Last year at our planning meeting we decided to integrate peer review of teaching activities during 2011 as part of our departmental plan to engage with a scholarship of teaching and learning. A few of us developed a peer review form based on a few examples we found online and then submitted the form to everyone in the department for comments and suggestions. The form is very basic compared to other, more comprehensive reviews, and we’ve already identified a few details that don’t fit well into our teaching structure. But it’s a start to what will become an increasingly refined process that will (hopefully) improve every year.
We are now in the process of undergoing reviews of our teaching activities and will each conduct one review for a colleague, as well as be reviewed during the last semester of this year. Yesterday I underwent my first peer review. I tried to keep my session as “normal” as possible and not be influenced by what I knew my colleague would be looking at. To be honest, I considered preparing a lecture that I knew would speak to every item on the form but decided that that would pretty much negate the purpose of the peer review in the first place.
The feedback that I received was largely positive, although there were some comments around the lack of structure that I know I struggle with. I tend not to situate a particular session within the larger context, which can leave some students feeling disoriented. I’m going to spend more time preparing lectures so that I can link a particular session with the previous one, as well as the bigger picture.
We’ll collate everyone’s forms at the end of the year, do a document analysis linked to a focus group discussion and write a collaborative article as part of our commitment to develop a scholarship of teaching and learning in our department. We’ll identify the strengths and weakness of the process and be able to make changes in preparation for next year. See below for the template we’re using to review teaching activities.