In this project I am investigating the benefits of using Blackboard and Turnitin for grading and feedback both from the student and the lecturer perspective.
Sample Blackboard comments
Sample Turnitin Quickmarks
From the student perspective, I found that initially students had a negative attitude towards Turnitin and viewed it only for originality and not grading and feedback. In a short survey 68% of students would prefer to use Blackboard for grading and feedback. One of the reasons for this may be due to access, in Blackboard the student have to click an icon in grade centre. In Turnitin the students needed a video to explain how to access the feedback, this does not help the student engagement with the process.
From the lecturer perspective, I have been using Blackboard for grading and feedback for a few years, I find that Blackboard is not very user friendly for giving feedback however the grading is easy to use. Turnitin in comparison is a lot more user friendly for giving feedback as I am able to save the QuickMarks and re-use them on other assignments but the grading was a little confusing. I am not sure how well the student engaged with the feedback as I noticed in Turnitin 25% of the students did not view the paper. Both systems suffer from the fact that the student can view the grade without accessing the feedback.
In conclusion, I had not experienced the use of Turnitin prior to this project, the learning curve has been very steep and I still have some way to go with regard to both applications. I received training from the T&L centre which proved very useful and as this is an on-going process I expect that I will need their advice again. It is a key digital literacy tool for formative and summative feedback especially for students who engage with the process and for lecturers who will save time using this technology to enhance student learning.