Sara,
Great descriptions and tips for critical feedback. Your information will help others develop better feedback. I like the sandwich method as well.
Hello Dr. Crews and Colleagues, :-)
Feedback is a crucial part of the learning experience. It allows students to ascertain their strengths and weaknesses, thus enabling them to improve their skills and become more successful academically.
I believe that feedback needs to be timely, specific, and include resources to help students more successfully meet future coursework. Instructors need to provide feedback as soon as is possible relative to submitted work or exams; doing so will make it more meaningful as it will be easier for the students to relate the feedback to their work as opposed to receiving delayed input. The feedback needs to be specific as to the areas/questions that were correctly and incorrectly addressed/answered so that students know exactly what they do and don’t know. Lastly, instructors should provide students with references as to where they can turn to improve the subject area knowledge as students may not always know where to turn for help with a specific topic.
We were asked to provide 3 items; however, I would also include “The Sandwich Technique.†I always present feedback in this manner as it allows students to view their good points along with those that need improvement.
Sara Fine
Online Instructor
Donna,
You are right on target. Where did you present? To your colleagues or at a conference or something?
I recently presented on developing rubrics for online course instruction. When developing meaningful feedback, it is important to develop the rubrics to communicate how assignments will be evaluated. It is also important to communicate how feedback will be provided and in what formats. Finally, it is important to evaluate our own methods of feedback to ensure that they are substantive.
laura,
I like your point about "get to the point." It's good to start positive and provide feedback, but students do need to understand the main point of your feedback so they can improve. Thanks!
Meaningful feedback is crucial in order for students to learn and improve. Here are the three items I believe important to remember:
1. Supportive: Feedback needs to have an encouraging tone. It's important to highlight the areas where the student excelled and the areas that need improvement
2. Clear: It's important for students to understand exactly where and why they lost points on an assignment. This can be highly effective when tried to a rubric
3. Concise: It's important for feedback to "get to the point." Again, this goes back to ensuring that the student understands what he/she did will and what areas need improvement.
Gregory,
Feedback should be taken seriously so I'm glad you do. The feedback should help students understand what they are working toward and why. That makes it meaningful. Thanks!
Hello,
I take meaningful feedback very seriously. The three most important aspects of feedback to me are as follows:
1) Reinforce positives (start out by encouraging)
2) Provide explanations to wrong answers
3) Connect feedback to learning objectives.
I believe that all 3 of these methods will encourage the student to do better and understand why he/she didn't correctly answer a particular question. These methods can also help our students recognize what our expectations are.
Gregory Becoat
Carl,
Yes - we have to make sure the assessments we use and the feedback we provide help students improve. Thanks!
Lyn ,
I like when instructors work together to develop rubrics as long as all of the assignments are the same. It's when an individual instructor makes edits in the assignments that shared or distributed rubrics do not work. Thanks for your input.
Albert,
So, do you use rubrics to assess the students' work? Is that how you deduct points?
Thanks!
The three most important things to remember when developing meaningful feedback for assignments/projects are:
1. the right type of assessment
2. rubrics for providing assessment
3. feedback that helps the student learn
Hi everyone,
Our class projects all have rubrics, some of which have been developed by a group of instructors for use in all classes, and some of which I have develop myself.
In my feedback, I address each of the criteria, provide the points earned for each, and provide comments.
If a student does well, I say so. If they need improvement and did not earn full points for one of the assignment questions or rubric criteria, then I offer suggestions not only for improvement, but also suggestions for where to look for more information about the topics they did not understand.
I always invite students to follow up with me for clarification of anything I have said in feedback. Lyn H.
I agree that tone is essential but I only provide praise if I can identify the exceptional work.
I never remove points unless I can note and point to exactly where the student needs to revise and redo the assignment. Therefore, to avoid embarrassing moments on discussion boards, I address concerns by asking the student a question in a comment on their post. The question is guided and directed at my concern in the student's post. I let the student determine the reasons for my concerns.
Elias,
Thanks for bringing that up. Student centered learning and involving formative feedback is an awesome connection to the learning outcomes. Thanks!
I like to always bring up the issue of learner centered approach. Surely connection to LOs is important for justification. Formative feedback should also be substantive. It should be constructive. It should be ...
The subtle point to drill in our minds is that students are not means, medians, or modes. They are individuals, so we always have to double-check that the qualities of our feedback are in fact perceived in the right measure by each individual student.
Tyra,
Any time we can personalize the feedback and learning environment, the better. Providing examples is a good way to show students the proper way to do things.
Hi Tena,
I find that personalized feedback is the most important. I need to highlight the topic that the student wrote about for example. The feedback needs to also be specific enough to the errors in the assignment and then provide examples of how to improve or fix the errors in the future. Ending with an encouraging tone is always important in non-verbal communications.
Best
Tyra
Darlene,
Any time we provide feedback, it should be meaningful. When you include the components you've listed, the better.
Nizar,
It's great how you can add detail within the "sandwich." That type of feedback helps the students understand how they can improve. Thanks!
