Peer response groups increase the number of idea units in English learners' writing but show no significant effect on composition quality or sentences written (Prater & Bermudez, 1993)¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study (2 entries) · causal r? · q3 · i2 medium
Currency · newest study 2007 · 1 of 2 entries checked against their sources (automated) · not reviewed by a person

Subclaims¶

q3 i2 The peer response group condition produced statistically significantly more idea units (effect size 0.73) than individual writing. → What Works Clearinghouse 2007 q3 i? No statistically significant differences favored the peer response group on composition quality (0.15), total sentences (0.33), or total words (0.62 after WWC multiple-comparison correction). → What Works Clearinghouse 2007 (2)

Evidence¶

What Works Clearinghouse 2007¶

What Works Clearinghouse, U.S. Department of Education. (2007). WWC Intervention Report: Peer Tutoring and Response Groups. https://ies.ed.gov/ncee/wwc

q3 · i2 · quant-synthesis · r1

Randomized controlled trial of 46 fourth-grade English language learners in two Houston-area elementary schools, assigned to mixed-ability peer response groups or individual writing for four weeks. Appendix A3 reports an idea-units effect size of 0.73, statistically significant, improvement index +27; the impact was at least 0.25, substantively important by WWC standards.

"Prater and Bermudez (1993) reported statistically significant differences favoring the peer response group on the number of words written and number of ideas presented in student compositions but no statistically significant differences in overall composition quality and number of sentences written."

What Works Clearinghouse 2007 (2)¶

What Works Clearinghouse, U.S. Department of Education. (2007). WWC Intervention Report: Peer Tutoring and Response Groups. https://ies.ed.gov/ncee/wwc

q3 · i? · causal · r?

In the same RCT, Appendix A3 reports effect sizes of 0.15 for composition quality, 0.33 for total sentences, and 0.62 for total words written, none statistically significant after WWC corrections. Equivalence was not tested.

"Corrections for multiple comparisons did change Prater & Bermudez (1993) outcomes for total words written from statistically significant to non-significant."

Discussion¶

Learner Variables¶

• Writing Skills — outcome: instruction changes it

Related Claims¶

• Peer assessment improves academic performance by a small average amount relative to no assessment or to teacher assessment — the general claim this finding bears on, with the studies behind it

• Peer Feedback Improves Writing — the general claim this finding bears on, with the studies behind it

• Peer pairing increases English learners' peer-directed language behavior but shows no significant effect on listening comprehension or teacher-directed language (Jun-Aust, 1985) — related
• Process Writing Improves Writing Quality — related
• In one keystroke-logging study, spontaneous sentence production under minimal planning is associated with gains in writers' self-rated understanding and with lower initial text quality — related
• Authentic Audiences Improve Student Work — related
• Concrete reward increases children's mean ideational fluency on creativity tasks relative to control conditions — related
• Writing to younger students produced better mixture understanding than writing to the teacher, while younger-student and peer audiences did not differ — related
• Writing instruction produces a statistically significant positive overall effect on the writing performance of K-12 English language learners in the United States (g = 0.33) — a broader claim this one bears on
• Both conditions improved in overall idea units, evidence-based units and functional units, with no significant condition-by-time differences — related
• Individual engagement with an educational robot yielded greater divergent-thinking gains than pair work — related