Feedback
Feed-forward
Elaine Payne
Assistant Director, Higher Education Academy
October 2010
The Higher Education
Academy
To support the sector in providing
the best possible learning
experience for all students
Subject Network
24 Subject
centres
- Changes –
Elite 10% of students
Diversity
Students – holiday work
Work during study
Enhanced professionalism
Complex operating environment
Student contributions
Variety of motivations
Customers, consumers
74% - improved job prospects
60% - improved salary prospects
Source:
survey 2008
Members … of
an Sodexho
academic
community
29% - for
experience
Co-creators
of the
knowledge
Source: NUS student experience survey 2008
What do students think?
2010 National Student Survey
83% - satisfied with
teaching
82
Source: National Student Survey 2010 (Northern Ireland)
61% - satisfied with
assessment
66
and feedback
Source: National Student Survey 2010 (Northern Ireland)
! Assessment is important !
Assessment defines what students
regard as important, how they
spend their time and how they
come to see themselves as
students and graduates
(Brown and Knight, 1994, p. 12)
Assessment - what is it for?
Encompass
Summative
assessmentcertification.
Formative
assessment learning
Attend to
Substantive
content
Learning process
Focus on
Immediate task
Life long learning
Assessment shapes learning
NSS Results
Northern Ireland
Assessment and Feedback
2009 2010
The criteria used in marking have
been made clear in advance
69
70
Assessment arrangements and
marking have been fair
Feedback on my work has been
prompt
I have received detailed comments
on my work
Feedback on my work has helped me
clarify things I did not understand
72
72
53
55
54
55
53
54
Staff comments
They often don’t even collect their
essays…..Some of them are more ready to
argue about their mark than they are to collect
their essay
They came up to me afterwards…and they said
well we didn’t really understand what you
meant by evaluate. And I kind of thought well
isn’t it obvious, but the more I think about it I
wonder if it is actually obvious to students, what
the word means
Ref:www.writenow.ac.uk/assessmentplus/
Students comments
They are not very specific when they mark. I
got “some good evaluation”, what does that
mean?
You put so much effort into this work that you
really want feedback and to know they have
read it properly. If you just get a mark you
think, “I’ve worked for days and that’s it?”
Ref:www.assessmentplus.net
Feedback
How do we engage students with
feedback?
Activity - Card Sort
• As a group decide in which pile a card should
be placed
• Aim for consensus
• Note those for which consensus cannot be
reached
• Place cards under the appropriate headings
• Strongly agree
• Agree
• Neither agree or disagree
• Disagree
• Strongly disagree
What is feedback for?
{ Correction
{ Reinforcement
{ Forensic
diagnosis
{ Benchmarking
{ Longitudinal development –
feed forward
Why do students not engage?
{
Clarity of language
z
z
z
Emotional impact
Pedagogic intelligence
Past experiences
Perceived relevance or
applicability
{ Assessment criteria
{ Timing
{ Tutor – student relationship
{
Give an example of feedback which hasn’t
been a positive experience
Comparison of courses within ‘x’ University
in terms of students’ use of feedback
Assessment Experience Questionnaire (AEQ)
items
‘Best’
course
‘Worst’
course
%
strongly
agree
%
strongly
agree
The feedback helps me to understand better
things
36%
6%
The feedback shows me how to do better next
time
31%
4%
The feedback prompts me to go back over
material covered earlier in the course
13%
1%
% agree or
strongly agree
I do not use the feedback for revising
17%
44%
Principles of good feedback
{
{
{
{
{
{
{
Clarify what good performance is (goals,
criteria, expected standards)
Facilitate reflection and self-assessment in
learning…….
Deliver high quality feedback information that
helps learners self correct ……
Encourage teacher-learner and peer dialogue
Encourage positive motivational beliefs and
self-esteem
Provide opportunities to act on feedback
Use feedback from learners to improve
teaching
Nicol, D., Macfarlane-Dick, D. (2006)
Feedback Principles (NUS)
Feedback should be:
{
{
{
{
{
{
{
{
{
{
For learning, not just of learning
A continuous process
Timely
Relate to clear criteria
Constructive
Legible and clear
Provided on exams
Include self assessment and peer to peer
feedback
Accessible to all students
Flexible and suited to students needs
Academy DVD
( Student Views on Feedback)
Give an example of feedback which hasn’t
been a positive experience
Give an example of a good piece of
feedback
you’ve had
What would be useful feedback for you?
How has feedback helped you to learn?
Engaging students with feedback
Student perceptions
{ Clarify purpose
{ Link to criteria
{ Language
{ Application …….
{ Dialogue
{ Timely
{
Personal action plan
Which feedback methods or techniques do
you currently use, support or promote?
What is the purpose?
Develop and action plan that will transform
your feedback practice.
Three things that I intend to do ….
Any questions?
http://www.tla.ed.ac.uk/feedback/inde
x.html University of Edinburgh
Enhancing feedback
Involve the students
For Staff Completion
For Student Completion
1. These are areas of my work
that I think are good for the
following reasons
2. Please comment on the
following areas of work
3. What I want to improve or
do differently next time
4. The mark I think this piece
of
work deserves is
Return
Do these comments aid learning?
A
CC/CC
CD
Excellent
Fine
Interesting
Opening lousy - main part OK
Your writing is appalling
Terrible - didn’t you learn anything at
school about essay writing!
return
On submitting your first essay on a course
Please tick one or more columns for
each of the options below.
This is
what I did
I would have liked to do
this, but didn’t manage
it
I started thinking about this essay in
plenty of time.
I started to collect my reading
materials well in advance.
I discussed the ideas associated with
this essay with someone, virtually or
live, prior to starting writing.
I had a timetable in mind for prereading, planning, drafting, writing,
checking, doing the references.
I planned out the structure of the
essay logically, so my train of thought
was continuous
1.
I made reasonable efforts to clear the
decks for the actual writing of the
essay.
I made referencing easy for myself by
properly noting all of my sources as I
did the reading.
I showed someone a draft of my essay
before I completed it.
I acted on feedback I received to
make my essay better.
I wrote a summary/abstract that
encapsulated my key points succinctly.
I checked my work over carefully for
obvious mistakes, and I used a
spellchecker.
Source:http://phil-race.co.uk
Return
I didn’t think
this necessary
This just was
not possible for
me
I’ll do this
next time