PHD, Kent State University, 2007, College of Education, Health, and Human Services / Department of Educational Foundations and Special Services

Some theorists consider writing and cognition to be symbiotic if not synonymous. Writing is regarded not only a means of communicating and assessing understanding of content knowledge, but as a way of constructing knowledge. Yet, though writing is likely a beneficial activity in most, if not all, disciplines, it has been difficult to implement in content courses. Robust online peer review systems for student writing now offer solutions to many of the problems that have impeded peer review activities in the past. Research in self-explanations and reciprocal teaching has suggested that students stand to benefit cognitively by articulating explanations to self and others, but this research has been conducted primarily in math and science domains. There have been few, if any, investigations of the effects of articulating feedback for others on one's own subsequent writing. The goal of this study was to examine the effects of reviewing on one's subsequent writing. Further, the study sought to illuminate distinctions between different types of reviewing and reviewer preparation, namely the effects of feedback elaboration and the effects of providing prototypical examples of helpful and unhelpful feedback. Results indicate that students who provided elaborate forms of feedback, which included free-form comments, performed significantly better on their own writing than students who provided numerical ratings only. In this context, the use of examples did not have significant effects on reviewers' subsequent writing quality. Also, review-first groups did not perform significantly better than write-first groups, however, the author notes that the design of the study may have inadvertently counteracted reviewing effects.

Committee: David Dalton (Advisor) Subjects:

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2019, Music

The professional development of teachers is an ongoing process of learning that is essential to their personal and professional growth and plays a significant role in students' achievement and success. The purpose of this study was to examine how participation in a peer review and assessment program catalyzed changes in teachers' attitudes, beliefs, and practices as a part of their professional growth. Specifically, the study examined how participation in a peer review and assessment program catalyzed music teachers' professional growth (Borko, 2004; Desimone, 2009; Stanley, 2009). Nine music teachers were interviewed in this case study of a peer review program designed for the review and assessment of Student Learning Objectives (SLOs) and set in a large urban Midwestern school district in Ohio. The peer review program presented a unique opportunity to examine the capacity for music teachers' professional growth in varied contexts as teachers created and applied measurable student learning targets. Five key themes emerged from the findings: a) attitudes of resistance resulting from reviewee's misinterpretations of the SLO process and its purpose; b) advocacy for music teaching for the purpose of teaching and learning with clarity; c) asset-based vs. deficit ideology in which teachers examine standards for student achievement in urban settings; d) reflection and review upon individual teacher's practice; and e) enacting the role of reviewer as policy enactor, to enforce the authenticity and rigor of the content-specific initiative. Findings hold implications for: (a) informed peer review planning; (b) teacher evaluation; and (c) effective professional development linked to collaboration.

Committee: Julia Shaw PhD (Advisor); Jan Edwards PhD (Advisor); Antoinette Miranda PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Educational Evaluation; Fine Arts; Music; Music Education; Teacher Education

Master of Science, The Ohio State University, 2017, Agricultural and Extension Education

There is a need for more leaders who are working to disrupt pervasive, systematic injustices and promote positive social change in agriculture and higher education. Colleges of agriculture and related sciences have recognized their role in preparing future leaders and responded to this charge, yet students of agriculture are not exhibiting the leadership behaviors that society and employers need. In a series of three studies, the author explored the leadership development of students of agriculture at The Ohio State University. The first study was a secondary analysis of campus data from the 2010, 2012, and 2015 Multi-Institutional Study of Leadership (MSL) in order to explore the trends, similarities, and differences in leadership outcomes by major field of study. Results indicated that respondents who identified their major as agriculture did not differ from non-agricultural students in leadership capacity or leadership self-efficacy. However, while at college, students of agriculture reported significantly lower levels of engagement in socio-cultural discussions that non-agriculture students, but higher levels of mentoring by others. The results of this study imply a greater need for opportunities for students in agriculture to engage in conversations of personal and global importance with their peers. By conducting this study, the researcher was able to identify an additional need to specifically investigate how mentoring relates to leadership development in students of agriculture. In the second study, a four-phase scoping review of the literature sought to identify, appraise, and summarize existing knowledge and knowledge gaps in the instrumentation and assessment of soft skills. The result of this study, a systematic map of soft skill assessment instruments, were used to form recommendations for appropriate instruments to measure soft skill development based on a hierarchical assessment of psychometric evidence, generalized construct validity, composite re (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Jeff King (Advisor); Jeff Hattey (Committee Member); M. Susie Whittington (Committee Member) Subjects: Adult Education; Agricultural Education; Education

