Evaluation of academic behavior in high school biology with online form-styled homework

Internet-based technologies are now a common resource used by young students worldwide. Despite the numerous reports regarding the possible negative effects of such tools on the individual behavior and health, schools and professors are now faced with the opportunity of applying novel strategies to improve alumni assessment throughout high school and college courses. Here, an online form-based tool was applied to evaluate student learning throughout a high school biology course (18 weeks). Parameters such as date and hour of delivery, average score and frequency of completion were automatically obtained and then analyzed to draw a perspective on student behavior towards online assessment tools. Results indicate that students are most likely (~ 65% of assignment completions) to finish their homework in the two days prior to the deadline. Also, these tools seem not to correlate with late hour smartphone/computer use, as indicated by the submission hours (2-10 p.m.). Finally, a small positive correlation (R2 = 0.2620) was observed between completion frequency and average homework score. These results suggest the possibility of using online tools to improve student engagement in high school courses. Future studies would benefit from exploring the correlation between participation frequency and student test scores.