Peer Evaluation Form: Templates and Examples

Evaluations and feedback provide insight into how a system works. In situations that involve peers, this kind of assessment can tell you how people working or learning together view and rate each other, allowing for cooperation and improvement. In schools and other educational organizations, peer evaluations are used to rate the performance and competencies of students, workers, and teachers, based on how people at the same level perceive them. This is made possible by asking the “peers” to fill out a peer evaluation form evaluating each other. Let’s review how this document works.

What Is Peer Evaluation?

A peer evaluation is also called a peer assessment. It is a common learning strategy that requires students to assess their peers and provide constructive feedback on their work. During the process, the participating students pick up communication and critical thinking skills. The goal is to study the assignment or course material and determine whether the work of their peers meets the set objectives.

What Is a Peer Evaluation Form?

A peer evaluation form is a fillable document used to facilitate the peer evaluation process by providing fields in which students can enter information about their peers. The form allows the reviewing students to record their findings and comments, which the evaluated students and teacher can analyze later to promote improvement.

Peer Evaluation Forms

Peer Evaluation: Questions

Typically, a teacher or professor will customize the questions on a peer evaluation form to meet their curriculum needs. However, common questions that can be found in this document include:

• What, in your opinion, are this student’s strengths?
• Did this student’s essay answer the underlying question?
• In what ways could this presentation be improved?
• Use four or five words to describe this student’s performance
• How well did this student understand the thesis statement?
• What are two things this student should avoid in their next assignment?
• Identify three positive things about this work.

These are just some example peer evaluation questions a teacher might use. If the review is happening in a different setting, say one involving employees, the questions can be tailored to that environment.

Why Use Peer Evaluation?

Peer evaluations are usually incorporated into the learning process because they promote positive self-assessment. They allow students to objectively review the work of others, offer constructive feedback, and apply this same feedback to their work, promoting improvement all-round. Overall, this review process offers the following key benefits:

• Preparing for peer assessment involves reviewing course material or assignment guidelines, which can help the assessing student refresh on the curriculum content.
• Peer evaluation teaches students to take responsibility for their class performance and their duty to help their peers do well. This fosters self-improvement and cooperation.
• Because it involves discussion, the process can nurture communication and social skills in participating students.
• Assessing students often apply the feedback they offer their peers to their own work.
• The assessment process also allows students to familiarize themselves with the marking process teachers use to assess their work.

Peer assessments can also eliminate “free riding,” which is when some students piggyback on the efforts of other students in a group setting, allowing them to do all the work but sharing in the credit. This is because the process requires the active participation of every student.

Challenges with Peer Evaluation (And How to Overcome Them)

Successful peer evaluations are built on honest and constructive communication, feedback, and criticism. However, this can be difficult to achieve sometimes due to the following obstacles:

1. Friend-Enemy Dynamics

Fried-enemy relationships within a class can affect the authenticity of peer review results. You can avoid this by establishing clear assessment objectives and guidelines presented in a rubric that the students can refer to during the process. Additionally, you can make the results less skewed by making the assessment anonymous and creating an avenue for complaints about unfair evaluations.

2. Unestablished Value

Because it is not a part of the curriculum, students are very likely to discount peer evaluations as busy work. The best way to avoid this is to implement the process with the same guidelines you use for other evaluations and reiterate its impotence to class performance.

3. Reluctance

Students may be reluctant to assess their peers, especially in the beginning. You can alleviate their fears by discussing the process and its benefits and checking in with them throughout the evaluation.

Tips to Facilitate an Effective Peer Evaluation

In addition to overcoming these common challenges, you can take the following extra steps to secure the success of your peer assessment program:

• Use a Rubric: Introduce a rubric to help the students focus on key areas during their evaluation rather than proffer general praise. A clear set of guidelines will also make the results uniform.
• Provide Feedback on the Evaluation: Allow assessed students to evaluate their feedback. Did they find it helpful? Motivational? Ambiguous? This feedback will help your students become better assessors in the long run.
• Diversify the Process: Pair students with reviewers with a wide range of interests, strengths, and abilities. This diversification will make the results more potent.
• Anonymize The Process: Make the evaluation process anonymous to allow students to feel freer offering and receiving feedback. This move will also eliminate bias.
• Check In: Constantly check in with your students to ensure they follow the rubric and utilize all the evaluation process benefits.

FAQs

Conclusion

Using a peer evaluation form in schools allows students to participate in the review process and their overall learning actively. Students filling out these forms have to study the assignment and determine whether their peers are meeting its objectives. Overall, this leads to greater accountability, cooperation, and personal improvement within the classroom.