Providing feedback is one of the most powerful tools that you can use to transform your students’ learning. But as we all know, sometimes feedback can be negative, causing it to be counterproductive. So how can educators provide effect feedback to students and encourage them to work harder?
Even though there’s no easy way for providing feedback, we generated a list of 4 different ways that you, as an educator, can use with your students.
- Be specific with your feedback.
You many think that “Good job!” is a good feedback. But this doesn’t tell your students what they are doing correctly or what they are doing incorrectly. What we suggest to do is try to be specific with your feedback by either focusing on one part of the work or provide your students with information on what they did correctly or incorrectly.
- Provide feedback in a timely manner.
The most effective feedback is usually given immediately. Students who receive feedback immediately respond positively (i.e., better grades). Also, if you give feedback weeks or months later, your students will not remember what they wrote about! Your feedback can be written (i.e., post-it note), verbally or non-verbally (i.e., frown, smile).
- Alternate due dates.
If you have a lot of students or classes, this is a great method for you to provide feedback on research projects or tests. By alternating due dates for each students/classes, you can spend more quality time to provide feedback.
- Ask students to give YOU feedback.
That’s right. Have your students give you feedback and be sure to read them! Let them know that they can provide feedback anonymously. Create surveys that allow students to take at home at the end of the school year or semester. Ask them what they like or dislike about your class, what would they do differently, etc. If you are planning to use a survey for feedback, there are free survey tools, online like SurveyMonkey or SurveyPlanet.
Do you have other methods for providing feedback? Share it with the rest of the Voki community!
Until next time,
Eva D.
The Voki Team
Bio: Eva is the Community Manager for Voki and is part of the Marketing Team at Oddcast. She enjoys playing the piano and knitting on her free time. (She’s also a Rubik’s cube master!) She loves to hear your feedback and comments for Voki!
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