Student-generated content: using
PeerWise to help support chemistry
understanding and increase student
engagement in a first year module
Dr Suzanne Fergus & Dr Stewart Kirton
Department Pharmacy, School Life and Medical Sciences
A 1st year chemistry module
(Molecular Structure and Reactivity)
co-taught to undergraduate students
from Dept of Pharmacy (n= 223) and
Dept Health and Environmental Science
(n=180).
Lack of
practice
questions
Too much
content. Not
enough exam
practice.
A lot of
information I found
was like A-level,
making it hard to
remain engaged
Would like
more access
to exam
questions
Hard to repeat
work done inside
out at A level and
still be engaged
in lectures
Provide sample exam paper with answers
Staff produce more practice questions
What about Week 12 Progress Test

?
?
Start Module with Contextualised Examples
Mixed abilities in cohort
?

BLOOM’S TAXONOMY OF COGNITIVE
SKILLS
The amount
of content
per lecture
can be a
challenge.
….remembering
all the material.
The amount of
material that needs
to be learned. The
huge difference
between material
learned at A-level
compared to now.
..being able to
remember all the
names, properties
and reactions
involving different
molecules.
Lectures sometimes
feel like information
overload…. Chemistry
has many details that
are often difficult to
remember.
BLOOM’S TAXONOMY OF COGNITIVE
SKILLS
Students create multiple choice questions
and share them with peers
Students view, answer, and give feedback
to their peers
Free to use
MSR9 Assignment
Peerwise Question Development
Due in Week 10, Friday 30th Nov at 18:30
You are assigned two chemistry theory topics
(which are also covered in Semester A lectures).
You are required to create an MCQ on each
topic, answer 5 questions, comment on 3
questions and rate other students’ questions for
quality and difficulty.
The main stadium for the 2012 London
Olympics was located in
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
Great Britain
British Isles
England
Scotland
Europe
Which of the following is not an
intermolecular attractive force?
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
Hydrogen Bonding
Dispersion Forces
Dipole-Dipole Interactions
Resonance Structures
Ion-Ion Interactions
Camtasia video with step by step guide
on “How to Register with Peerwise”
http://peerwise.cs.auckland.ac.nz/docs/
Student Engagement
 3 students out of 237 did not create any questions
 52 students just answered the required 5 questions
 75% of cohort answered more than the required
number (2 students answered 95 questions!)
The MSR workshop 1 helped me to develop writing good quality
Multiple Choice Questions (MCQs)
Answer Options
Strongly Agree
Agree
Neither Agree nor Disagree
Disagree
Strongly Disagree
Response
Percent
23.3%
66.7%
8.3%
1.7%
0.0%
Response
Count
14
40
5
1
0
The MSR workshop 1 helped me to develop writing good
quality Multiple Choice Questions (MCQs)
Strongly Agree
Agree
Neither Agree nor Disagree
Disagree
Strongly Disagree
Which aspect of the assignment (MSR9) did you find the most beneficial
to your chemistry learning?
Response
Percent
Response
Count
Creating MCQ Questions
31.1%
19
Answering MCQ Questions
63.9%
39
Commenting on MCQ Questions
4.9%
3
Other (please specify)
0.0%
0
Answer Options
Which aspect of the assignment (MSR9) did you find the
most beneficial to your chemistry learning?
Creating MCQ Questions
Answering MCQ Questions
Commenting on MCQ
Questions
Other (please specify)
Which aspect of using Peerwise did you find the most challenging?
Response
Percent
Response
Count
Creating MCQ Questions
62.1%
36
Answering MCQ Questions
17.2%
10
Commenting on Questions
10.3%
6
Registering on Peerwise
5.2%
3
Posting on Peerwise
1.7%
1
Other (please specify)
3.4%
2
Answer Options
Which aspect of using Peerwise did you find
the most challenging?
Creating MCQ Questions
Answering MCQ Questions
Commenting on Questions
Registering on Peerwise
Posting on Peerwise
Other (please specify)
Did you use Peerwise after the assignment deadline to prepare for the
Progress Test in week 12?
Response
Percent
Response
Count
Yes
57.6%
34
No
42.4%
25
Answer Options
Comment
0
Did you use Peerwise after the assignment deadline to
prepare for the Progress Test in week 12?
Yes
No
It is very useful because I can
find answers and
explanations to various
questions that I do not
understand. moreover, I
understood and learnt a lot
of things by answering the
questions in peerwise
It definitely helps when
revising for exams
I thought it was an effective way of
learning about how much you understood
a certain topic as you had to understand
something in order to write a question
about it.
I'd question how beneficial
it is compared to other
revision/learning
techniques. A lot of the
questions written by
students looked like they
were written quickly and
were unchallenging.
Peerwise is good to use,
however the fact that it is your
own choice to answer which
ever question you prefer, it is
easy to just choose the easy
questions and not attempt the
more challenging ones.
There is that cynical feeling knowing that
a student wrote the question so there is
that doubtful factor an lack of confident
in the answer and a explanation for the
MCQ.