Reflections on, and suggestions for, class participation: A perspective from a student and teaching assistant
Any business student (and increasingly, those of other majors) would be familiar with “class participation” or “class part” as some of us say for short.
The ability to contribute to discussions in class (by answering questions or asking good ones) occupies a not insignificant percentage of one’s grade in the modern business school curriculum, and appears in most, if not all, courses at both business schools I attended.
Some justifications for including this component are that such skills — speaking, critical thinking, discussing with others— are important, even necessary, in the modern workforce. For the students, it could introduce different perspectives and experiences from others, contributing to richer knowledge gained by everyone. Pedagogically, it could likely make the class more engaging. Having to prepare in advance could also spur pre-class learning, enhacing the student’s education in general (if flipped classrooms are to be believed). To be sure, these are good things, and making it part of a student’s grade naturally incentivises increased participation.
Still, class participation is not a simple affair. It can get messy. What questions should be asked? How long should a student speak and how should the discussion evolve and be facilitated, or move on to the next agenda item? How should the discussion be managed, even encouraged, beyond one-question-and-one-answer? How should it be integrated with the other parts of class — specifically, the traditional function of transferring knowledge? How can students be encouraged to participate? Should we grade it? How does one student’s participation affect another’s?
Socially, class participation can generate negative feelings among students, especially if class participation is graded on a bell curve, and/or due to peer comparison effects. From a ‘societal’ perspective (the ‘society’ being the class), it’s also important to get the dynamics right, since it could stifle participation from some, or induce less than optimal ones from others.
At the same time, ideally, one would hope that the distribution of class participation is fair. I don’t mean that each student should speak the same amount of time for each question. The fact that students have diverse backgrounds and experiences mean that some have more (relevant) things to share for each question (this itself would vary from question to question). Still, it is unlikely that any one person has absolutely nothing to share, and yet, most classes I have attended have seen some form of the 80–20 rule in action: only the same 20% of students (probably myself included) contributing to 80% of the aggregate class participation.
(How) Should class participation be graded?
But before I consider how class participation is affected by grades, should it even be graded in the first place? Before university, there was no such component in my primary school, secondary school or junior college, at least during my time. Of course, students were allowed, even encouraged, to ask questions, clarify or provide their input, but those were always on an as-needed, voluntaristic or altrusitic (one can ask questions individually outside of class and hence, one may choose to ask in class to benefit others’ learning) basis.
Overall, given the benefits for students’ personal development and the class learning described above, class participation is, at least conceptually, beneficial, on balance and if managed well. Of course, purists who value learning for learning’s sake argue that such incentives risk participation for the wrong reasons, and the incentives themselves may cultivate less than optimal types of participation (see below).
Still, I would say that incentives do matter, as in other aspects in life. Without them, a student with a valuable insight may not want to share, simply because there is no tangible and certain upside in the near term, which is where most students operate. The issue is to develop the right incentives and rules of the game to elicit optimal participation.
More generally, if skills related to class participation are valued in the modern workforce, and school is meant to educate and develop future workers, grading would provide a necessary and useful reflection of a student’s skill in this area (see Spence’s signalling theory of education).
Then another question is what proportion of the grade should be allocated to class participation. From society’s perspective, if the goal is to educate future workers, and if skills related to participation is increasingly valued by firms and the modern economy, then it being an increasing proportion of the grade is justified.
Still, on a conceptual level, any proportion of any component class participation, midterms, finals, homework, presentations and/or reports) is arbitrary — in the sense that what society happens to value is arbitrary, and that different careers likely require different extent and intensity of class participation-derived skills — and, as such, will advantage and disadvantage different students, each with their own aptitude for each assessment type and career aspirations.
Grades as incentives
So if we have to make do with grades, how do they affect class participation? Of course, this incentive naturally means that students participate more, in quantitative terms, on balance.
In an ideal world, one would hope that other reasons prevail— the desire to share and gain diverse knowledge, critiquing and building on ideas, opinions, and experiences. The question is whether the more ‘mecernary’ and blunt incentive of grades, and the extrinsic motivation it engenders, especially when coupled with bell curve grading, affects the nature of the class participation, and introduces new downsides or mitigates the desired benefits.
It probably does: Extrinsic motivation can crowd out intrinsic motivation. In a well-known study by Gneezy & Rustichini (2000), introducing a monetary fine for parents picking up their children from kindergarten late, resulted in more late arrivals. By associating a task with extrinsic rewards or punishments, we change the considerations and thus, meaning and values associated with it. When it was the right thing for a parent to do for their kid, now it was a price to be paid. What was once meant for learning and perspective-taking has turned into a grade to be scored.
Similarily, it is not hard to imagine that because class participation is tied to grades, and is evaluated by the professor or teaching assistant, then the content and quantity of such participation may be warped to suit the assessor’s (perceived) preferences. If the teacher is opinionated, then opinions that risk not aligning (or even offending) the teacher, albeit potentially insightful, would be less contributed.
