Aims:

The main aims of this project were to:

• implement and evaluate the new text analysis tool (Quantext) in real classroom settings as a tool for:
  • teacher development and reflection 
  • providing timely, formative feedback to students, especially in large-class settings.
• evaluate the utility of the mechanism employed to develop this software. That is, a public-private partnership between New Zealand tertiary institutions and a social enterprise dedicated to supporting educational software innovation and development.

Methodology:

This project used a mixed-method approach to data collection and analysis.

• Teachers and staff from a wide range of contexts across four New Zealand tertiary institutions were recruited to pilot Quantext in ways that are meaningful for them. Each of these contexts makes up an individual case-study.
• Introductory workshops were held with the teachers who then asked their students formative, open-ended questions, or used existing short-form student writing, to analyse with Quantext. Reflections from teachers, staff and in some cases students, who used Quantext, along with the analysed text data made up the dataset for each case-study.
• Throughout the pilot study, Quantext was updated and where possible, additional prototype tools were incorporated in response to feedback from pilot participants.
• Towards the end of each case-study there were individual or focus group sessions with all teacher participants to provide summaries of the key teaching and learning insights they had gained along with potential issues faced and opportunities for improvement.