Hello everyone,
When I develop meaningful feedback for my students’ assignments and projects, I first produce a rubric so students can see how they are being evaluated and what weight each component of a given assignment or project carries (rubrics also cut down on arguments about grades). I then make certain that I provide thoughtful, thorough, pointed commentary and corrections on each assignment (invariably, I insert comments and corrections in the text of the assignment and then I provide a summary statement that includes the rubric at the end of the assignment). Finally, I returned graded work to students in a timely fashion so that they can absorb my comments, corrections, and suggestions and apply them to the next submission.
Mark A. Coppelli
Feedback needs to be formative. It should be specific enough to inform the learner about how she can improve for future assignments,
Feedback needs to relate to and be consistent with the rubric. Part of the goal of the rubric is to inform the learner of the important elements of the assignment. The elements in the rubric should address each component of the assignment that the learner will be graded on.
Feedback needs to be timely. It almost goes without saying that we should be turning assessments around while the assignment is fresh in the mind of the learner.
1) should be tailed to the student and the material
2) needs to be constructive and designed to teach the objectives of the course
3) self-evaluations are also meaningful feedback
Jingxi,
Thanks for continuing the conversation. The positive and constructive criticism components are both important. Thanks.
Dr. Tena B. Crews
Daniel,
I like the "future guide" aspect. This is the student improvement piece.
Nice job.
Dr. Tena B. Crews
Robin ,
Yes, the details will help individualize the feedback and make it more meaningful. This will all help students improve.
Thanks.
Dr. Tena B. Crews
Amanda,
Right on. It should be individualized and not seem like it is "canned."
Thanks.
Dr. Tena B. Crews
Otis,
The conversations from various forums should connect - especially when the topic is communication or feedback. It is so important.
Thanks.
Dr. Tena B. Crews
Detra,
Feedback should be developed to help students improve. Meaningful feedback is the only kind that will do that. Thanks.
Dr. Tena B. Crews
cynthia,
Yes, and if you can actually list the objectives in the rubric, that is very beneficial to help students understand why they need to know what they need to know. Good job.
Dr. Tena B. Crews
Hi, William:
I agree with All oyur 3 answers. There is another one I think is very useful, especially if the students work is not perfect. That is the correct answer, or what improvement the student can have.
I always start with a compliment, and end with suggestions of improvement.
Jingxi
The three most important steps to developing feedback, in my opinion, are:
1) Clear feedback, which the student understands. It should be simple, yet effective, with no upper-level jargon.
2)It should act as a future guide for the students, including new questions for the student to focus on if it was a creative assignment, or suggestions towards study skills if it was a content based assignment. (Just two examples.)
3) Timely feedback is a must. What is feedback worth if the students don't have enough time to implement suggestions in future work?
When providing feedback the three things I think are most important are:
1. Be positive: I try to tell the students what they did well, before telling them where they are off track.
2. Tie the feedback to the objectives of the assignment and the rubric.
3. Be detailed: Show the student where they were off track and where they should be. Providing a high level of detail let's the student learn and learn from their mistakes.
Meaningful feedback should include:
1. Encouragement as well as critiques
2. Details (as much detail as possible without overburdening the student)
3. Personalization. Try to make sure it's not too "processed" and formulaic.
1. Align assignment requirements to rubric to feedback
2. Clear, detailed sentences
3. Suggestions for improvement
Hi Tena and classmates,
The three characteristics that I select are:
A. Timely
B. Specific
C. Constructive
Oddly enough, I started this conversation in Forum 2. Yes, it is so important that this forum lets me directly address feedback.
When assessing students at all universities, I want my feedback to be timely. It is very hard but I have found it is more important to teach less classes so I can uphold my rule of 24-48 hours to give feedback to a student. This is because I want to give the feedback while the assignment is still fresh in the student's mind. Normally, assignments in the online environment are spaced out 48-72 hours apart. If you do not catch the student early enough, he/she is on to another assignment, possibly carrying poor habits to the next assessment.
It is sometimes hard to be be specific when students make the same errors. I find that I try to take details out of the student's essay and incorporate them in my feedback. Now they know I have read their work and I can direct my comments specifically at what I feel needs to be improved or what is efficiently done and they can carry on into future assignments, good habits.
We, as an instructors, have a responsibility to build a student's confidence. That is not saying we laud and commend all that is good and let the errors go. What I mean is that we want to build with constructive criticism also. It is a very delicate process as we deal with student's egos. However, we can still suggest as give ideas on how a student's paper or essay can be better or more powerful. It takes a few extra lines but it is worth by the time you get to week five essay and it is a much improved version over week one essay.
The three most important things to remember when developing meaningful feedback:
1. Give feedback in a timely manner so that students may learn from their mistakes and avoid making the same ones on future assignments.
2. Feedback must be specific and detailed to help students learn from the information.
3. Feedback should allow students to learn from their mistakes and ask questions that may deepen their understanding of the concepts and/or content.
Sarah,
Timely and concrete are important. I particularly like your third item. Giving students resources to help them improve is excellent.
Thanks for your input.
Yolanda,
When you can provide examples to help students understand, that is essential. Thanks for your input.
Donald,
As long as the clicking rubrics have appropriate criteria and the measure the learning outcomes, they should be helpful. But these aspects are essential.
