Create
To add a Peer & Self Evaluation activity to your design, just drag and drop the activity in the authoring canvas and double click on it to set it up.
Peer & Self Evaluation Content
Title
Defines the name of the activity as seen by students. Use a clear and meaningful title, e.g. “Team Contribution Evaluation”.
Instructions
Provide guidance to students on how to complete the evaluation.
This is critical to ensure students:
Understand the criteria
Know what is expected
Provide constructive and honest feedback
Rating Criteria
This is the core of the activity, where you define how students will evaluate peers and themselves. You can add multiple criteria using different evaluation methods.
There are 5 different evaluation types you can use:
Star rating (Likert scale)
Ranking
Hedging (Point Allocation)
Comments (Qualitative)
Rubrics
Educational Value of Peer Evaluation (Tips for Effective Use)
Make the self-evaluation component explicit Encourage students to honestly reflect on their own contribution, not just rate others
Discuss discrepancies openly Differences between self and peer ratings can spark valuable discussion and insight
Use clear, behaviour-based criteria Focus on observable aspects like preparation, participation, and collaboration
Start simple Begin with rating scales, then introduce more nuanced or hybrid approaches
Encourage constructive feedback Provide guidance on how to give specific, actionable comments
Consider anonymity where appropriate This can improve honesty in peer ratings
Use results as a learning opportunity Highlight patterns such as:
Overestimation or underestimation of self-performance
Strong or weak team dynamics
Apply it consistently across activities This builds trust, fairness, and student confidence in the process
Star rating (Likert scale)
Allows students to rate peers using a scale (e.g. 1–5 stars).
Ideal for quick, intuitive evaluations.
Options:
Criterion name: Define what is being evaluated (e.g. Participation, Preparation)
Minimum number of ratings: Require a minimum number of peers to rate
Maximum number of ratings: Limit how many peers can be rated
Allow students to comment on other students: Adds a qualitative feedback layer alongside the rating
Use when: You want a simple and scalable evaluation method, especially for large cohorts.
Ranking
Students rank peers relative to one another (e.g. best to least contribution).
Options:
Criterion name: e.g. Overall contribution
Rank limit:
ALL: Rank all peers
Or limit ranking to a subset
Use when: You want to force differentiation between students.
Hedging (Point Allocation)
Students allocate a fixed number of marks across peers, based on contribution.
This is one of the most powerful accountability mechanisms.
Options:
Criterion name
Hedge mark: Total points available (e.g. 100)
Scale:
Total: Distribute points across the whole group
Per student in group: Allocate points individually
Ask for justification:
Require students to explain their allocation
Minimum words in justification:
Enforces depth and quality of reflection
Use when: You need clear differentiation and accountability, especially in graded group work.
Comments (Qualitative)
Students provide written feedback on peers.
Options:
Minimum / maximum number of comments
Minimum word count:
Encourages meaningful and detailed feedback
Use when: You want to develop reflection and feedback skills.
Rubrics
Allows you to define structured, criteria-based evaluation grids.
Options:
Max score: Defines the scoring range
Column headers: Performance levels (e.g. Poor → Excellent)
Row headers: Criteria (e.g. Communication, Collaboration)
Column content: Descriptions for each level
Use when: You need clear, standardised, and transparent evaluation criteria.
Advanced Settings
Review Options (Feedback after completion)
Control what students can see after completing the evaluation.
Feedback they provided
Students can review their own submitted evaluations
Feedback they received
Students can see how peers evaluated them
Maximum number of reviews
Limits how many evaluations a student can complete
Particularly relevant for Star Rating criteria
Self Assessment
Allow self review
Enables self-evaluation using the same criteria as peer evaluation
This is a key feature, as it:
Encourages reflection
Allows comparison between self-perception and peer perception
SPA & SAPA Factors
When you use Peer & Self Evaluation, LAMS can generate SPA and SAPA factors to help you interpret results in a fair, structured, and meaningful way.
The SPA factor is a fairness adjustment score that reflects how much each team member contributed to a group task, based on the ratings given by their peers and their own self-assessment.
The SAPA factor compares how a student rates themselves versus how their peers rate them.
What is the SPA Factor? (Student Performance Adjustment)
The SPA factor is a fairness adjustment score that reflects how much each student contributed to the group, based on:
Peer ratings
Self-evaluation
The overall distribution of scores within the team
What does it actually do?
It helps you:
Differentiate individual contribution within group work
Adjust marks fairly, so stronger contributors are recognised
Identify under- or over-contributors
How to interpret it
SPA > 1.0 → The student contributed more than the team average
SPA = 1.0 → The student contributed at the expected level
SPA < 1.0 → The student contributed less than the team average
In practice, you can use SPA to scale individual grades from a group mark.
Why it matters
Without SPA, group work often leads to:
Free-riding
Unfair grade distribution
With SPA, you introduce accountability and fairness, making contributions visible and measurable.
What is the SAPA Factor? (Self vs Peer Assessment Alignment)
The SAPA factor compares:
How a student rates themselves vs how their peers rate them
What does it reveal?
It gives you insight into a student’s self-awareness and perception accuracy.
How to interpret it
SAPA ≈ 1.0 → The student’s self-assessment is aligned with peer perception
SAPA > 1.0 → The student rates themselves higher than their peers do
SAPA < 1.0 → The student rates themselves lower than their peers do
Why it matters
SAPA helps you identify:
Overconfidence (inflated self-perception)
Underconfidence (students undervaluing their contribution)
Mismatch in perception, which can indicate:
Lack of awareness
Communication issues within the team
Misunderstanding of expectations
SPA vs SAPA , What’s the difference?
SPA = Contribution (fairness and grading)
SAPA = Self-awareness (reflection and development)
👉 Think of it this way:
SPA tells you “how much did this student contribute?”
SAPA tells you “how accurately does this student understand their own contribution?”
How you can use these in your teaching
Use SPA to:
Adjust individual marks in group assessments
Identify imbalanced team contributions
Support fair grading decisions
Use SAPA to:
Prompt reflective discussions
Develop professional self-awareness
Identify students who may need:
Feedback on expectations
Support with confidence or engagement
Rubrics Settings (Advanced)
Student rubrics view
Defines how students see rubric evaluations (e.g. by student)
Require evaluation for all peers
Prevents students from skipping evaluations
Add in-between columns in rubrics
Adds more granular performance levels, improving clarity and consistency
End of Activity
Lock when finished
Prevents students from editing their evaluations after submission
Important for maintaining assessment integrity
Learning Outcomes
Mapping learning outcomes to activities is very useful for curriculum mapping.
As with all activities in LAMS, you can map your learning outcomes to this activity. If you want to add a learning outcome, just search for the particular outcome or type a new one it will be added to your list of learning outcomes for the future.
You can search Learning Outcomes by code or name.
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