Using Collaborative Pictures to Understand Student Experience

Authors: Tessa Berg, Emma Guion Akdag

Abstract:

Summative feedback forms are used in academia for gathering data on course quality and student understanding. Students answer a series of questions based on the course they are soon to finish in these forms. Feedback forms are notorious for being homogenised and limiting and thus the data captured is often neutral and lacking in tacit emotional responses. This paper contrasts student feedback forms with collaborative drawing. We analyse 19 pictures drawn by international students on a pre-sessional course. Through visuals we present an approach to enable a holistic level of student understanding. Visuals communicate irrespective of possible language, cultural and educational barriers. This paper sought to discover if the pictures mirrored the feedback given on a typical feedback form. Findings indicate a considerable difference in the two approaches and thus we highlight the value of collaborative drawing as a complimentary resource to aid the understanding of student experience.

Keywords: Feedback forms, visualisation, student experience, collaborative drawing.

Digital Object Identifier (DOI): doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.1123937

References:

[1] K. Dunegan and M. Hrivnak, “Characteristics of mindless teaching evaluations and the moderating effects of image compatibility,” Journal of Management Education, vol. 27, no. 3, p. 280–303, 2003.
[2] C. Emery, T. Kramer and R. Tian, “Return to academic standards: a critique of student evaluations of teaching effectiveness.,” Quality Assurance in Education, vol. 11, no. 1, pp. 37-46, 2003.
[3] M. Gray and B. Bergmann, “Student teaching evaluations: inaccurate, demeaning, misused” Academe Online, vol. 89, no. 5, 2003.
[4] P. Marks, “Silent Partners: student course evaluations and the construction of pedagogical worlds,” Canadian Journal for Studies in Discourse and Writing, vol. 24, no. 1, 2012.
[5] J. Felton, J. Mitchell and M. Stinson, “Web-based student evaluations of professors: the relations between perceived quality, easiness and sexiness,” Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, vol. 29, no. 1, 2004.
[6] Bronte-Stewart, “Regarding Rich Pictures as Tools for Communication in Information Systems Development,” Computing and Information systems, vol. 6, pp. 83-103, 1999.
[7] M. Campbell Williams, “Interpreting Rich Pictures Symbolically,” SYST.RES, vol. 15, pp. 55-59, 1998.
[8] Monk and Howard, “The Rich Picture: A tool for reasoning about work content,” 1998. (Online). Available: http://www.ics.uci.edu/~wscacchi/ Software-Process/Readings/RichPicture.pdf. (Accessed 23 05 2009).
[9] M. Sidhu, H. Jani and s. Ramesh, “Critical Evaluation of Rich Pictures as a Pictorial Technique in SSM for Resolving Unstructured Problems,” National Conference on research and development in Computer Science, pp. 137-143, 2001.
[10] S. Bell and S. Morse, “Rich pictures: a means to explore the 'Sustainable Group Mind',” Sustainable Development., 2010.
[11] S. Bell and S. Morse, “How People Use Rich Pictures to Help Them Think,” Systemic Practice and Action Research, 2012.
[12] Lewis, “Rich Picture Building in the Soft Systems Methodology,” European Journal of Information Systems, vol. Vol. 1, no. 5, pp. 351-360, 1992.
[13] A. Waring, System Methods for Managers, Oxford: Blackwell Scientific Publications, 1989.
[14] Wood-Harper, L. Anthill and Avison, Information Systems Definition: The Multiview Approach, Blackwell Scientific, 1985.
[15] Avison, Shah and Golder, “Tools for SSM: a justification – a reply to ‘critique of two contributions to soft systems methodology,” European Journal of Information Systems, pp. 312-313, 1993.
[16] S. Bell and A. Wood-Harper, “Rapid Information Systems Development: a non-specialist’s guide to analysis and design in an imperfect world, Maidenhead: McGraw Hill, 1992, pp. 70-75.
[17] T. Berg and R. Pooley, “Contemporary Iconography for Rich Picture Construction,” Systems Research and Behavioral Science, 2012.
[18] S. Bell and S. Morse, Resilient Participation: Saving the human planet, Abingdon: Routledge, 2012a.
[19] T. Berg, “Understanding Iconography: A Method to Allow Rich Picture Interpretation to Improve,” Heriot-Watt Research Repository, Edinburgh, 2013.
[20] R. S. Zander and B. Zander, The Art of Possibility, New York, NY: Penguin, 2000.
[21] L. Harvey, L. Plimmer, S. Moon and V. Geall, Student satisfaction manual, Buckingham: SRHE & Open University Press, 1997.
[22] L. Harvey, V. Geall, P. Mazelan, S. Moon and L. Plummer, “Student satisfaction: The 1995 report on the student experience at UCE,” Centre for Research into Quality, Birmingham, University of Central England, 1995.
[23] J. T. E. Richardson, “Students' perceptions of academic quality and approaches to studying in distance education,” British Educational Research Journal, vol. 31, no. 1, pp. 1-21, 2005.
[24] J. Wiers-Jenssen, B. Stensaker and J. B. Grogaard, “Student satisfaction: towards an empirical deconstruction of the concept,” Quality in Higher Education, vol. 8, pp. 183-195, 2002.
[25] K. Narasimhan, “Improving the climate of teaching sessions: the use of evaluations by students and instructors,” Quality in Higher Education, vol. 7, pp. 179-190, 2001.
[26] A. G. Greenwald and G. M. Gilmore, “Grading leniency is a removable contaminant of student ratings,” American Psychologist, vol. 52, pp. 1209-1217, 1997.
[27] J. T. E. Richardson, “Students' perceptions of academic quality and approaches to studying in distance education,” British Educational Research Journal, vol. 31, no. 1, pp. 1-21, 2005.
[28] S. Bell, T. Berg and S. Morse, Rich pictures: encouraging resilient communities, New York: Routledge, 2016.