Analysing peer feedback in asynchronous online discussions: A case study

Peer feedback is referred to as comments provided by one student to another with the intention to aid their peers’ progress in learning. The responses or feedback provided by peers has been recognised as an integral part of the learning process in online learning environments. However, the research on using peer feedback to stimulate students’ higher level of thinking, especially at the secondary school level, in asynchronous online discussions is rather limited. Hence, this is a gap that the researcher attempts to address in this study. A case study was conducted among Economics students from an all-girls high school located at the northern part of Malaysia. The findings show that the most common type of feedback provided by students in the four AODs was categorised at cognitive dimension, with the affective and the metacognitive dimensions following behind. Even though most of the students had positive perceptions toward peer feedback of their learning in AODs, the findings show that there was a lack of constructive feedback found in AOD forums. Therefore, based on the findings of this study, some recommendations for future research have been proposed.