Master of Science, Miami University, 2024, Computer Science and Software Engineering

Peer review is an integral part of academic publication necessary to maintain high standards and novelty of published research. Despite its importance, peer reviewers are rarely provided with incentives, leading to journals facing difficulties in finding reviewers willing to accept invitations and submit reviews on time. This thesis proposes a Blockchain-based Anonymous Reviewer Incentive Token (BARIT) to incentivize peer reviewers. We conducted interviews with academic researchers to identify the system requirements and understand the factors that motivate them to contribute as reviewers or editors. BARIT introduces flexible incentive schemes that provide both recognition and tangible benefits for reviewers' contributions while preserving the anonymity required by the venue's review process (open, single, or double-blind). By leveraging blockchain technology to record reward tokens, their permanence, immutability, and acceptance across different publishers are ensured. The incentive model aims to encourage researchers' involvement as reviewers, reduce invitation refusal rates, and prompt the timely submission of review reports. We demonstrated the designed solution to experts to evaluate its usability, benefits, and efficiency from their perspective.

Committee: Suman Bhunia (Advisor); Arthur Carvalho (Committee Member); Karen Davis (Committee Member); Liudmila Zavolokina (Committee Member) Subjects: Computer Science

PHD, Kent State University, 2021, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of English

Peer review's relationship with revision remains under-explored, and it is worth investigating how revision skills are developed or polished during peer review conversations among a variety of first-year college students. Early research on reviewing practices centered on the nature of revisions made by novice and experienced writers, without looking closely at the conversations occurring between peers. Thus, my dissertation investigates ongoing interactions among student writers and how revision practices and advice mediate their relationships with their peers. Studying various writer relationships with regards to student texts will seek to help composition instructors become better-equipped to address a myriad of academic writing concerns, as students indeed care about their grades in their writing courses, but they also want to engage competently—and compassionately—with one another and each other's work. This dissertation work posits that students who participate in regular peer review would like the opportunity to share about their experiences and whether these experiences aid or hinder the solidarity they feel for one another. Interviewing students during the course of a semester, reporting on how their perspectives change over time, and sharing the findings with the field will help practitioners refine their peer review assignments and make their objectives clearer to concerned students. This project will also make plain the need for centering student voices as a means for transparent composition pedagogy.

Committee: Brian Huot (Advisor) Subjects: Composition; Education; Teaching

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2019, Educational Studies

Peer review in nursing is essential to accountability and self-regulation of practice in the nursing discipline. However, the literature reveals that professional nurses and nursing students feel peer review is not their responsibility. Research has shown that they state they do not have time to do it, and they feel unprepared for and anxious about the process of providing good feedback to peers. Academic nursing programs should be teaching future nurses to participate in peer review and recognize its value to professional nursing practice. Training in peer review through peer assessment exercises in the academic environment has potential benefits for the student, the instructor, and nursing. However, the current literature lacks empirical evidence of concrete, tested teaching strategies designed to prepare nursing students for the peer assessment process. The purpose of this study was to explore the effect of a peer review lesson on the quality of feedback nursing students provide to their peers, investigate whether that effect persists beyond the immediate time period after the lesson, and to determine if the effect was influenced by the motivational constructs of expectancy, value, or cost. In this investigation, motivation was viewed through the lens of the expectancy-value framework. Expectancy, value, and cost were hypothesized to influence the effect of a peer review lesson on the quality of feedback a nursing student provided to his or her peer. The peer review lesson was hypothesized to exert an effect on quality of peer feedback through the student's knowledge of supportive peer feedback practices. A peer review activity covering the six principles of peer review and five characteristics of effective feedback was presented to graduate nursing students in an online format. Student motivation to provide supportive peer feedback was then measured with an instrument underpinned by expectancy-value theory. Learning outcomes, including knowledge of pe (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Kui Xie PhD (Advisor) Subjects: Education; Nursing

