversation. These conversations are not live; they take place whenever and wherever it’s convenient for people to participate. A VoiceThread allows people to present content and allow others to provide feedback via any mix of text, a microphone, a webcam, or uploading an audio file. 

Features and Considerations: 

• The advantage VoiceThread is the variety and combinations of media that can be submitted for review as well as the wide ranges of ways that users can provide feedback. 
• Reviewers can share feedback with text, audio, or video. 
• This tool is particularly useful for providing auditory feedback. 
• There is an annotation tool that allows you to mark up the work and you can play, skip and pause the media under review, which allows reviewers to provide in-depth and interactive recording of their feedback. 
• All audio and video comments are machine captioned and the captions are edible. 
• This tool exists outside of myLesley and there is a learning curve. We only suggest using VoiceThread for peer reviews if you are already using the tool for other activities or the feature benefits outweigh the learning curve.

Find out more about VoiceThread in Education. 

Comparing Features 

Blackboard Peer Assessment tool, Blackboard Discussions, and VoiceThread are all effective tools for facilitating student peer review. There are multiple factors to consider when selecting a tool for your review activities, including privacy, anonymity, content types, and review methods. Below is a chart that indicates what features each tool has. 

If you want help assessing which direction to go in, reach out to eLearning and Instructional Support at elis@lesley.edu. 

Overall Features

Work Submitted for Assessment

Assessment Feedback Types