Exploring the Feedback Conundrum

Two-stage Assignments - Two-stage Projects (Individual/Group)

2010-07-26T01:17:00.002-07:00

The following examples show how two-stage individual/group projects enable the teacher to review students' learning progress and provide feedback to performance before submitting the final product.

Example 1:

Description: One continuous group project with two submissions in a class of 20 – progress report and final report

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Gives feedback to students’ progress reports to let them know about their progress, constraints, weaknesses, potential pitfalls;
•	Allocates a high percentage of final mark to the group project as an incentive to give to the students

What student do (and when) –

•	Submit progress report;
•	Review feedback;
•	Incorporate the feedback of the progress reports into the final report

Teacher's comments –

•	The teacher thought she was more willing to give student comments on their progress reports because she was more confident that the feedback would be acted upon as an 'echo' at the end; and
•	The teacher thought the students would have an incentive to come to her because they wanted to get a good grade in the course.

* * * * * *

Example 2:

Description: Individual project ‘Design of a Bridge’ - the project aim is to design a prestressed concrete bridge to support a certain weight. The project comprises successively a single-page statement of intention, a short critique and a final report.

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Gives a minimal mark to the single-page statement of intention as an incentive to give to the students;
•	Gives students verbal and written feedback on the single-page statement of intention; and
•	Spends one hour during the class for commenting on the initial report

What students do (and when) –

•	Have a single-page statement of intention to incorporate in the initial report

Teacher’s comments –

•	The teacher said he was able to see the students using the feedback on the initial report to improve their final performance

* * * * * *

Example 3:

Description: Group project, which comprises a project proposal and a final report

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Gives feedback to the one-page proposal to make sure what students are thinking is more or less 'doable' and possible for implementation

What students do (and when) –

•	Have to submit the one-page proposal within 4 weeks

Teacher’s comments –

•	The teacher described the idea of the one-page proposal as the process of going through idea generation prior to implementing students’ ideas

Two-stage Assignments - Two-stage Written Essay (Individual)

2010-07-26T00:18:00.002-07:00

The following examples describe two-stage written assignments, which usually incorporate a draft submission before the submission of the final essay.

Example 1:

Description: Essay submission with two deadlines – one deadline is for draft submission, which is voluntary, and the other deadline is for submission of final essay

What teacher does (and when)

•	Gives feedback and critique to the students who submit the draft

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher thought submitting the draft could help the students to learn from the feedback, but it might take quite a bit of research time for marking the drafts;
•	However, the teacher thought finished product was improved and so might take less time to mark final paper.

* * * * * *

Example 2:

Description: Submit reflective writing twice to give a chance for students to improve in the final writing submission

What teacher does (and when)-

•	To get an idea of students’ learning progress, for example how well the students responded to the course topic in the assessment;
•	Allocates 20%-30% of final grade to the first piece of work; and
•	Gives written and oral feedback to the first piece of work

What students do (and when)

•	Submit the first piece of reflective writing between week four and week six of the semester

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher said he was harsher for the first piece of writing because he wanted to identify the weak students and help them to get a better grade at the end
•	The teacher said 50% of students asked for tutorials or one-to-one discussion with him after the submission of the first piece of writing
•	The teacher found that weak students who did not perform well in the first piece of writing could make improvements in their final paper

Two-stage Assignments - Two-stage Portfolios (Individual)

2010-07-26T00:12:00.001-07:00

The following example describes a portfolio assessment that has to be submitted twice.

Description: Submit portfolio twice to allow students to incorporate the feedback on the first work to the second one

What teacher does (and when)-

•	Gives feedback on the first submission, and suggests what areas students have to pay attention to and how they can improve in the next submission; and
•	Awards the grades to both submissions and the final grade generally being the average of the two grades, but there would be a possibility to reward appropriately if there is a significant improvement in the second portfolio

What students do (and when)-

•	Prepare first submission;
•	Review feedback;
•	Submit revised portfolio

Teacher’s comments-

•	The teacher thought submitting the portfolio twice could reduce the pressure of an ‘all or nothing’ submission at the end of the course;
•	For the second submission when the students hand in the portfolio, the teacher thought most of them had picked up at least some of the feedback on the first portfolio; and
•	Although the two submissions of the portfolio could generate a heavy marking workload, the teacher thought portfolio assessment was still effective because the students could tell her in the portfolio about what they had learned, their joy, their worries and the aspirations

Multi-stage Assignments

2010-07-26T00:08:00.001-07:00

The following examples describe the feedback practice by using multi-stage assignments.

