An Investigation of a Joyful Peer Response System: High Ability vs. Low Ability

Abstract

Existing peer response approaches majorly take place in traditional educational contexts, where students may not be highly motivated. On the other hand, game-based learning takes a joyful way to enhance students’ motivation. Accordingly, we propose a joyful peer response (JPR), where game-based learning and peer response are integrated together. Furthermore, two empirical studies were conducted to investigate how high- and low-ability students perform in the JPR and how their perceptions are associated with their performance. Regarding the former, the findings suggest that the JPR is beneficial to high- and low-ability students. Regarding the latter, the findings imply that the writing performance of the high-ability students is majorly related to their perceptions of game elements. On the other hand, the writing performance of the low-ability students is related to their perceptions of both game elements and peer response.