Feedback to the Future
Sue Gill, QuILT and Rachael Thornton,
NUSU
Background
• Sector wide concerns about assessment and
feedback
– NSS not the only driver
– Staff concerns too
• Our plan
– Building on previous joint campaign
– Run a campaign to raise student awareness of the
feedback they were already getting; how to make use
of that feedback; and, to start new students thinking
about assessment and feedback at university is
different from school
What we did
• Week 19-25 November
• 6 venues, Herschel, Union, Courtyard, Med
School, Library and Business School
• 7 student helpers + 3 NUSU officers and SG
• 467 response postcards completed
• Talked to an estimated 700+ students
On the day
• Asked students to complete a very brief postcard
asking them 3 questions
• What was the most useful feedback you ever received
from a teacher or lecturer?
• Why was this feedback so useful?
• What did you do with it?
• Asked for their School/subject
• If they wanted they could also leave the name of the
lecturer who’d given them the feedback
Results
• Had a JobsOC student who transcribed the
cards
• Analysed by SG
• It is anecdotal information
• Students interpreted the questions in a variety
of ways, though the vast majority did talk
about feedback on assessment
• Very few rude responses
What was the most useful feedback
you ever received from a teacher or
lecturer?
Motivational/folk sayings (20)
• “To never give up on what I am doing and
strive for success”
• “If you act like an idiot you'll get treated like
one”
• “It won't get done till you actually do it!”
• “Put the effort in and you will get what you
want”
Time management (9)
• “Not to rush work, do it properly not quickly”
• “Time is the problem not content”
“I have lots of distraction”
Attendance(5)
• “Come to all lectures”
• “must always attend optional tutorials”
“Small parts of lectures
spark ideas/inspires”
What was done well (5)
• “Tackled through a complicated question in
seminar, shook my hand because I got it so right”
“Confidence boost”
Coursework feedback (114)
Range of ways of it being delivered
email and notes on work
feedback in small tutor groups
written feedback
face to face over an essay
calculation class
lab work
working through question in lecture
revision lecture
a combination of face to face and detailed
annotation on my work
feedback from presentations
in seminars
marks on written pieces of work
Exam Feedback (23)
post exam feedback session
given guidance on exam technique after
the exam
exam question and answers
past papers
“told me where I
went wrong”
“detailed and identified
weak areas”
“I know what
to work on”
“Helped to know about
how well people do on
exams”
Specific advice (133)
highlighting areas for correction/improvement
recommended reading, journals, books
explanation of the aims of the assessment
how I could have done better
subject specific skills
references
“Way I was presenting
structure of piece
back a history was too
analysis
muddled and needed
writing style
restructuring in a
study skills
particular way”
Cautions
• The language students use is not quite the same
as staff use – tests, exams, coursework,
assignment, essay – we can’t assume we mean
exactly the same
• For example, is a ‘Blackboard test’ a summative
exam or an individual module formative
assessment or something else?
• Without a shared vocabulary are other aspects of
assessment and feedback also misunderstood?
• The questions we asked meant we probably
haven't heard anything here about formative
assessment
What’s not most useful?
• Only one student felt their mark was the most
useful feedback they got
• No students said they were told the right
answer as their most useful feedback
• No responses talked about self or peer
feedback being useful
Assessment literacy
• The majority of respondents mentioned
aspects of assessment literacy as being the
most useful feedback they had received
Aims of the assignment
To improve writing skills
Learnt about referencing
Makes you think and
form an argument
I understood what is required
Why was it useful?
What did you do with it?
What did we learn and what next?
• Initial plan was to run a ‘what one thing would
you change about assessment feedback’ at the
same time – this was a bad idea! Will now run
this 22-29 April
• It is hard, exhausting work persuading students to
give us 2 minutes of their time, however the
cheerfulness and enthusiasm of the our student
team overcame all but the most grumpy student!
• Providing a highlighter pen as a thank you was
effective
What did we learn and what next?
• We produced a document about the differences
between school and university assessment – we
now need to make this more widely available for
new students
• http://www.ncl.ac.uk/quilt/resources/assessmen
t/AssessmentandFeedbackatUniversity.htm
• Also have short document about ‘why reference?’
– copies available or can be found here
http://www.ncl.ac.uk/quilt/resources/teaching/w
riting.htm
What does this mean for us?
• What can we do to increase students’
assessment literacy?
• QuILT can host resources and promote them
• We can author resources if we know what
would be useful
• The best time to ‘get’ students is in the first
semester of their first year, how can we do
this effectively?
Thank you
Rachael Thornton
education.union@newcastle.ac.uk
Sue Gill
sue.gill@newcastle.ac.uk