USING TECHNOLOGY TO ENGAGE STUDENTS WITH FEEDBACK ON ASSESSED WORKDr Fiona Handley, Centre for Learning and Teaching

ISSUES IN FEEDBACK ON ASSESSED WORK

What is the purpose of giving students feedback on assessed work?

What is the purpose of giving students feedback on assessed work?• To close the gap between the teacher’s

concept or understanding and the student’s concept or understanding

What is the purpose of giving students feedback on assessed work?• To close the gap between the teacher’s

concept or understanding and the student’s concept or understanding

Staff concept

Student concept

Feedback

Feedback

Types of feedback: • Corrective• Feedforward• Immediate • Delayed

Main sources of feedback:• Tutors• Student him/herself

Staff concept

Student concept

Feedback

Feedback

The work of Royce Sadler, David Nicol and Graham Gibbs have been particularly influential in conceptualising this gap and suggesting ways to bridge it.

For example:

• Formative feedback opportunities (Gibbs)• Dialogic approaches to feedback (Nicol)• Reviewing – self and peer (Nicol)• Complex appraissal (Sadler)

All these are about increasing activity around that feedback loop.

“The most problematic aspect of the classical feedback model is that assessors (whether academics or student peers) are the ones who do the noticing, the thinking

about repair and modification, and the generation of ways to improve”

Sadler 2013 Opening Up Feedback: Teaching learners to see. In Merry, S. et al (Eds) Reconceptualising Feedback in Higher Education: Developing dialogue with students. London: Routledge p. 54-63.

WAYS OF ENGAGING STUDENTS WITH FEEDBACK

• Legible handwriting• Use variety of feedback types • Structure feedback to assessment

criteria• Hand back assessments in class• Return feedback quickly

• Legible handwriting• Use variety of feedback types • Structure feedback to assessment criteria• Hand back assessments in class• Return feedback quickly• Not revealing mark until feedback

collected or read

• Legible handwriting• Use variety of feedback types • Structure feedback to assessment criteria• Hand back assessments in class• Return feedback quickly• Not revealing mark until feedback

collected or read• Tutor gives generic feedback to whole

class, students consider how it applies to them

• Legible handwriting• Use variety of feedback types • Structure feedback to assessment criteria• Hand back assessments in class• Return feedback quickly• Not revealing mark until feedback

collected or read• Tutor gives generic feedback to whole

class, students consider how it applies to them

• Students mark each other’ work and practice giving feedback

• Legible handwriting• Use variety of feedback types • Structure feedback to assessment criteria• Hand back assessments in class• Return feedback quickly• Not revealing mark until feedback

collected or read• Tutor gives generic feedback to whole

class, students consider how it applies to them

• Students mark each other’s work and practice giving feedback

• The next assignment includes a section where the student states how they have addressed feedback

TECHNOLOGICAL RESPONSES

eFeedback tools

Blackboard’s Assignment toolTurnitin’s Grademark

Studentfolio Stand alone tools

Blogs, wikis, discussion boards

Rubrics, QuickmarksGroup work, Peer mark

Audio, videoMarked up texts or images

Online quiz feedback

Using technologies including:Desktop computers, laptops, tablets, smart phones

And platforms including:VLEs, classroom technologies such as Polleverywhere & Nearpod,

social media, discipline specific apps

Basic ‘hygiene’ factors covered by eFeedback:• Variety of forms of feedback (text,

rubrics, audio, video, short comments etc, and in combinations)

• Typewritten feedback (mostly!)• Speed of return (online quizzes, feedback

instantly available on mobile devices)

Digitization of ‘paper-based’ ways of engaging, for example:• Burying marks within audio feedback• Requiring students to write learning points

from feedback to activate release of grades (Sheffield Hallam)

• Completing a section on an online cover sheet (University of Dundee; Institute of Education)

• Use of QuickMark banks to link to further resources

University of Brighton• School of Health

Sciences QuickMark set to use in GradeMark

• Speeds up marking• Ensure consistency• Highlights guidance

for future work• Can link to other

resources such as academic writing support materials

New tools and new approaches for example:• online collaboration tools such as Nearpod and

PollEverywhere for engaging students with generic feedback in class

• using ePortfolios as a reflective tool• using wikis (Dundee)• an online questionnaire (IoE, Westminster) • a blog entry (IoE, Westminster)

These are key ways of ‘closing the feedback loop’.

