The Cambridge Open-Review Educational Research e-Journal (CORERJ)

Instructions for open reviewing

corerj

September 24, 2014

¶ 1 Leave a comment on paragraph 1 0 Dear Open Reviewer,

¶ 2 Leave a comment on paragraph 2 0 Thank you for your interest in reviewing prospective CORERJ articles for Volume 6 to be published in 2019. The papers which you are about to review have undergone an initial peer-review review phase to determine their suitability for publication. Most papers that pass this first stage are expected to be published. Papers will be open for comments until 9th of August 2019.

¶ 3 Leave a comment on paragraph 3 0 As an open reviewer, we invite you to comment on the paper and provide feedback to the author in terms of how the material can be further improved. You may comment on as many papers as you like; write as much or as little you wish; and leave general comments about an article or on individual paragraphs. Some general questions you may wish to ask yourself whilst reading a paper are: How can this article be improved? What are its strengths? What are its weaknesses? (See the guidelines below for further suggestions). We also encourage you to engage in a dialogue with other open reviewers and/or the author, such as raising or answering questions and commenting on another reviewer’s remarks. The opportunity to engage and participate in these discussions is the unique part of the open-reviewing phase, so we hope that you’ll take full advantage of it. (Please note that the full commenting function is currently unavailable in Chrome. We recommend using Firefox, Internet Explorer or another browser when commenting.)

¶ 4 Leave a comment on paragraph 4 0 Please also be mindful when commenting. Whilst the purpose is to provide suggestions for improvement and critical feedback, it is important to deliver comments in a respectful manner. Comments should not single out individuals or be degrading, derogatory, demeaning, or discriminatory in any form. If you are hesitant about what you’re thinking of posting, you may wish to consider having someone else read your comments to get a second opinion. Don’t forget that pointing out good things about a paper is also helpful and encouraging for the author.

¶ 5 Leave a comment on paragraph 5 0 Please familiarise yourself with the policies and guidelines below before open reviewing. Thank you once more and we wish you an enjoyable open-reviewing experience!

¶ 6 Leave a comment on paragraph 6 0 POLICIES

¶ 7 Leave a comment on paragraph 7 0 To comment, you must use your full name (which will be publicly displayed) and provide an email addresses (this will not be made public, but is necessary should the journal editor need to contact you). By submitting a comment, you agree that your name and words will be shared publicly under the Creative Commons license for this website. Any inappropriate, degrading, derogatory, demeaning, or discriminatory comments made will be removed. Should comments with such content continue to be made, one warning message will be given before the open reviewer’s rights are revoked to further comment on this website.

¶ 8 Leave a comment on paragraph 8 0 GUIDELINES

¶ 9 Leave a comment on paragraph 9 0 In addition to addressing general questions mentioned in the instructions (i.e., How can this article be improved? What are its strengths? What are its weaknesses?), the following are some suggested criteria you may wish to consider when reviewing a paper:

• ¶ 10 Leave a comment on paragraph 10 0
• Sophistication of the argument (e.g., topic area was problematised; discussion had an obvious structure, moving from a general to more focused theme(s), ideas were clearly/fully developed, circular reasoning was not used etc.)
• Appropriate methodology (e.g., clear justification of why the methodology was chosen over alternative approaches)
• Clear, defined objectives and aims (e.g., hypotheses/ research questions/objectives were  stated)
• Valid conclusions (e.g., claims were supported with evidence/references made to the literature)
• Clear, coherent text (e.g., main ideas were obvious/understandable and presented in a logical, easy-to-follow manner; main themes were repeated/summarised; ideas were not “out-of-the-blue” i.e., they develop from out of the discussion)
• Context specific or specialist terminology defined (Could someone from a different educational area understand the paper with relatively little difficulty?)
• Appropriate reference to relevant published literature (e.g., major theoretical or empirical work in the field has not been omitted)
• Title of the paper reflected the study/central theme(s)
• Little to no grammar/spelling mistakes
• From what you can tell, no material included in the submission was copyrighted (e.g. scanned material from books or copied off the internet) or plagiarised
• All figures and tables (and any appendices) have suitable titles

¶ 11 Leave a comment on paragraph 11 0 If you have any questions or you would like to inquire about becoming a peer-review associate for CORERJ, please contact the Chief Editor at corerj@educ.cam.ac.uk.