Using Perusall

Dr. Keith Jones, 
Mathematics Department, 
SUNY Oneonta, 

About the Website

The website Perusall is designed to facilitate reading and discussion online. It provides a platform which integrates textbook (or other document) reading with annotations that spawn discussion threads. One reader can highlight a portion of the text and make a note or ask a question, and then any other readers in their group (which may be the whole class depending on how it is set up) can respond to that annotation, creating a discussion thread. Perusall supports scientific discussions through rather robust LaTeX support for equations. Its interface is pretty sleek and convenient. 

Instructors can upload whatever PDF documents they wish, and Perusall does a good job understanding the breakdown of the documents into chapters and sections and reflecting that in the interface. Additionally, they have a large library of freely available OER textbooks, and they partner with a number of publishers to make digital versions of textbooks available through the site at normal digital pricing. 

Perusall also supports a relatively robust automatic grading system when at least 15 students are participating, based on measurements of quantity, quality, and consistency of contributions. I am not actually using the automatic grading, so I won’t speak to it. 

Social Reading…I missed the boat on Perusall - Greg Kulowiec - Medium

My Experience

I began using Perusall with my Calculus classes this semester, and I have had very mixed results. It has been difficult to get students to engage with this interface despite the fact that it is part of their grade. Ironically, since we made the switch to online, the Calculus students are using it less frequently. So, for those classes, it has not been a success story. However, I am mentioning it here because when I switched my Discrete Mathematics class to online, I placed my PDF notes on Perusall and a portion of their graded work which was no longer feasible in-person became implemented through Perusall discussion. Most of the students in this class took to Perusall quickly, and the students have been having very healthy and helpful discussions about the mathematics they’re studying. I’ve been very impressed! There are a variety of venues for the students to communicate with each other, including during class-time video conferencing, through Blackboard Discussion Boards, and through Perusall. The students have been very reticent during videoconferencing, and only use the Discussion Boards as much as needed to satisfy the letter of my grading requirements, if not the spirit. The Perusall discussions have really stood out as a place where the students are discussing the problems they are working through. It had not occurred to me to use Perusall with this course before, but now I plan to use it even in the face-to-face implementation of this class. I believe with the right buy-in, this tool can successfully help students in most classes have discussions that lead to better understanding of, and better progress with, the material. 

This is part of a series of posts collected by the TLTC and Faculty Center to share ideas and tools that have been helpful in the shift is teaching during the Spring 2020 semester.  If you are interested in sharing either a tool that you have found very useful or a method that you are now using in your courses, we would love to hear from you. Send your video or brief description to Chilton Reynolds and we will post it as a part of this series. 


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