A Web-Based Peer Interaction Framework for Improved Assessment and Supervision of Students

One of the challenges of both traditional and contemporary instructional media in higher education is creating a sustainable teaching-learning environment that ensures continuous engagement of students and provides efficient means of assessing their performance. We present a peer-based framework designed to increase active participation of students in courses administered in both traditional and blended learning settings. Students are continuously engaged in attention-eliciting tasks and are assessed by their peers. The framework allows semi-automated assignment of tasks to students. In completing these tasks, students ask questions, answer questions from other students, evaluate the quality of question-answer pairs and rate answers provided by their peers. We have implemented this framework in several courses and run extensive experiments to assess the effectiveness of our approach. We discuss the results of students’ surveys of this approach, which, in general, has been perceived as