Application Form
Teaching Fellowship Award Scheme 2008 - 2009
Signed forms to be returned to:
Margaret Powderley
EDaLT
2nd Floor, Isaac Foot
Plymouth Campus
Deadline: Monday 7th April 2008, 12pm (Please note that no applications can
be accepted after this time.)
Title of proposed project:
The impact of the level of engagement on students’ perception of feedback provision
Name(s) of Applicants for Teaching Fellowship: Dulekha Kasturiratne and Khine Kyaw
Project leader contact details: Dulekha Kasturiratne
Faculty/School: Social Science and Business/PBS
Ext: 32810
Fax: 01752 232249
Email: dulekha.kasturiratne@plymouth.ac.uk
Other staff supporting project (but not applying for teaching fellowship):
Jon Yorke, Graham Clayton
Proposal (maximum two sides)
Please give an overview of what you want to do and indicate how this relates to the following
criteria:
How does the proposed project
 enhance the quality of learning and teaching at an individual and subject level;
 contribute to the achievement of the Faculty and University Learning and Teaching Strategies;
 develop materials or ideas that can be applied by other colleagues to enhance learning and teaching
more widely;
 result in outcomes that can be used for academic publications or conference presentations?
Please include details about aims, context, methods, outcomes and dissemination and an
approximate timetable for the project.
Aims
1. To improve students’ engagement in the feedback process.
2. To examine students’ perceptions of the usefulness of providing interactive feedback where they are
encouraged to reflect on their submitted work.
3. To shed light on alternative styles of feedback provision.
Context
This research falls within a sector wide and international wide issue of feedback provision in HE. The
students’ responses to the NSS survey have indicated that there is room to improve the quality of feedback
that they receive during their studies. Specifically this research aims to improve PBS’s standing in the NSS
with regard to feedback in general and items number 8 (“I have received detailed comments on my work”)
and 9 (“Feedback on my work has helped me clarify things I did not understand”) in particular. Although we
the researchers lecture in two different subject groups, we have experienced firsthand the fact that students
mostly absorb the mark that they receive for their assignments rather than the feedback that is provided in
conjunction with the mark. This is not a new phenomenon. “McInnis et al., (1995) found that only 28% of
university students strongly endorsed that feedback was helpful” (Covic and Jones, 2008)1. Authors found
from students’ evaluation responses that when there is a resubmission option students view feedback as a
way to improve marks, rather than an opportunity to learn. This relates to what Snyder (1971) 2 calls the
‘hidden curriculum’ of how students focus on how to pass the exam/course rather than how to gain an
understanding of the subject. Our own intuition suggests that students’ perception of the quality of the
feedback they received may improve with the increase in their involvement and interaction with the
feedback and mark that they receive. This view is supported by Nicol (2007)3 who discusses this issue as
one of the ten principles of good assessment and feedback practice. This research aims to improve
students’ perception of the quality of feedback they received by introducing a model of feedback provision
where students will be encouraged to reflect on their learning process. Gibbs and Simpson (2002)4 report on
a study conducted by Forbes and Spencer (1991) which draws parallels with our study that what achieves
learning is designing feedback regimes that generate engagement with learning tasks without making extra
demands on time.
Methodology
In most cases across academia lecturers provide certain written feedback on student assignments with the
mark provided. This is no different in the University of Plymouth and the Business school. In our proposed
approach we will return the assignments with some written feedback as normal and the assignments will be
returned during a normal lecture or tutorial slot. When we are returning the assignment in the session, we
will, with the students consent, temporarily withhold the mark until the students have completed an exercise.
During the exercise, the students will first be encouraged to reflect on their submitted work and the feedback
provided. The students will then be provided with extensive verbal feedback where questions and
discussion are encouraged in order to increase interaction and involvement in the feedback and mark
provided. By doing so, the students, we believe, will engage more with the feedback they received and learn
to reflect on their work on the piece of coursework as well as on other coursework from different modules.
This discussion will be carried out with the staff member who marked the assignments and who is also the
Module Leader. The students will be provided their marks towards the end of the exercise. However in order
to provide anonymity the marks will be put up to correspond to student (ID) numbers instead of their names.
The students will also be encouraged if required to stay behind and talk to the academic member of staff or
make an appointment to meet later on if they require further clarification and direction on the feedback they
have received.
This feedback session will be an optional one for the purpose of the study. However, if the outcomes from
this exercise have a positive impact on students’ perception on feedback, then we can look to making such
sessions compulsory. By making the session optional in this study, we can find out if there is a difference in
the perception of those students who have attended the session and that of those who have not attended
the session on the quality of feedback they received.
1
Covic, T. and M. K. Jones. 2008. Is the Essay Resubmission Option a Formative or a Summative Assessment and Does It
Matter As Long As the Grades Improve? Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education 33, no. 1: 75 – 85.
2
Snyder, B. R. (1971) The hidden curriculum. Cambridge, MA:MIT Press.
Nicol, D. (2007) Principles of good assessment and feedback: theory and practice
4
Gibbs. G. and Simpson, C. (2002) How assessment influences student learning: A conceptual overview. SSRG 42/2002
Student Support Research Group Available online at http://www2.open.ac.uk/cehep/ssrg/reports/documents/42_02.pdf
(accessed on 25th March 2008).
3
Those students who do not attend this session can collect their marked assignments from the Student
Support desk. They will receive feedback as normal through comments and instructions given by the marker
justifying their mark. This system is normal practice as we all write certain comments in the assignment as
good practice. Thus all students will receive feedback on their assignment although through different
modes.
After the interactive, reflective feedback session, and after all students have collected their assignment,
interviews and questionnaires will be conducted on these students to understand their perceptions on the
usefulness of the feedback they receive (thereby satisfying aim 1 above). Interviews will be conducted in
order to identify in-depth feelings and perceptions of students of the usefulness and applicability of the
feedback that they received. These interviews will consist of 1-2 students at a time and will consist of
students who attended the feedback session and those who didn’t. The interviews will be conducted by an
independent person who is unrelated to the modules and the data will be looked at in terms of key theme
analysis. These interviews will be conducted across our two disciplines. The outcomes will inform a detailed
questionnaire that will be completed by all the students (those who did and didn’t attend the feedback
sessions). This will further enable to understand students’ perception of the feedback they received.
Outcomes and dissemination

