Cycle 8: Video Feedback for First Draft Writing

7/30/2019 Cycle 8: Video Feedback for First Draft Writing

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Cycle 8 Video Feedback for First Draft Writing:

22 Respondents

ACTION TAKEN: The students were asked to write an artist statement for their

photography portfolios. Screencasting was used to provide feedback for the rough

drafts of their artist statements in conjunction with Adobe Illustrator to mark thegrammatical errors. Since this was a rough draft, no rubric was used to assess the

quality writing.

RESEARCH QUESTION: How will video feedback without a rubric and showing

corrections, apply to written work andaffect student-learning outcomes, as evaluated

by the students?PREDICTED OUTCOME: This method should work better for first-drafts because

the feedback provided will be more relevant when students can still correct their

work. I was concerned that writing corrections on the paper would be distracting

and that the students would feel uncomfortable pausing the videos to make the

necessary changes. My challenges in the previous cycle of placing feedback on the

schools server made me concerned about continued challenges in this area, but the

file sizes left few options.

EVIDENCE USED TO EVALUATE THE ACTION: The evidence used to evaluate

the actions in this cycle was a survey with the following questions:

1. How useful was the video in providing feedback on your writing?

2. What was the worst part of video feedback?

3. What aspects of video feedback are different than what you would receive

from written feedback?4. Were the written notes on your artist statement helpful or distracting when

presented in a video with a voiceover?

5. Would having a rubric or another type of scoring tool be helpful in

understanding how you performed?

6. Did you find video feedback helpful in any way that you did not mention

earlier? (Please describe in detail.)

7. Will having this opportunity to provide your opinion affect your learning in

photography?

EVALUATION: The first question of this cycle asked how useful video feedback was

to writing (Figure 8.1.) The responses to the question were not as positive as inprevious cycles. 46% of the students responded positively, with 23% providing the

highest rating. 32% of the students believed that video feedback provided the same

level of effectiveness as written feedback. For the first time, it was indicated that

video feedback was less useful than written feedback, with 22% of the students

indicating that screencasting was detrimental to their learning. It was my belief that

when this question is looked at in context with question 2 (Figure 8.2) issue will be

that the video did not present static corrections, and the students were unable to


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make the changes without pausing the video. Thus far, they have displayed an

inability to work in this method and I hope that this second exposure will increase

their likelihood of pausing the video while working.

Figure 8.1. How Useful was Video Feedback on your Writing?

The second question (Figure 8.2) asked students to identify the worst part of video

feedback. The majority (59%) said that that there was no worst part. The next

highest response was 18% of the students indicating that this method made itdifficult to look back upon their work. Students may not have thought of, or liked

the method of pausing the video to look at the suggested corrections. This could be

corrected by presenting the paper with the corrections on it as well as the video

feedback. The inability to access the feedback at home was also mentioned again in

this cycle (8%.) File sizes continue to be a challenge because students do not

download the video before leaving for home. A new delivery method could be

created if screencasting continues to be used.

23%

23%

32%

18%

4%

How Useful was Video Feedback on Writing

Much more useful

More useful

The Same

Less Useful

Much Less Useful


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Figure 8.2. What was the Worst Part of Video Feedback?

The next question asked what the differences between video and written feedback

were (Figure 8.3.) The most common answers suggested that the information was

clearer in video (32%.) The next highest category contained 23% of the responses,

and suggested that this form of feedback was more personal than a written version.

Both the clarity of information and personal nature of the responses are the primary

reasons why video feedback shows promise, suggesting that its benefits apply to

both written work and the larger sample size. Along with none at 9%, otheranswers included a variety of personal views that either did not directly answer the

question or were only mentioned by one respondent.

59%

4%

18%

5%

9%

5%

What was the Worst Part of Video Feedback?

No Worst Part

Speech Mistakes

Difficult to Look Back on

Work

Could not Ask Questions

Could not get at Home

Went to Quickly


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Figure 8.3. What aspects of video feedback are different than what you would receive

from written feedback?

The students were asked if they found the written notes helpful while listening to

the voiceover. The large majority of 82% found that the notes were in fact helpful.

This suggested that my concerns about the hand written notes being a distraction

when paired with a voiceover were unfounded, since the students responded that

they benefited from the notes.

The next question asked if including a scoring tool would be helpful in their

understanding of how they performed (Figure 8.4) and 68% of the students

indicated that they would find this helpful. These responses are somewhat

surprising considering that this was a first draft of a paper. It was my belief that

they would not be interested in a scoring metric because this was not their final

product. Rather, it appears that they want to know how well they performed on this

paper regardless of their need to make changes. The rubric may help clarify how

the severity of my feedback or if they should restructure larger sections of their

papers, both of which would suggest a motivation for these responses.

32%

23%9%

4%

4%

5%

5%

18%

What Were the Differences Between Video and

Written Feedback?

Clarity

Personal

None

Better

Went To Quickly

Cannot Ask for

Clarification

You Only Need to Listen

N/A


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Figure 8.4. Would having a rubric or another type of scoring tool be helpful in

understanding how you performed?

