Peer Assessment

1. Logistical challenge – the need for additional teacher time
Prepare clear rubrics and instructions before the activity begins and use assessment examples to align understanding of the criteria. The activity can be partially automated through digital tools such as the Moodle Workshop or FeedbackFruits, which reduces the teacher’s workload.

2. Affective challenge – the tendency of students to give overly high grades
Where possible, ensure anonymity of assessment and assign multiple reviewers per submission, as well as include teachers in the assessment process with a higher weighting. It is important to familiarise students with the purpose of the assessment and emphasise that it serves learning rather than grading their peers.

3. Metacognitive challenge – insufficiently developed assessment skills
Introduce short practice assessments with sample work before the real activity. Gradually develop students’ ability to provide reasoned feedback and reflect on their own assessment process.

4. Analytical challenge – superficial assessment without relying on criteria
Use rubrics with clear performance level descriptions and encourage students to briefly justify their grades. The teacher may review a sample of assessments and, if necessary, calibrate the results.

A specific type of assessment is self-assessment, which enables students to evaluate their own work based on predefined criteria and thus improve it. Self-assessment is often used in combination with peer assessment of peers’ work.

Peer assessment and self-assessment are often used alongside contemporary teaching and learning methods such as project-based learning and flipped classrooms (Van Helden et al., 2023).