Peer comparison and the effect on quality
At the same time, class participation is a communal activity. This means peer comparison effects are at play, which are further aggravated if class participation is graded on a bell curve, transforming those relative differences (and perceptions thereof) into tangible gains and losses for the student.
This means that, in class participation, there is, as I have experienced and admittedly exercised myself, ‘escalation’, where students who want to perform well in class participation have to match one another. So, for example, if one student speaks 3 times in class, then a second student who wants to do well, but is worried he/she could be graded behind the first student, will strive to speak at least 3 times as well, or even more to be graded better, and the first student will then have to match this new high, escalating it further.
This is especially when there is uncertainty about whether there are more opportunities to participate later in the class, and even then, one might be worried about having nothing to say. Some classes in which discussions are scheduled in the later part might drop those discussions due to time constraints (as I can attest, actual lessons tend to take more time than plans or agendas at the beginning predict).
Practically, the ‘escalation’ also means class progress is slower since there are potentially ‘unlimited’ answers; even if the contributions are value-adding, the class has to go on; after all, any topic has a wealth of information and perspectives which could take years to discuss!
I personally don’t agree with or like this bell-curve system, because, at least based on personal experience, places too much unnecessary pressure on students, and seems to result in more quantity over quality.
This is even when quality is explicitly stated to be assessed, since its subjective nature means that students can never be sure whether their participation is of high or low quality. And so, one student might simply maximize their participation counts in hopes that some of them sticks. (Of course, this assumes that students don’t consider how the presence of low-quality participation might affect their overall evaluation — a potential dilution effect)
This pressure may also result in some less-than-courteous behavior among students. Some students might speak up without having raised their hands or be called upon, because they are worried that what they wanted to say would be said first by others, or that they would not be called upon given time constraints.
At the same time, even without such rudeness, there are social costs from what can be perceived to be ‘too much’ participation, especially when you add the grading component. An enthusiastic student can be seen to be showing off, or blocking others from participating, inviting backlash and animosity from her fellow coursemates. Thus, for example, in my university, there are some not-so-nice terms used to describe those who participate a lot. More importantly, this could also deter or discourage valuable participation from others.
Suggestions
To address these concerns, I provide some suggestions which may help balance participation from those who are eager to share, but at the same time cultivate a conducive environment such that all students feel comfortable to participate, while ensuring that the class progresses smoothly and that contributions are actually of good quality and value-adding.
One idea would be to assess class participation (and clearly communicate to the class this requirement) against a fixed target, meaning there is a certain ‘target’ for each student to reach to count as having fulfilled all the class participation points for that one lesson (maybe one contribution per hour per student).
This should be explicitly stated as a hard limit, meaning, for example, students must not speak more than 3 times per class. This avoids ‘escalation’, and since each person is limited to only 3 times, less participative students would be less deterred by the more enthusiastic students in answering future questions. (Of course, if these other students don’t participate, then perhaps the professor has to cold-call, or specifically open up the floor to anyone who wants to speak, even if they had already spoken 3 times).
But one potential problem is abuse (i.e. speaking for the sake of speaking the 3 times, since the target is now known). If so, perhaps it needs to be stressed an additional requirement — the quality of contribution matters — in that it must answer the question or value-add something else.
(One potential check for quality is that students need to contribute something new, compared to what had been said, although this might be unfair, since those who go first — benefitting students with ‘fast hands’ or minds — would have the advantage of having more things to say, while later students would have more limited things to share.
A possible solution to address this unfairness is to suggest that the next student can give an example or elaboration if they had the same point — which would likely be different and difficult to copy— while across questions, the order of students prioritises those who have not spoken up first in the previous bout of class participation.)
On the other hand, for the more enthusiastic students who tend to participate more, when there is a hard limit and quality is graded, then the content of their contributions would be improved as well, since they would be driven to share only their most high-quality answers for their limited 3 contributions. This would benefit the class’s knowledge overall. (Of course, practically, this may involve the student having to predict which questions would arise and thus whether to ‘use’ their quota on a particular question, though I would think, in practice, the difference is marginal and of minimal concern.)
Furthermore, if we are just interested in ensuring good contributions are shared with the class, not just the skill in speaking up (why must they be assessed together?), then we can implement another channel which separates the two. Vocal class participation assesses for both, but why should students who can do well in the former be penalized for the latter?
Hence, one suggestion is to use online forums (and/or the Chat function for online classes). This less direct medium of communication may elicit more participation from less naturally open students, while allowing those who have spoken up frequently, but still have content to share for altrusitic reasons, to contribute (again, it should be made clear that for such students, these secondary contributions will not be taken into account, lest we risk another escalation.)
Conclusion
In short, it seems that class participation is here to stay for now. And that’s a good thing in principle.
Still, in practice, we need to ensure it is managed and faciliated in such a way as to maximize its benefits with mitigating its disadvantages. Having a hard limit and stressing quality are some suggestions which might improve the process. If so, professors, students, and teaching assistants too, can look forward to engaging and value-adding participation in class.
