The Möbius strip of feedback.

gfpeck - http://flic.kr/p/98X3nk

I've taken some time to look into one of the teaching and learning agendas being driven here at my institution. Feedback.

I was advised as a starter to read David Nicol and Debra MacFarlane-Dick's (2004) 'Rethinking Formative Assessment in HE: a theoretical model and seven principles of good feedback practice'. This wasn't a massive read but had some very pertinent points about how the general thrust of how feedback should be thought about and articulated.

I think one of the points I picked up more quickly than the others due to the work I've done on being a reflective learner was Nicol and MacFarlane-Dick's first principle, 1. Facilitates the development of self-assessment (reflection) in learning.

I think this entails more than just reflection though, it lays a pathway to progress further down the principles and provide more than the normal lines of feedback, the 'This isn't very good' and abruptly stopping at the 'This is excellent'. So I think it's top spot as first point is well deserved.

Phil Race expands on this in his 'Using Feedback to help students learn' paper, where he mentions that "In all such cases it is better to praise exactly what was very good or excellent in a little more detail, rather than take the short cut of just using the adjectives themselves." helping students realise what they did or reflect upon the good/bad points.

Expanding on these adjectives helps the learner understand why it was/n't 'very good' or 'excellent', this in turn opens doors for the feedback to be steered in a direction of self assessment. Encouraging a student to look at what made it good/bad, and drawing a comparison to previously laid down standards or comparative work makes for good reflective practice, and something I'm keen to mirror in an online course where I will be providing feedback on, using online e-portfolios.




I also attended a workshop here called 'Feedback & Feedforward', an interesting intro activity was given where we had to draw the person next to us and give feedback to each other on how they did. This was a little ice breaker to help us understand what it is like to receive either good or bad feedback to something that, to be honest, is quite personal (what someone else perceives you to look like). I couldn't bring myself to actually draw anything so instead used my Chromebook to take a photo of the person next to me.

What?.. I used Technology to bridge the gap between my weakness (drawing) and my strengths, Technology (I also saw TEL bulleted on the powerpoint!). The person next to me was pleased that I caught her good side :) I however saw for the first time.. a drawing of myself.. with glasses on.

But I digress, I was pleased that the workshop bolstered what I had read before hand, echoing what David, Debra and Phil expressed as important. A couple of the main points I took away from the workshop was an awareness that having effective formative feedback loops can help scaffold a safe structure to summative assessment. A guiding light if you will to help steer students and lecturers away from high stakes assessment failures where students get disillusioned with their abilities and spend precious time catching up.

Another point was how effective peer assessment can be, getting students used to the methods and models used by lecturers to assess, e.g criteria, model answers and the added benefit of using other students work to reflect upon ones own work.

Overall, I can see more clearly, not necessarily the way feedback should be explicitly written, but an awareness of the possible avenues, some of the benefits and downsides to these avenues and lastly, and I think more importantly, how formative feedback is intrinsic to a students learning and development.

Feedback should be seen as something that doesn't end, a continuous journey through learning, a constant loop or strip twisting between lecturer and student.