Question six gave the students an opportunity to provide any other feedback that

they did not have a chance to mention earlier. One response stated that video being

colorful and visual is more helpful than voices alone, and another response

suggested that video feedback was not that helpful, the remainder of the responses

indicated that they had nothing else to add.

The final question was in regards to the action research process. It asked the

students if having an opportunity to voice their opinions would be beneficial to their

learning. Surprisingly 50% of the respondents did not think that this would help

their experience learning photography. I changed the wording of this question from

the previous cycle because it might have been too leading, and these results may

have existed because the question was not as clearly stated. Since there is no way of

knowing which students have responded in each cycle, it may be that this group of

respondents did not feel a chance for feedback would be as beneficial as the

previous group. Finally it may be that they did not feel as though providing

feedback for this assignment was beneficial.REFLECTION: When asked how useful video feedback was for written responses

varied a great deal (Figure 8.1.) 46% of the responses were positive and 32% were

neutral, but for the first time I received negative response (22%.) This cycle of

feedback on written work was different than the last cycle, and some of the changes

that were made in this cycle may have resulted in negative responses. First, this

cycle was used for a rough draft of a paper, which meant the students needed to use

the feedback to make changes. A number of the students did not follow directions

68%

27%

5%

Would a Scoring Tool be Helpful in

Understanding Performance?

Helpful

Not

Helpful


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correctly and needed to rework large sections of their writing. My critical feedback

may be part of the reason they did not prefer the use of screencasting. Of the 33

students who turn in their artist statements for proofreading only 22 responded to

the survey questions. Out of the original 33 students there were 6 (18%) who did

not follow directions or wrote an artist statement that needed many corrections.

This aligns with the 22% who did not respond positively to screencasting. Howeversince the questions were anonymous there is no way of knowing which students

answered the questions. This makes these results untestable and this was only an

attempt to look at possible testing biases as a cause for both the positive and

negative responses.

A second possibility for the negative results is that for the first time I made

markings on the written work that the students needed to incorporate into their

final drafts. I did not however provide them with a non-video copy of my markings

because I wanted to test if they would adapt to pausing the video and then make

corrections. In looking at these results along with the questions what was the

worst part (Figure 8.2) and what were the main differences (Figure 8.3) itappears that only some of the students struggled while working from a guiding

video. This could be due to the students level of experience with previous

screencasts as feedback, or their level of comfort with a computer.

When asked about the worst part of video feedback the results were varied. The

majority response indicated there was no worst part (Figure 8.2.) The next highest

response was the challenge of being unable to look back on their work. This

challenge has appeared in previous cycles and continues to a problem. Photography

is the only class that requires students to use the schools servers to store and

retrieve work. This being the case, students are unsure to downloading work from

the server and working with it at home. Due to the file size of the videos, this is the

only option available to give students the feedback and it may continue to present a

challenge moving forward.

In the suggested differences between written and video feedback, the 32% of the

respondents indicated that the information was more clearly presented in video

form and 23% stated that it was a more personal approach. This continues to

reinforce the reasons I believe video feedback is preferable to written feedback.

These findings have been consistent throughout my research and they are

encouraging signs that video feedback may be an improved method of assessment

for students. This must be balanced with the extra time and complications that it

takes for educators to learn this method, but I believe that there is a strong potential

for this system. Once a level of comfort is obtained with the programs, the process

does not take much longer than other methods of feedback, yet the benefits of a

personal approach, clarity, control of sequencing and the modeling art-oriented

speech, are much grater than the extra efforts needed to create the feedback.

The written notes on the students papers were found to be helpful. I was

concerned that it would be too much to ask the students to follow my voice and read

through the comments. However, it may be that because I was discussing the


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comments on their paper the redundancy allowed for a clearer message. It appears

that the corrections were greatly preferred and should be continued.

There was an overwhelming response that having a quantifying assessment tool

would be beneficial on a rough draft (Figure 8.4.) I had not included a scoring

metric in this cycle for two reasons: first, one was used on the last writing cycle and

I wanted to test this cycle without a rubric, and secondly, I did not think that

providing a grade would be necessary for a rough draft. It may be that middle

school English and Social Studies teachers provide rubrics to students rough drafts

and so they are used to having that grade as a way of marking their progress. This

could help to explain the students interest in a rubric for the rough draft.

When asked if providing an opinion would benefit their learning, 50% of the

students indicated that it would make no difference. This was surprising because in

the previous cycle 74% of the students indicated that they would benefit from this

opportunity to share their views. I purposefully changed the wording of this

question because I found it too leading in the previous cycle, however I now wonder

if now this question was too vague and the students didnt understand the meaning.

It may also be the I provided much more negative feedback in this cycle that the

students then had to incorporate into their work and that may have directly affected

their feelings towards this process.

Average length of recording 1:42

Documents

Cycle 8: Video Feedback for First Draft Writing