Example 1: Multi-stage projects

Multi-stage projects enable the teacher to know whether the students have acted upon the feedback throughout the project stages

Description: A large-scale group project, which comprises the submission of a series of reports (inception report, the progress reports and so on) and a series of oral presentations.

What teacher does (and when)-

•	Gives feedback to the inception reports and progress reports to help students to identify their weaknesses and to think about how to improve.

What students do (and when)-

•	Have to develop the project in stages by going through the inception report, the progress reports and so on;
•	Review feedback;
•	Submit final reports incorporating feedback

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher commented that the multi-stage project was to keep students to gradually develop their idea from a very rough idea into something more feasible; and
•	The teacher said he was able to see the students acting and using the feedback throughout the project stages

* * * * * *

Example 2: Multi-stage group presentations

Multi-stage group presentations refer to group presentations that are arranged throughout the course period so to allow students to receive continuous feedback in order to improve their performance.

Description: Group presentation sessions once every four weeks, to allow peer feedback and feedback from practitioners after each presentation

What teacher does (and when)-

•	Provides immediate feedback to the presenter group at the end of the presentation;
•	Encourages students to ask questions and to give feedback to the presenter group after the presentation; and
•	Gives feedback to students’ final report submission so that they realize strengths and areas needing improvement

What students do (and when)-

•	Revise and incorporate the feedback from the presentations into their final report submission

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher thought students treasured the presentations because they could receive continuous comments which would definitely benefit to their final submission; and
•	The teacher found it was sometimes difficult to motivate students to engage in peer feedback or comment on classmates’ presentations

* * * * * *

Example 3: Multi-stage written assignments

Multi-stage written assignments refer to the submission of two or more written assignments, that are relevant to each other, to allow students to know what areas they need to improve in the next submission/assignment.

Description: Three written assignments (short research essay, long research essay and final research essay), each of the assignments has a specific deadline for submission.

What teacher does (and when)-

•	Posts the marking guideline on the website ;
•	Gives individual comments a week later after each submission of the first and second written assignment;
•	Allocates 10% of the course grade to the second work, which is a much longer piece, but flexible to change if there is a significant improvement in their second written assignment; and
•	Gives one-page feedback comments to the final research essay, including both general and specific comments

What students do (and when)-

•	Submit the solution to a problem case (as the first research essay), the problem is given in the PBL class during the forth or fifth week of the semester;
•	Submit the longer piece of work (as the second research essay) in week 8 or 9 (same process as in the forth or fifth week); and
•	Submit the final research essay at a specific deadline;

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher thought the timing to give students feedback was important;
•	The teacher said the first piece of the exercise was not a formal assessment, but was a part of the learning exercise; and
•	The teacher said the final research essay was independent research, so students could not get as much feedback in the process of completing it

Dialogic Feedback - In-class Discussion/Debate

2010-07-26T00:01:00.001-07:00

The following examples describe how to promote dialogic feedback through in-class discussion and debates, so students can get verbal feedback from peers and the teacher.

Example 1: In-class Discussion

Description: Case-based teaching aims to create an interactive and dynamic in-class discussion, and students can get verbal feedback from peers and the teacher.

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Gives the basic guideline to students about the cases; and
•	Facilitates the in-class discussion

What students do (and when) –

•	Interact with peers to discuss the case

Teacher’s comments-

•	The teacher thought the interaction in the class helped students to know right away if the feedback was making sense or not, and they would know whether they are on the right track

* * * * * *

Example 2a: Class Debate (Several Student Groups)

Description: A small group class debate - by having students into groups to argue on a controversial issue, with diverse opinions or interpretations.

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Arranges the second half of the lecture to have a workshop that allows debate on, application of or challenge to the topic;

•	Sits with one or two student groups, and the tutor will sit with the other two groups, to listen and comment about students' arguments; and
•	Swap the groups the teacher and the tutor joins in the next lesson, so all students can get the benefit of sitting both with the tutor and the teacher

What students do (and when) –

•	Divide into groups of 6 or 8 in the class with the size of 25 to 30; and

•	Learn how to argue and how to strengthen their arguments about the case in the debate

Teacher’s comments-

•	The teacher thought small group debates were useful to help students to develop ideas in a relatively non-threatening environment

•	The teacher said students could learn to argue, which was an essential skill they would need in to organize their thoughts before doing the written piece of work

* * * * * *

Example 2b: Class Debate (Two Student Groups)

Description: To split the class into two groups and to have a class debate - for or against a bioethics issue, but without letting students know which side they have to be before the lesson.

