My Thoughts on

1

• My Thoughts on
• How You Can Have a Successful Experience
• with Calibrated Peer Review
• by Dr. Wendy Keeney-Kennicutt,
• CPR Administrator, TAMU

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WHAT IS CPR?

• A Web-based instructional writing and
  peer assessing tool
• Originated in the Molecular Science Project, an
  NSF-sponsored chemistry reform project (DUE
  95-55605) at UCLA
• Enables you to learn by writing about significant
  topics in a course, then going through a
  critiquing process 7 times

FREE
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HISTORY AT TAMUcpr.tamu.edu

• 2002 - CPRTM was introduced to TAMU by me, Dr.
  Wendy Keeney-Kennicutt after a Chemical
  Education workshop demo.
• 2003 - To avoid FERPA issues because of WALS
  NSF grant thru CTE, CPRTM was housed on a secure
  TAMU server.
• 2003 - I volunteered to be the CPRTM
  administrator because of experience.

WALS Writing for Assessment and Learning in
the Natural and Mathematical Sciences
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USE OF CPR AT TAMU

• In the last 3 years, CPR at TAMU has been used by
  approximately
• 19,000 undergraduate and graduate students doing
• 492 new assignments by
• 384 instructors in
• 400 courses spread over
• 30 majors in
• 9 colleges. 

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MAJORS USING CPRTM

• Accounting
• Ag. Economics
• Animal Science
• Anthropology
• Archeology
• Biochemistry
• Biology
• Botany
• Bus. Admin.
• Ctr. Acad. Enh.
• Chemistry

• English
• Ed. Curriculum
• Ed. Psychology
• Engineering
• Film
• French
• German
• Geography
• Kinesiology
• Learn. Comm.
• Math

• Microbiology
• Nutrition
• Physics
• Poultry Science
• Psychology
• Reading
• Secondary Ed.
• Vet Integr. Bio. Sci.
• Wildlife Fish. Sci.
• Zoology

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Why are you doing CPR?

• Giving you more practice writing in your classes
  not just English papers
• You will have to write after university in the
  real world
• Ramifications of Blooms Taxonomy pyramid (next
  slide)
• What level will pay you the Big Bucks?
• How will you get experience at working at higher
  levels of understanding (analysis, synthesis and
  evaluation)?

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Why is writing important?
Evaluation
Judgment the ability to make decisions and
support views requires understanding of values
Combination of information to form a
unique product requires creativity and
originality
Synthesis
Identification of component parts determination
of arrangement, logic, semantics
Analysis
Use of information to solve problems transfer of
abstract or theoretical ideas to practical
situations.
Application
Identification of connections and relationships
Interpretation
Restatement in your own words paraphrase summary
Translation
Verbatim information memorization with no
evidence of understanding
Recall
Blooms Taxonomy categorizing level of
abstraction of questions
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HOW DOES IT WORK?

• You write an assignment as per instructions.
• You pass a calibration step, where you learn to
  recognize and rank 3 essays of different quality
  on the same topic.
• You, NOT the instructor, critique 3 of your peers
  and your own work on-line.
• Your instructor can change grade afterwards.

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INTRO

• A CPR assignment consists of three stages    
• Stage 1 Text Entry Stage    Stage 2
  Calibration and Review Stage    Stage 3 Results
  Stage
• Only one stage can be accessed at any time.
• If you dont do the text entry, you cannot do the
  rest of the assignment.

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STAGE 1 TEXT ENTRY

• You will explore the assignment source material.
• The source material provides the information
  about the assignment topic. Source material can
  include web sites, articles, text books,
  pictures, movies, animations, etc.

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STAGE 1 TEXT ENTRY(continued)

• You then submit a text based on the material and
  guiding questions. Use HTML (see Student FAQs and
  instructor notes).
• Make sure you answer all the guiding questions in
  your essay. Read the Writing Prompt carefully
  it sets the scene.
• Write in MSWord, then copy/paste into text box.
  CPR will time you out after about 10 minutes and
  you can lose all your work. You can also check
  your grammar/spelling.

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STAGE 2 Calibration and Review Stage

• You will
• evaluate three example texts, called calibration
  essays using a grading rubric. These calibrations
  will develop your ability to effectively review
  the work of your peers. You have 2 chances to
  pass each calibration.
• evaluate the work of three peers anonymously.
  Take some time be fair in your written
  comments.
• evaluate your own work.

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Stage 3 Results Stage

• You will view your assignment results.
• For Your Instructor
• A problems list is generated
• All data can be downloaded.
• Times can be altered for specific students that
  miss deadlines, so tell your instructor right
  away if you miss a deadline.

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CPR OVERVIEW

• CPR deals with both writing and critiquing and
  usually critiquing is worth more.
• CPR gives you practice in evaluating other
  peoples work (this may make you nervous). This
  is a very powerful skill!
• We know you are novice reviewers, but the only
  way you will get any better is to practice!
• There is a safety net your instructor who
  will regrade your work if you think your peers
  graded you badly. Every instructor will handle
  this differently, but it will get handled.

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More Words of Advice

• The Writing Center (2nd floor of Library) will
  be happy to look over your writing and make
  comments before the due date.
• Always preview your writing before you submit to
  be sure it looks OK. You can submit as often as
  you like until the deadline. Beware of the 10min
  timeout.
• HTML coding is easy put at the end of a line
  to start a new paragraph, etc. See student FAQs
• If you forget your login information, email me
  kennicutt_at_mail.chem.tamu.edu.

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FINALLY

• Let me show you how to log in.
• http//cpr.tamu.edu
• Then GOOD LUCK!