A Method to Improve Giving Feedback
David G Sharpe
Department of English
Ohio University
Senior Lecturer sharpe@ohio.edu www.english.ohiou.edu/directory/faculty_page/sharpe
Teachers of writing already have a delivery system that is familiar and mature in development, but underused. That system is Word. Most of us know about, and many use, Track Changes to add feedback to documents. Few, however, unlock the potential in Word available through two overlooked practices:
 feedback made efficient and versatile by combining Track Changes with AutoCorrect, and
 building a catalog of frequently accessed comments, rapidly searchable using the Navigation
Pane
My presentation will show techniques for maintaining extensive, individualized communication with students, illustrated by experiences from my Freshman and Junior Composition courses over the past eighteen years. I have compiled, for example, a master list of over 600 line-editing comments that are instantly available to me and easily customized for ad hoc variations. With AutoCorrect, feedback comments deliver full, thirty-word explanations by typing no more than a few characters.
The level of feedback made possible creates a model from teacher to student that is then applied to peer review of papers. Through specific solutions always accompanied by explanations, students are encouraged to become constructive, collaborative editors for their peers, and as a result, independent and perceptive editors of their own writing.
Participants will be offered a sampler of line-editing comments that can jump-start their own collection.
Students repeat the same errors or weaknesses, so you find yourself continually repeating feedback comments. You waste considerable time in those repetitions, and for practical reasons, you must keep your comments short (sometimes using only a cursory abbreviation).
Here is a method that not only makes feedback rapid and efficient, but also allows full, plain
English comments AND customization.

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The Empowering Word method makes use of a feature in Word called Track Changes, with options set to favor in-line editing. You would need to be acquainted with Track Changes for the following to make sense. Setting the options is beyond the scope of this presentation. You can find detailed help for Using Track Changes at one of my course websites.
Suggestions must always invent a solution in the original text, with a comment from the editor made distinct by entering double square brackets at the start and finish of the comment, such as this: [[<<add double arrows to point to the change being commented on]]
Let’s begin with a single passage from a student paper and we’ll make three feedback suggestions –
The burden of paying for this care could have the potential to cripple healthcare facilities.
If a facially accumulates charges to the point that they are no longer able to afford to pay back the costs they will be forced into bankruptcy, or possible closure. The closure of any healthcare facility would have dire consequences for numerous groups of people.

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We could point out a case of wordiness --
The burden of paying for this care could [[<<shorten for a cleaner style without losing meaning]] cripple healthcare facilities.
The feedback is done here by selecting the words to be deleted, and typing a keyword, in this case “=short". The deleted and added text show up immediately.
The burden of paying for this care could have the potential to=short cripple healthcare facilities.
This efficient substitution is done by using AutoCorrect. I’ll show you how to enter keywords into AutoCorrect after two more examples.
The burden of paying for this care could [[<<shorten for a cleaner style without losing meaning]] cripple healthcare facilities. If a [[<<watch out for misspellings that resemble the right sound]] facility accumulates charges to the point that they are no longer able to afford to pay back the costs they will be forced into bankruptcy, or possible closure. The closure of any healthcare facility would have dire consequences[[<<”less is more” – if you cut back, the remaining words work harder]].
Here are the keywords --
The burden of paying for this care could have the potential to cripple healthcare facilities.
If a facially =sound accumulates charges to the point that they are no longer able to afford to pay back the costs they will be forced into bankruptcy, or possible closure. The closure of any healthcare facility would have dire consequences for numerous groups of people
=less.

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How is this done? Any time you enter a comment that you know you will be repeating in the future (and you have many!), take a bit of extra time to enter that comment into AutoCorrect using the following method.
1. Select the comment you have made, including the [[<<square brackets]] that surround it
2. Click on the AutoCorrect button or menu choice. The location of this varies by the version of
Word. If you have a recent version, the easiest is to add it to the Quick Access Toolbar at the top of your Word window. Check the Help info or ask a local tech support person for help if the following doesn’t work for you.
 2a. click the downward arrow on the top row of buttons in Word. That should open up “Customize Quick Access Toolbar”
 2b. click on “More Commands”
 2c. Choose commands from: All Commands

2d. Scroll down to “AutoCorrect Options ...” (the one with an icon)

2e. Click on Add

2f. (optional) you can move it up in the list to wherever you want

2g. Click on OK
3. You will see a window like this –
4. In the box for “Replace:”, enter any keyword you like, preceded by an equals sign so that it is distinct from any ordinary use of that word. For example, if I enter =demo, and then click OK, any time I type =demo and then a space, the keyword will expand.

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When you do this for a large number of feedback comments, you need a fast way of remembering which keywords you need. The solution is the other half of this Empowering
Word method. Each time you add a new AutoCorrect entry, you add it to a plain Word document that becomes a catalog of your feedback entries.
Here is a simplified catalog, using just the example keywords from above –
=demo [[<<the words of your comment will appear here]]
=less
=short
=sound
[[<<”less is more” – if you cut back, the remaining words work harder]]
[[<<shorten for a cleaner style without losing meaning]]
[[<<watch out for misspellings that resemble the right sound]]
This catalog stays open in a window beside whatever paper is receiving your current feedback.
When you have gathered a large enough number of entries, you can find the exact ones you need by using the Navigation Pane provided by Word.
Since this is a Word document, you can test this now. Click on View > Show >Navigation Pane
(or press Control-F). Make sure “RESULTS” is selected. Then enter any word you remember from the comment, or any keyword with the equals sign if you have a number of related entries. To see how this works, in the box that says “Search document”, enter =demo and you’ll see an immediate list of all the places where your search word appears.
The format of your catalog is unimportant, but add the entries alphabetically. Any time you add the keyword with an equals sign, it will want to expand, so use a Tab, then Undo, and Tab again to make it stay unexpanded.

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I have gathered feedback comments over 18 years of teaching. My own catalog has now grown to more than 600 entries on 26 pages. Each one of them can be found immediately using the
Navigation Pane.
To give you a sense of how focused and thorough those comments can be, you can download a
Sampler of Line-Editing Comments , a Word document that gives a selection of my entries (feel free to adapt any of them, if you like).
As for Customization? Note that a number of the entries have a double >>. Those are a signal to me for places where I customize the comment to fit the particular passage. Because the
Empowering Word method is so fast, time freed from standard, repetitive feedback can be applied to the special cases and special students needing extra attention.
Also available is a full example of the feedback I give to each of my students. The feedback appears to need a long time to prepare – but this level of feedback can be done in twenty minutes. The first few paragraphs are marked in depth, followed by a disclaimer allowing a scan of the remaining text. The feedback always ends with a summary talking about larger issues. Click to view the Line-Edit Example .
This is ‘saturation feedback’. I do this for two of the four papers during a semester, creating a model for students to refer to as they do their own peer feedback. The remaining two papers are done with peer feedback only, giving them a chance to find their own solutions. All four papers are rewritten as a final project.
I’ll be happy to answer questions sent by email to sharpe@ohio.edu.
As an example of the unfortunate, but minor, glitches you might come across -- AutoCorrect doesn’t work directly after a period or other major ending punctuation. Separate the keyword from the punctuation by a space.