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Splits the class into two groups during the lesson – for and against a bioethics issue; and

•	During the discussion, comes in on both sides of the argument to see what they have argued and what they have missed

What students do (and when) –

•	Study the reading materials given on both sides of the arguments before the class;

•	Have a discussion in the group that the teacher assigned – either for or against a bioethics issue - during the lesson; and

•	After the class debate, nominate a person in the group to present what’s been discussed and argued

Teacher’s comments-

•	By alteration of the two groups, the teacher was able to observe students' discussion and know what they had missed and what they knew about the topic;

•	The teacher said he would usually join the argument of the weak side to help them with another point for argument and guide students into another way of looking into the issue

Dialogic Feedback - Peer Feedback

2010-07-25T23:48:00.001-07:00

The following examples describe how presentations during group projects promote verbal peer feedback.

Example 1:

Description: Peer feedback is given after the group presentation; students complete the peer evaluation in written format.

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Asks questions and give comments to the presenter group; and
•	Gives an evaluation sheet to the students prior to the presentation to rate the performance of each group independently (except their own group)

What students do (and when) –

•	Give feedback and ask questions to the presenter group;
•	Respond to the questions and/or comments given by other peers, regarding their own presentation; and
•	Submit written final report one week after the presentation

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher said he was not sure on how much revision students did after receiving feedback in the presentation, but he was sure they had done some revisions;
•	The teacher said the idea of submitting the final report after the presentation was to provide a chance for self-reaction and to receive further feedback * * * * * *

Example 2:

Description: 10-minute group presentation in a small class with less than 25 students

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Gives feedback to students, right after students give the peer feedback to the presenting group after the presentation

What students do (and when) –

•	Give peer feedback to the presenting group after the presentation

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher commented that when students knew each other in a small class, they would be more confident about speaking up and critiquing and criticizing people; and
•	The teacher thought giving feedback after the presentation was really effective in smaller classes with less than 25 students. * * * * * *

Example 3:

Description: 5-minute oral presentation in group for ‘Spaghetti bridge experiment’

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Encourages and requires students to ask questions or make suggestions to the presenting group

What students do (and when) –

•	Each group has to ask questions to other presenting groups

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher said students felt he forced them to give feedback at first and later on they seemed to enjoy providing peer feedback; and
•	The teacher said the comments from students were reflective and helpful for students' learning because they were all facing to the same design problems * * * * * *

Example 4:

Description: Mid-term group presentations that receive teacher feedback and peer critique after the presentation

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Gives feedback after each presentation and raises questions at the end of all presentations;
•	Randomly picks a group to give a 5-minute critique to the presenting group; and
•	Gives bonus mark to those students who raise good question or have good response

What students do (and when) –

•	Give feedback to the presenting group as a peer critique; and
•	Respond to peer’s questions after own presentation

Teacher’s comments

•	Teacher said she didn’t know how effective students would be in doing the critique, but she usually raised some questions to arouse their critical thinking in the lecture, so she thought the students were quite used to doing the peer critique technique; and
•	Teacher said students were not required to incorporate teacher’s or peer comments into the final report

Dialogic Feedback - Questioning Approach

2010-07-25T21:57:00.000-07:00

The following examples describe a feedback practice on how a teacher responds to students' questions and how this approach could help students to learn by themselves.

Description: Use questioning method to respond to students questions in order to force them to think from the ‘First Principle’, which could help the students with other principles for the class discussion.

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Responds to students with question rather than giving an answer when students ask the teacher questions; and
•	Delivers the materials based on ‘First Principle’, in which students have to condense a lot of information down into principles

What students do (and when) –

•	'Boil' a vast amount of information materials into more condense principles

Teacher’s comments

•	In the discipline of real estate and construction, the teacher indicated the skill in how to convince clients was particularly valued because there was no right or wrong answer;
•	The teacher thought the idea of ‘First Principle’ approach really could help students to learn independently in the future; and
•	The teacher commented that the interactive 'First Principle' approach could take place in all kinds of applications

Dialogic Feedback - Collective Feedback

2010-07-25T21:56:00.001-07:00

The following examples describe feedback practices in giving collective feedback verbally on written assignment and past exam papers regarding students’ commonly made mistakes.

