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Unwrapping the Literature on the Impact of Exam Wrappers

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Who We Are

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Dr. Heather Maness

Assistant Director, Learning Analytics & Assessment, University of Florida

Dr. Deb Hokien

Associate Dean, College of Liberal Arts & Sciences, Kutztown University

Dr. Rebecca Gibbons

Director of Disciplinary and Institutional Accreditation, �Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University

Dr. Bryant Hutson

Director of Assessment, �University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

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Goals

  1. Use Assessment Findings to Increase Equity
  2. Make Visible and Actionable Findings to Drive Innovation
  3. Use Assessment for Rapid Pedagogical Improvements

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Poll: Who Are You?

1) What is your primary “roll”?

  1. Assessment Practitioner
  2. Student Affairs Staff
  3. Other Professional Staff
  4. Faculty/Educator
  5. Senior Administrator
  6. Other

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2) How familiar are you with Exam wrappers?

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GCA Goal 3

  • Improve measurement of student learning over time
  • Increase the use of assessment to guide rapid and equitable improvements in learning

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Use Assessment Findings to Drive Rapid and Equitable Improvements in Pedagogy

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Rapid = during a learning experience

(semester/quarter/course)

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Today’s Outcomes

  • Summarize the implications of variations in exam wrapper implementation in the research literature
  • Recognize the role of explicit metacognitive instruction alongside key elements of exam wrappers for enhanced learning outcomes

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Exam wrapper definition (Lovett)

  1. Reviewing preparation approaches and estimations of performance
  2. Analyzing successes, errors, strategy effectiveness, and knowledge gaps
  3. Setting specific goals and plans for the next assessment

Wrapper Protocol (Lovett, 2013)

  1. Pre-exam prep reflection
  2. Post-exam performance eval
  3. Post-exam goal setting
  4. Passback to students (most often skipped)

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Equity Accelerator analogy: �“Triple Decker Sandwich”

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Self Efficacy & �Self-Regulated Learning

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Self Efficacy

Why It Matters:

  • Drives motivation and effort
  • Influences persistence after setbacks
  • Shapes use of learning strategies

Key Characteristics:

  • Context-specific – can vary by course or task
  • Malleable – can be strengthened through experience and feedback

Developed Through:

  • Mastery experiences (succeeding at tasks)
  • Observing peers (social modeling)
  • Encouraging feedback from instructors (verbal persuasion)
  • Managing stress/anxiety (physiological interpretation)

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Exam Wrappers' Role:

Promote self-efficacy by encouraging students to:

  • analyze their preparation,
  • reflect on results, and
  • focus on learning process

A student’s belief in their ability to succeed in specific academic situations (Bandura, 1977)

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Self-Regulated

Learning (SRL)

  • Promotes deeper engagement and academic achievement
  • Helps students adapt strategies to improve performance

Why It Matters:

  • Forethought: goal-setting and planning
  • Actions: using strategies and monitoring progress
  • Self-reflection: evaluating effectiveness and adjusting

Core Components:

Challenges:

  • Many students enter college with weak SRL skills or overestimate them
  • Without support, students may struggle to evaluate or improve their strategies

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  • Scaffold SRL by guiding students to:
    • Reflect on how they studied
    • Analyze mistakes and strategy effectiveness
    • Plan concrete changes for future assessments
  • Effects are strongest when combined with metacognitive training

Exam Wrappers' Role:

The process by which students actively manage their own learning through planning, monitoring, and reflection (Zimmerman, 1990)

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Conceptual Model

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Self-efficacy

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Self-Regulated Learning

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Academic Environment/ Course Design

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Learning Gains

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Exam: Assessment OF learning

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Wrapper: Assessment

AS learning

Wrapper: Assessment

FOR learning

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Execution

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Variations in Exam Wrapper Implementation

  • Only 6 studies followed all 4 steps of Lovett’s protocol (missing passback)
    • In most studies, students completed exam wrappers and kept them
  • Most wrappers were only implemented after an exam (no pre-work)
    • Some were associated with in-class quizzes, writing activities, papers, etc.
  • # of wrappers & questions varied widely (and often not specified)
  • Grading criteria varied (and often unclear: what’s 10 points mean?)
  • Explicit SRL instruction varied (extensive ↔ brief & informal)
  • Peer review was occasionally included
  • ALL THE NAMES (more like descriptions)

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Is a hot dog a sandwich?