University of Westminster’s MACE/eReflect 3.2• Students complete online questionnaire

and reflective blog, and receive an automatically generated report

• Questionnaire creation by staff, completion by students, report generation and storage, and updating/sharing of the learning journal all completed in one system.

• System of alerts via email which communicates when a tutee has completed a reflection, and when the tutor has commented.

University of Westminster’s MACE/eReflect 3.2• Students complete online questionnaire

and reflective blog, and receive an automatically generated report

• Questionnaire creation by staff, completion by students, report generation and storage, and updating/sharing of the learning journal all completed in one system.

• System of alerts via email which communicates when a tutee has completed a reflection, and when the tutor has commented.

Automated feedback• Open University’s

Interactive Computer Marked Assignments (ICMAs)

• Large cohorts = strong analytics

• Uses pattern matching software to generate responses

• (Jordan 2012)

Drawing feedback together• Development of a ‘feedback store’ was a

recommendation from Sheffield Hallam’s project Making Connections

• Development of a moodle plug-in to draw together past marks and feedback from across modules for staff (IoE)

• An in-house VLE where students can see all feedback on current and past modules in one place (Essex)

• App which draws together marks and feedback from across different marking platforms (Portsmouth)

University of Portsmouth MyFeedback App

FEEDBACK DASHBOARDS

Linked to discussion forums

Tagging feedback

Built in group activities

Analytics on engagement

All feedback from all sources in one place

Accessible by tutors

Linked to PDP

Allows comparison to other students

Links to programme learning outcomes

Other technologies

Haptics SimMan Location aware

BEARING FRUIT?

The NMC Horizon Report 2014 predicts in the medium to long term an increased focus on:• Learning analytics• Data driven learning and assessment• Evolution of online learning• Games and gamification• Personalized learning and adaptive

learning software• Finding new ways to analyse and

represent data sets

Staff concept Student concept

Feedback

Feedback

Tutor

Self - reflection

Staff concept Student concept

Feedback

Feedback

Tutor

Self - reflectionPeers

More advanced students

Staff concept Student concept

Feedback

Feedback

Tutor

Self - reflectionPeers

More advanced students

External community

Staff concept Student concept

Feedback

Feedback

Tutor

Self - reflectionPeers

More advanced students

External community

Computer generated

Staff concept Student concept

Feedback

Feedback

Tutor

Self - reflectionPeers

More advanced students

External community

Computer generated

Learning Analytics

Staff concept Student concept

Feedback

Feedback

Tutor

Self - reflectionPeers

More advanced students

External community

Computer generated

Learning Analytics

Staff concept Student concept

Feedback

Feedback

Tutor

Self - reflectionPeers

More advanced students

External community

Computer generated

Learning Analytics

Student concept

Ways forward:• Developing ways of more voices into

feedback, breaking down the tutor – feedback – student loop.

• Possibilities of using feedback beyond individual assignments

• Surfacing of feedback• More automated feedback based on

student response and on other student data

• More data on how students engage with feedback

References cited• Gibbs, G Principles of assessment http

://www.testa.ac.uk/index.php/resources/best-practice-guides/127-principles-of-assessment• Jordan, S. (2012) "Student Engagement with Assessment and Feedback: Some Lessons from

Short-Answer Free-Text E-Assessment Questions", Computers & Education, 58 (2) pp. 818-834.

• MACE report https://sites.google.com/a/staff.westminster.ac.uk/mace/e-reflect• Nicol, D. J. & Macfarlane-Dick, D. (2006). Formative assessment and self-regulated learning: A

model and seven principles of good feedback practice. Studies in Higher Education, 31(2), 199-218

• Nicol, D. [2010] From monologue to dialogue: improving written feedback processes in mass higher education. In Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education Vol 35 No. 5 August 1020 501-517

• Sadler, D. R. 2013 Opening Up Feedback: Teaching learners to see. In Merry, S. et al (Eds) Reconceptualising Feedback in Higher Education: Developing dialogue with students. London: Routledge p. 54-63.

• Sadler, D. R. 2010. Beyond feedback: developing student capability in complex appraisal. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 35, 535-550.

• Lots of information on initiatives can be found at http://www.jisc.ac.uk/guides/feedback-and-feed-forward

Images from openphoto.net