Example 1:

Description: Provide collective feedback verbally on written assignment regarding students’ commonly made mistakes

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Gives feedback after each tutorial submission to the whole class at the beginning of the lecture on common errors;
•	Provides instructions for postgraduate students on how to mark student work on the tutorial problems; and
•	Asks the postgraduate students to summarize their observations and things that are important to tell the students

* * * * * *

Example 2:

Description: Provide collective feedback verbally based on the performance of past exam papers in the lecture

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Spends one hour in the end of semester revision period to tell the students the commonly errors in the past exam papers

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher thought students very often continue to make the similar mistakes even having discussed about the past exam papers in the lesson

Dialogic Feedback - Face-to-Face Discussion during Non-class Time

2010-07-25T21:11:00.000-07:00

The following examples describe how teachers give verbal feedback to the students during non-class time.

Example 1:

Description: In a Problem-based Learning (PBL) class, teacher used to give one-to-one feedback to the students after they complete the self-evaluation form at the end of the course

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Does a lot of observations in the PBL class to see how the students understand the PBL process; and
•	Sees the students one-to-one to give students feedback after they have done the self-evaluation form

What students do (and when) –

•	Meet the teacher individually after completing the self-evaluation form

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher thought PBL was the most exciting model to give feedback, as was more of an exploratory type of feedback, instead of directive feedback, to encourage students to continue thinking

* * * * * *

Example 2:

Description: Face-to-face feedback on academic aspect in non-class time

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Talks to the students when they come to her after the class or stop into her office in the non-class time; and
•	Creates an atmosphere that encourages students to ask questions and come to see the teacher

What students do (and when) –

•	Come to the teacher for suggestions, questions or comments at the end of the lesson; and
•	Come to the teacher’s office for suggestions, questions or comments

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher found talking after-class with students to provide feedback was very useful.

* * * * * *

Example 3:

Description: Face-to-face feedback on academic aspect in non-class time

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Uses own time to answer students questions

What students do (and when) –

•	Come to teacher’s office to ask questions

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher thought this requires a lot of time to answer students' question and would like to also encourage students to make an appointment with him beforehand

* * * * * *

Example 4:

Description: Give face-to-face feedback on non-academic aspect in non-class time about students’ personal development

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Talks to the students when they come to the teacher

What students do (and when) –

•	Come and ask the teacher about career prospects; and
•	Send an email to the teacher to give feedback after the course on how they are getting on after graduation

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher said she never knew how much students would take her feedback on board because there was no way of knowing when her course is over.

Dialogic Feedback - Peer Tutoring

2010-07-25T21:03:00.000-07:00

The following example describes how peer tutoring could assist in giving dialogic feedback to students.

Description: Peer tutoring, which is an approach for senior students to assist junior students

What students do (and when) –

•	Senior students help the first year students to learn about subject-based material

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher thought peer tutoring was an idea to actually help the first year students to develop professionally;
•	The teacher thought peer tutoring was also an idea for junior students to have a buddy to break into university life; and
•	Peer feedback can also consolidate the senior students' learning

Technology-supported Feedback - Blogs

2010-07-21T23:38:00.000-07:00

The following examples describe how to use the blog as a platform to allow students to give peer feedback and to build an interactive environment.

Example 1:

Description: Post articles to the blog to allow students to comment on articles and also to comment each other’s comments

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Puts the articles on the blog written both those by the teacher, or the articles extracted from other places;
•	Asks the students to discuss the online controversial articles, and sometimes intentionally and randomly the teacher would get involved in the online discussion; and
•	Allocates a large part of the final grading (about 40%) to the participation of the blog

What students do (and when) –

•	Go on to give comments on the articles posted on the blog to build upon the arguments

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher said using a blog was a good way to start the discussion;
•	The teacher indicated that using a blog was effective to make students to think about a particular issue and give them a sense of sequence, so they could give instant feedback to each other; and
•	The teacher thought this approach could be a kind of follow-through because students could know somebody was monitoring their work, so they would take the feedback most seriously

* * * * * *

Example 2:

Description: Provide an interactive blog that is open to public to allow students to discuss on the topics and/or ask questions

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Provide a blog as a platform for the online discussion among students and also practitioners

What students do (and when) –

•	Post questions on the blog before the class, after the class or even after the examination; and
•	Refer the blog, for example, questions raised by last year's seniors

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher indicated that the blog had attracted external experts who could really contribute knowledge from a practical side, so students could learn both in the university and from the real-world practitioners

Technology-supported Feedback - WebCT

2010-07-21T21:55:00.000-07:00

The following examples describe the practices of using WebCT to give feedback to students.