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Are the variations “exam wrappers”?

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Thoughts?

  1. What makes it an exam wrapper experience?
  2. Do you have any experience with these?
    • Exam wrappers
    • Test corrections
    • Reflection/metacognition assignments
    • Test prep content

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Small Group Discussion (5-8 min)

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Our Distilled �Key Ingredients

  1. Bread/structure (experience framing): �self-reflecting on assessment preparation1 or goal-setting3
  2. Protein/filling (sustenance for growth): �self-evaluating the effectiveness and weaknesses/errors on assessment performance2

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Our Structured Review

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Review Methodology

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Full paper: Intersection (v6 i1)

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Trends and Variations

  • Primarily STEM courses
  • Research Design:
  • Majority quantitative studies (16); Mixed methods (10); Qual (4)
  • Descriptive (14), Quasi-Experimental (13),

Randomized Control (5)

  • Implementation:

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Element

Variation noted

# of wrappers

Range = 1-16, Mean = 3.6

# of Qs per wrapper

Range = 2-30, Mean = 7.2

SRL Instruction

Less than half (13/30)

Timing

Post-exam (19), Pre-exam (1), Both (8)

Grading

Extra Credit (9), Graded (8), None (3), Unknown (9)

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Non-Academic Impact Summary: Positive

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Context (16 studies)

Positive Impact or Outcome

Biology, Computer Science, Engineering, Nursing, Physiology, Statistics (7)

Effective study strategies/aids use

Chemistry, Computer Science, Psychology (4)

Positive perception of wrappers

Psychology, Statistics, STEM [Biology, Chemistry, Calculus, Statistics] (4)

Metacognitive ability*

*Only non-1st yrs (1 STEM study)

Chemistry (1)

Self-Efficacy

Spanish, STEM [Chemistry, Calculus, Statistics] (2)

Self-Regulated Learning

Biology, Math (2)

Monitoring Accuracy

Chemistry, Engineering, Psychology, Statistics (4)

Exam Affect/Confidence/ Competence

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Non-Academic Impact Summary: Negative or No Impact

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Context (6 studies)

Impact

Biology (1)

No impact on accurate prediction

Chemistry (1)

No impact on conceptual understanding or problem-solving

Chemistry (1)

No impact on active study strategies

Biology, Psychology (2)

No impact on metacognitive ability

Biology (1)

Negative on self-efficacy

(same study saw a positive effect in Chem)

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Academic Performance Impact Summary: Positive Impacts

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Context (14 studies)

Impact

Biology, Business, Chemistry, Computer Science, Criminology, Mathematics, Nursing, Physiology, Psychology, STEM [General], Social Sciences (11)

Higher exam or assignment scores �(1 study also tracked a specific item for higher % correct)

Chemistry, Statistics, STEM [Biology, Chemistry, Mathematics] (4)

Higher course grade

Chemistry (2)

  • Withdrawal rates decreased by 8%
  • More likely to withdraw from course, but did so earlier in the semester

Mathematics (1)

Higher pass rate on standardized test

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Academic Performance Impact Summary: Varied Impacts on Different Groups

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Context (12 studies)

Positive Impact or Outcome

Biology, Business, Engineering, Food Science, Genetics, Math, Psychology (9)

Exam scores -

  • Gain only for Bio students w/ low incoming standardized test scores
  • Gain only for ENG students w/ higher quality reflections or mistake decrease
  • Higher future exam scores only for middling students in Food Science
  • Gain only for Genetics students who stopped overpredicting their score
  • More benefit for those receiving 1:1 SRL help, struggling, more frequent self-reflectors & those who value critical thinking (Bio, Bus, Math, & SocPsych)

