Impact of Performance Level and Group Composition on Student Learning during Collaborative Exams

Collaborative exams have shown promise for improving student learning in computing. Prior studies have focused on benefits for all students, whereas this study seeks to refine our understanding of which students benefit and how group composition impacts that benefit. Using a crossover experimental design, the study first investigates whether students from differing performance levels (low, medium, or high) benefit from the collaborative exam. We find that students in the middle of the class (neither high nor low performers) tend to benefit strongly from the collaborative exam. Second, we explore whether group composition based on performance levels impacts the performance of members of the group. The results suggest more homogeneous groups (i.e., students in the group are at similar performance levels) are beneficial whereas students in groups with high heterogeneity do not experience significant performance differences between the pre-test and post-test.