When Syllabi and Discussion Boards Fail, Try Group Annotations
Presented by:
Evy Wright, West Virginia University
Keywords:
Syllabus, Online Discussion Boards, Group Annotations
Hear it from the author:
Transcript:
Hi, my name is Evy Wright. I teach quite a few online courses, and they were all handed to me with discussion board assignments. In my experience, both as a student and as a professor, online discussion boards do not lead to the quality of interaction that benefits student learning. I started researching alternatives and decided to try group annotations, also known as social annotations. I can upload any document or website and ask students to engage with the text by highlighting portions and responding in writing to carefully designed prompts. Students are also asked to respond to each other. I’ve used two group annotation platforms, Perusall and Harmonize. My poster walks you through the main points of my process in using group annotations. What’s not on the poster are some of my personal findings. These include that students will report an initial learning curve for using group annotation platforms, but the necessity for individual instruction from me in how to use them is minimal. (I had to help 1-2 students out of 80 the first semester I used Perusall.) Engagement with group annotation assignments was high, with over 90% of students completing all Perusall assignments in Spring 2025. Keep in mind that this rate was present despite late work on group annotations not being permitted. Additionally, students report that group annotations better mimic an in-class discussion than do traditional online discussion boards.
Enjoy my poster, and come talk to me about it!
Key Statement:
Students often overlook syllabi, and discussion boards may yield limited engagement. Group annotations with powerful prompts garner meaningful student participation.
Abstract:
Discussion boards may yield limited engagement in online courses, and students often do not find them useful. Group annotation platforms such as Perusall and Harmonize allow instructors to upload documents for collaborative review. Students highlight sections of a document, adding commentary that all group members can see and respond to. Breaking students into small groups and assigning annotations with targeted prompts improves student engagement with course concepts, reading comprehension, and knowledge construction. Using syllabus annotation as an initial low-stakes assignment introduces students to the technology while encouraging meaningful engagement with the course syllabus.
Outcomes:
1. Define group annotation and explain how platforms like Perusall support collaboration.
2. Create targeted prompts that promote meaningful engagement with course materials.
3. Evaluate student engagement in group annotations as evidence of participation and understanding.
References:
de Oliveira Neto, F. G., & Dobslaw, F. (2024). Building collaborative learning: Exploring social annotation in introductory programming. Proceedings of the 46th International Conference on Software Engineering: Software Engineering Education and Training (pp. 12-21). https://doi.org/10.1145/3639474.3640063
Morales, E., Kalir, J. H., Fleerackers, A., & Alperin, J. P. (2022). Using social annotation to construct knowledge with others: A case study across undergraduate courses. F1000Research, 11(235), 1-21. https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.109525.2
Tuiloma, S. H., Arnesen, K. T., Guo, Q., West, R. E., & Graham, C. R. (2025). Promoting active learning through collaborative annotation tools. The Journal of Applied Instructional Design, 14(4). https://doi.org/10.59668/2224.22361