Biology, Statistics (2)

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Final grades -

  • Increase only for actual use of reasonable, planned resources
  • Self-reported grade improvement from new study techniques

STEM (1)

Cumulative GPA increased for males but not for females

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Academic Performance Impact Summary: Negative or No Impact

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Context (10 studies)

Impact

Biology, Computer Science, Pharmacy [Prof], Psychology, Spanish, VetMed [Prof] (7)

No impact on exam scores

Chemistry, Genetics, Spanish, VetMed [Prof] (4)

No impact on final grade

Biology (1)

Negative impact on final grade

(same study saw no effect in Chem)

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Conclusions:

From crumbs  to a recipe for success

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Key Impact Studies

Study [et al.]

Wrapper (Wr) Design

Study Design

Results

Angell (2024)

Lovett 1-3; 3 Wr, 10-15 Q, Pre;

No SRL; Required, 3-5%/exam grade for thorough completion

Quant. – Quasi.

Bio (N = 233)

⇀ Moderate exam score inc. (for lower SAT/ACT)

⟳ Exam prediction accuracy

Chen (2017)

Lovett 1-3; 4 Wr, ~8 Q, Both;

SRL activity; Extra credit

Quant. – RCT

Stats (S1 N = 178, S2 N = 203)

↑ Final grades (4% to 10% w/ 2Wr)

↑ Grade if used planned resource

LaCaille (2019)

Lovett 1-3; 16 Wr, 13 Q, Post;

Yes SRL; Extra credit

Quant. – Quasi.

Psych (N = 244, Interv. = 123)

↑ Quiz and exam scores

Mutambuki (2020)

Lovett 1-3; 2 Wr, 2 Q, Post;

Yes SRL; Grading?

Quant. – Quasi.

Chem (N = 427, interv. = 239)

↑ Exam 3 and final scores

↓ Withdrawal rates

Rosales (2019)

Lovett 1-3; 4 Wr, 3-5 Q, Post;

Study tips; In-class, Grading?

Quant. – Quasi.

Chem (N = 154, interv. = 71)

↑ Final exam & course grades

↑ Withdrawal (vs failure) rates

⟳ Active study strategies

Stephenson (2017)

Lovett 1-4; 1 Wr, 6-8 Q, Post;

Brief SRL; Voluntary, 3%/exam

Quant. – S1= Quasi. S2 = RCT

CompSci (N = 289; S2 N = 752)

⟳ Final exam score

↑ Skill-building intentions

Zimmerman (2011)

Lovett 1-2; 4 Wr, 7-10 Q, Post;

Yes, hvy SRL; Voluntary, Extra Cr

Quant. – RCT

Math (N = 496)

↑ Exam Performance (>Wr = ↑↑)

↑ Standardized test scores

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Implications: Instructors

  • Teach students how to “think about thinking” & get buy-in
    • Slide deck e.g. in Mutambuki et al. (2020) https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jchemed.0c00254
    • Resource-infused prompts (& adapt resources to course/uni)
  • Incorporate peer-peer interaction (and expert feedback)
  • Reward good practice
  • Think: Triple Decker Dagwood or White Castle (not 1 & done)

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Template in Canvas Commons

Google doc direct link:

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Implications: Assessment Scholars

  • Increase rigor in future research design (e.g. RCT);
  • Evaluate student reflection quality (& plan adherence);
  • Document implementation fidelity �(Lovett alignment, variations, participation);
  • Detail pedagogical context;
  • Expand non-STEM studies; &
  • Investigate long-term behavior change

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Don’t just add an exam wrapper, be a hero!

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(and spread the word!)

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Discussion & Questions

  • How can you apply this to your context?
  • Are there elements you are considering adding to your previous activities?
  • Do you have some specific action steps?

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