Example 1:

Description: Use WebCT to give collective feedback on the test performance

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Gives student feedback after the test/exam on the WebCT;
•	Posts a summary on the WebCT about test/exam performance

What students do (and when) –

•	log on the WebCT to see the feedback given by the teacher on the past exam papers

* * * * * *

Example 2:

Description: Use WebCT to provide FAQs for students

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Keeps record about what has been discussed with the previous students and organize the information into FAQs

What students do (and when) –

•	Review the FAQs to solve students' questions before asking the teacher

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher commented that only a few students would use WebCT;
•	The teacher said many of students were not active in raising questions in WebCT, but he knew they looked at the information provided in the WebCT

Technology-supported Feedback - Storyboards

2010-07-21T21:34:00.000-07:00

The following example shows how a teacher gives feedback to the students' storyboards.

Description: Students’ storyboards allow the teacher to look for the characterized patterns of the storyboards and give collective feedback, as well as allow students to give peer feedback

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Identifies the characterized patterns in students’ storyboards and creates a summary to give feedback to students; and
•	Gets engaged in the online discussion

What students do (and when) –

•	Design their own storyboard;
•	Respond to the comments given by other students on their own storyboard; and
•	Comment other students’ storyboards

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher thought giving feedback to the students' storyboards could be effective because the support to each other enabled a more powerful feedback mechanism; and
•	The teacher said there was a possibility for this dialogue on the feedback to students' storyboards to be extended, so he thought storyboards could provide an ongoing platform for students to learn from each other

Technology-supported Feedback - Others

2010-07-21T21:25:00.000-07:00

The following examples describe about other technology-supported feedback practices by using videotape, online discussion forum and email.

Example 1:

Description: Use video-tape to record student group presentation in a small class to promote dialogue about effective presentation

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Records each student when presenting for roughly 5 minutes and the TA is present to ensure everything is technically fine; and
•	Shows the video tape after the presentation in front of all students, and receive feedback from presenters think and other students

What students do (and when) –

•	Give presentation that is video-taped; and
•	Give feedback on other students’ presentation by watching at the video tape

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher thought students found this approach was very useful and something they had not experienced in other classes; and
•	The teacher said students were able to give insightful analysis on their own presentation because they could see themselves

* * * * * *

Example 2:

Description: Use an online discussion forum to open for the whole year, to allow students to have an open discussion on the issues

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Posts four topics on the discussion forum to engage students in discussion

What students do (and when) –

•	Able to argue for or against the topic in the forum

Teacher’s comments

•	Teachers said he could follow students’ thinking and argument in the forum by participating in the discussion forum

* * * * * *

Example 3:

Description: Give feedback to the students through email

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Gives a very brief response to students who sent an email to the teacher

What students do (and when) –

•	Write email to the teachers for questions

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher said she liked using email because students could email to her any time; and
•	The teacher thought it was good for students to actually send an email and to have feedback from her in a short time

Students' Self-evaluation

2010-07-21T20:05:00.000-07:00

All of the above examples require student self-evaluation at some level. The following examples provide some additional specific examples of student self-evaluation.

Example 1:

Description: Self-evaluation incorporated in the PBL process

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Asks students to fill in the self-assessment form after 46 weeks of a PBL course; and
•	Writes the own comment at the end of the form after the students have completed the form

What students do (and when) –

•	Rate themselves on a number of items, for example, communication skill

Teacher’s comments

•	The teacher thought he could assess student performance in a PBL class quite well after with the students after 6 to 8 weeks, so he was able to provide comments to the students about their performance

* * * * * *

Example 2:

Description: Pre-workshop and post workshop assessment – an approach for students to self-evaluate their learning from before attending or after attending the course

What teacher does (and when) –

•	Asks students to answer professional questions at the beginning of the course; and
•	Asks students to answer the same professional questions at the end of the course

What students do (and when) –

•	Perform the self-evaluation at an early stage to assess what they knew and what they may not know, and compare after 10 or 13 weeks to see what they have learned