Good feedback tends to lead to good progress.
As teachers, we are trying to do the best for our students.
Feedback means we can give them access to our expertise.
This makes it easier for them to target their effort and make progress.
It also helps them to think and do things differently than would otherwise be the case.
Through feedback we correct, coach and cajole students.
We also support them, challenge them and give them access to opportunities that might otherwise pass them by – or not even come into their frame of reference.
We know from research that feedback can play a significant role in raising achievement.
Here’s an example to consider, that supports this argument.
Imagine that you decide you want to learn a new language.
Instead of going to one of the online courses available, you opt for a tutor. Someone who can give you face-to-face support.
You have a look at the local listings and identify someone who sounds good. They say they speak Italian and that is the language you have chosen to learn.
So, you get in touch with them and put a date in the diary for your first lesson.
Because you are an experienced, mature learner you do some preparatory work using a combination of books, apps and the internet.
You want to impress your tutor in the first session! And you want to convey a sense of yourself – what kind of learner you will be and your keenness to work hard to be successful.
On arriving at the first session, your tutor greets you warmly.
The two of you sit down and begin to chat. ‘Have you lived in Italy?’ you ask them. ‘No,’ comes the reply.
‘Is your family Italian?’ you ask. ‘No,’ they say.
‘Oh,’ you reply. ‘Did you study Italian at university?’ The tutor shakes their head.
‘A Level?’ ‘No.’
‘Right. OK. Um, do you know Italian?’
The tutor smiles. ‘Yes, of course. I took an online course last year and am well ahead of the novice stage. Now come on, let’s get started!’
Why would this be a deflating experience for most people?
Why would many people decide not to go back to the tutor after the first session but to find someone else instead?
Expertise.
We want an expert.
Someone who is at least reasonably more expert than us.
This is because we want access to their expertise.
And we want their feedback.
Because it is that feedback which we know will help us to learn more quickly and more effectively. That will help us to target our effort and sustain our purpose.
So, we leave the early-stage, self-taught tutor after a single session and find someone whose expertise is well in advance of our own.
And we do so because we know that the learning experience which follows will likely be much better (only likely, because feedback and expertise are not the sole criteria of success).
So that is my message to you when it comes to feedback.
Be the expert.
Give learners access to your expertise.
Do this by providing verbal and written feedback.
Ensure learners have time to act on and implement your feedback.
And use every opportunity, including marking, to elicit information you can use to inform your feedback.
That’s what works.