PHD, Kent State University, 2015, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of English

This dissertation examines Vygotsky's theory of imitation and it relationship to the zone of proximal development. After noting incongruities within scholarship regarding the ZPD, I discuss the similarities between Vygotsky's theory of imitation and Bandura's theory of modeling. Based on this discussion, I operationalize Bandura's paradigm for successful modeling, introduce his notion of self-efficacy, and describe how modeling and imitation provides students an opportunity to achieve mastery skills needed in a peer review session, skills which are effective in changing an individual's sense of efficacy and increases motivation for peer review and engagement in the writing process. This semester long, exploratory study used pre and post Self Efficacy surveys (see Bandura, Pajares, Zimmerman), pre and post in class writings, and an informal interview to generate data; results indicate that modeling and imitation increased student ability and engagement with peer review. Moreover, the participant's favorable claims for peer review and the effects which modeling had on them suggest that modeling cognitive strategies changed these writers' attitude toward revision and the peer review process. By providing observable behaviors and allowing students to imitate these behaviors, the mystique of the peer review process and the interpretive demand of the rough draft was reduced. In addition, understood as an important step in the writing process, students were using it in other writing tasks and intended to continue using it beyond the composition class.

Committee: Sara Newman PhD (Committee Chair); Michele Eodice PhD (Committee Member); Robin Selinger PhD (Committee Member); Lewis Fried PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Composition

Master of Arts, University of Toledo, 2010, English (as a Second Language)

This study analyzes the use of ESL students' L1 and L2 during the peer review process in terms of the number of comments and suggestions produced and the types of comments and suggestions produced. For this study, during one session of peer review, the first pair of students was able to give written and spoken comments only in the L2, and the second pair of students was able to give written and spoken comments in both the L1 and the L2. The results of this study suggest that ESL students produce more written and spoken comments and suggestions when they use their L1 and L2 during peer review. The results also suggest that ESL students produce more comments and suggestions concerning meaning errors such as content, development, and organization errors and sentence structure errors when they use their L1 and L2 during peer review, and ESL students produce more comments and suggestions concerning surface errors such as grammar errors and spelling, punctuation, and word choice errors when they use only their L2 during peer review.

Committee: Melinda Reichelt Dr. (Committee Chair); Barbara Schneider Dr. (Committee Member); Dwayne Demedio Dr. (Committee Member) Subjects: Language

Master of Arts, John Carroll University, 2010, English

Peer collaboration about writing often functions as a required step in the writing processes of first-year writing students. Within the composition classroom, students read and respond to the writing of their peers, sometimes obtaining useful feedback, and sometimes just getting “You did a good job” as an evaluation. Outside of the classroom, the Writing Center exists as a space where students can work with a trained consultant to receive helpful suggestions and a thorough evaluation of their writing. Though the first-year writing classroom and the Writing Center exist as physically separate places, both rely on principles of collaboration and conversation between peers with the objective of creating better writers. Composition scholars like Stephen M. North, Muriel Harris, and Kenneth Bruffee wrote foundational essays that support collaborative pedagogy for its social benefits, which encourage learning between two peer equals. The scholarship that follows these landmark essays further develops the exclusive benefits of collaboration in the Writing Center and the composition classroom. Despite the fact that both spaces rely on some of the same theories and practices, they remain distanced. This thesis examines the benefits of a style of peer review that takes place within first-year writing classrooms and replicates the procedures of Writing Center consultations. Based on my experiences as a Graduate Assistant—which placed me in both locations at the same time—I found that a Writing Center style of peer review encourages first-year writing students to read, talk about, and learn about writing with one other person, and is more productive than large group work. The thesis begins with a literature review that discusses key essays within the composition field. Then, I explain my procedures for peer review and my methods of gathering student feedback. I also take into consideration the college where I teach and its students. Also discussed are the objections and e (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Thomas Pace PhD (Advisor); Debra Rosenthal PhD (Committee Member); Mark Storz PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Composition