Reports to university, own and other faculties
o VC’s Teaching and Learning Conference, Plymouth 2009
o A summary paper distributed amongst other faculties detailing the findings from this project
o Ethos
o A summary paper made available to the Resource room at EDaLT and to the Pedagogic
Research and Development Database

Presentations to colleagues and other departments
o Plymouth Business School Seminar Series (objective: to present project’s progress and its
findings)

Conferences
o HEA Annual Conference 2009 (objective: to present project’s findings)
o The 16th International Conference on Learning, University of Barcelona, 2009 (objective: to
present project’s findings)

Journal papers
o Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education
o Teaching in Higher Education

This research will form a basis for further more extensive research with funding applications to other
sources such as BMAF grants

This approach can easily be adopted within PBS and across disciplines and faculties as a rule of
best practice
Timetable
September 2008 - October 2008 : Literature review and refining the research aims and methodologies
November 2008 - December 2008 : Refining the designing of the set assignment and implementing the
assignment
January 2009 - March 2009 : Providing feedback, implementing focus groups and questionnaires, writing
interim report (for February)
April 2009 - August 2009
: Analysis of the questionnaire, analysis of performance at the examinations,
writing final reports, writing journal articles and applying for relevant
conferences
Personal and professional development intentions
1) The project will enable us to reinforce the materials that we have learnt from LTHE programme.
2) The study will have an impact on designing assessment and feedback in our own practices.
3) We intend to apply for external funding such as Teaching Research and Development Grants from
BMAF based on findings from the project
4) The funds will be helpful in our participation in workshops and conferences on assessment and
feedback in order to exchange ideas with colleagues from other institutions
Outline costings
Staffing
Brief description
A facilitator for the
interviews
Materials
Amount required
Facilitating interviews (£50 x 6 hours)
20 hours of key theme analysis of interviews
(£8.08 x 20 hours)
£ 300
Questionnaires, reprographics
£ 600
Vouchers for interview participants
£ 400
£ 161.16
(40 participants x £10)
Vouchers for questionnaire participants
£ 300
(150 participants x £2)
Training and professional development costs
Workshops/seminars
Conference
attendance for two
academic staff
Workshops/seminars on assessment and feedback
organised by the HE Academy BMAF subject group
HEA Annual Conference 2009 (objective: to present
project’s findings)
£ 650
£1700
The 16th International Conference on Learning,
University of Barcelona, 2009 (objective: to present
project’s findings)
Other costs
Catering for interviews
Total Funding requested
£ 430
£ 4541.16
Applicants for Teaching Fellowships, please confirm that you have attached
□
a short curriculum vitae highlighting your learning and teaching track record (max. 2 sides A4)
If there is more than one applicant for a Teaching Fellowship each member of the group
should provide this information.
□
a letter of commitment and support from your line manager.
Application deadline Monday, 7th April 2008, 12pm