You can use this technique to help learners focus their efforts on a specific aspect of their work.
The idea is to maximise the return the learner sees on their investment.
By focussing on one particular thing, they can bring about fairly major changes in a short space of time.
Here’s how it works:
When you are marking learner work, select one specific aspect of what they have done and highlight this.
The easiest way is to use a coloured pen to draw a box around it.
Another option is to use a highlighter.
Next, write your feedback in the nearest possible place, making sure it is exclusively focussed on the area you have highlighted.
This means you are not providing feedback in the form of an overview covering all elements of the learner’s work.
Instead, you are providing highly focussed feedback dealing with one aspect of their work.
When you return work to your learners, explain what you have done.
Indicate that your aim is to help them make quick improvements in a specific area, rather than asking them to think about their work as a whole.
Give them time to respond and to reflect on your feedback.
Circulate through the room, offering support to any learners who need it.
You now have two options.
First, you can set a time limit and ask learners to act on your feedback immediately by redoing the part of their work you have highlighted.
Second, you can tell learners when they will next have a chance to act on your feedback. For example, in the last section of the lesson. This primes them for what is to come later.
Either way, you are making sure you close the gap.
In summary, the process runs as follows:
- Learners produce work.
- Teacher marks work.
- Teacher picks out a specific section of the work, highlights this and gives feedback.
- Learners read, respond, and reflect on their feedback.
- Learners act on their feedback – either immediately or soon after.
In certain situations, this can be a really effective method.
For example, learners might be working on coursework or a controlled assessment.
In these situations, specific, targeted feedback will help them to quickly improve a key aspect of their work.
Another example is project-based work, where the provision of focused feedback followed by an immediate opportunity to implement it can help learners improve the overall quality of what they are doing before they move on.
The approach can also eliminate the risk of learners compounding any errors they are making.
You can develop the technique by challenging learners to tell you in advance what specific areas of their work they think you should highlight and give feedback on.
This puts the onus on them to carefully assess their own efforts and break down their work into a series of separate elements.
Or, to put it another way, to analyse their work in the same way the teacher does.
