Using video technology to enable student voice in assessment feedback
Abstract
Students’ voices have been remarkably absent in feedback research, yet research shows that the way students engage with feedback significantly impacts on its effect on learning. Feedback research has mainly focused on aspects of the feedback message between a sender and receiver, with little consideration of the positioning of students in this process. This article (a) provides an overview of the literature about feedback in education and the role of the student in these processes and (b) provides findings from a pilot project that explored the use of video technology as a self-reflection tool for six teachers and six students to capture assessment interactions and give students a voice in feedback conversations. The pilot employed iPads to facilitate video-aided self-reflection on feedback practices. The results suggest that not only is video a powerful tool for teacher reflection on their feedback practices, it can also provide better understanding of the student perspective in feedback conversations. Importantly, involving students themselves in video-stimulated recall of feedback conversations has the potential to contribute to students’ self-reflection of their involvement in the feedback process, encouraging them to make their voices heard and participate in feedback as a dialogic practice.
Practitioner Notes
- Feedback can have a powerful impact on student learning, but the effects of feedback differ widely between individual students.
- Teachers struggle to establish conditions conducive to allowing students to have a voice, although they may not be aware of this.
- Video is a helpful tool for teachers to reflect on their teaching practices, including feedback practices, and for students to enhance their learning and engagement with feedback.
- A summary of the literature in relation to the role of the student in the feedback process.
- A new conceptual model of the feedback process in which students are active agents.
- A suggestion for how video technology can support students to have a voice in feedback conversations using the technology as a self-reflection tool for teachers and students.
- The role of the student in the feedback process cannot be taken for granted. Students need to be taught the skills that enable them to achieve a voice in the feedback process.
- Video-aided teacher reflection has been demonstrated to provide useful insights for teachers regarding their feedback practices and how they include students in this process.
- Involving students in video-stimulated recall of feedback conversations has the potential to contribute to students’ self-reflection of their involvement in the feedback process, encouraging them to make their voices heard and participate in feedback as a dialogic practice.
Introduction
Feedback is recognised as a key element in every learning theory that influences current educational practice (Thurlings, Vermeulen, Bastiaens, & Stijnen, 2013). Feedback is defined as “information provided by an agent (e.g., teacher, peer, book, parent, self, experience) regarding aspects of one's performance or understanding” (Hattie & Timperley, 2007, p. 81). Thus, feedback is a message provided by a sender, to a receiver. For example, a teacher may provide feedback to a student, a student may provide feedback to a classmate, the teacher or themselves, or an online instruction environment may provide feedback to a student. The educational purpose of feedback is to provide advice to students to improve learning. Feedback can help students identify and address misconceptions, and develop more effective strategies within the learning being addressed and metacognitively when engaging with the feedback to develop strategies to improve their learning (Hattie & Timperley, 2007).
However, research shows that feedback often has limited or sometimes negative effects on students’ learning outcomes. Although understandings about how feedback influences learning have advanced significantly in the last decades, results of large-scale review studies have also highlighted a high degree of inconsistency in feedback effects (e.g., Shute, 2008). One explanation for these inconsistencies lies in differences between how individual students perceive, engage, understand and act on feedback. When the student does not understand feedback, does not have time or opportunity to use it or is not willing or able to use it, feedback will not positively affect learning (Shute, 2008). Much of the research to date has primarily focused on aspects of the feedback message and sender, with limited consideration of how feedback is received and used by students–students are positioned as passive participants in the process (Hattie & Gan, 2011). A dominant assumption is that as long as quality feedback is provided, intended outputs of learning will automatically follow. Figure 1 provides a schematic overview of a traditional model of feedback.
Traditional model of feedback
… it would be a mistake to regard the student as the passive recipient of a call to action. There are complex links between the way in which the message is received, the way in which that perception motivates a selection amongst different courses of action, and the learning activity which may or may not follow. (p. 20–21)
However, despite Black and Wiliam's (1998) identification of student agency as an important component of feedback effectiveness, students as active participants have been largely ignored in feedback research.
In this article, we first provide an overview of the literature about feedback in education and the role of the student in these processes in order to propose a new conceptualisation of the feedback process. Second, we provide findings from a pilot project to explore the role that iPad video technology may play to capture teacher-student interactions and as a self-reflection tool for both teachers and students to realise student voice in feedback conversations.
The student role in feedback research: overview of the literature
A systematic review of feedback research from five learning theory perspectives: behaviourism, cognitivism, social cultural theory, meta-cognitivism and social constructivism, concluded that none of these perspectives fully capture the complexity of the feedback process (Thurlings et al., 2013). Only two studies from a meta-cognitive perspective were reported to identify learner control of the feedback process as important. More recently, sociocultural theories of learning have attended to the socially situated nature of knowing as a relational activity (Elwood & Murphy, 2015). Thus, feedback is viewed as more than a response to information; it is an interaction between the sender and the receiver where each attempt to make meaning from within their own historical, social and cultural context.
Effective feedback should enable students to take responsibility for their own learning, to become self-regulated learners (Nicol & Macfarlane-Dick, 2007). This requires a shift in the traditional teacher-student power relationships—moving away from the teacher as the provider of feedback as “telling” to a situation where the student is empowered, characterised by dialogue between teacher and student, question-asking by the student, and active listening by the teacher to the student. When feedback is viewed as a dialogic process, both students and teachers work collaboratively to develop meaning (Hawe & Parr, 2013), with students given voice to explain what is supporting and hindering their learning (Rodgers, 2006). As Clark (2012) notes, “The notion of ‘voice’ impacts on how teachers structure learning interactions or feedback with and among students” (p. 209). Further, teachers and students need to engage in conversations about feedback in order to optimise its effectiveness (Nicol & Macfarlane-Dick, 2007). Reflection plays an important role in such self-regulatory processes (Clark, 2012).
Research into student feedback experiences suggest that perceptions of feedback in education differ between senders and receivers (Debuse & Lawley, 2016; Havnes, Smith, Dysthe, & Ludvigsen, 2012). Teachers tend to rate the quality of their feedback to be higher than students do (Havnes et al., 2012). Such research implies that there is often a mismatch between teachers’ feedback intentions, students’ perceptions and understanding of teacher feedback, and realised feedback effects. Involving the student as an active agent in the feedback process can help overcome this discrepancy and make feedback processes more fruitful.
Figure 2 depicts a new conceptual framework of effective feedback as a dialogic process with teachers and students as both senders and receivers of feedback, rather than as a one-way transmissive process (Figure 1). Self-regulation is a vital link between feedback and learning, determining if and how feedback will be used (Nicol & McFarlane-Dick, 2007). When actively engaged in the feedback process, students request feedback, question to clarify feedback, negotiate feedback, reflect on feedback and also provide feedback to themselves, their peers or the teacher. Teachers likewise ask questions, and receive and reflect on feedback from the student and adjust their feedback accordingly. For optimal engagement in feedback processes, both teachers and students need to self-regulate as active agents. Feedback is a dynamic process as messages are sent and received, and acted upon through self-regulation resulting in learning. This then feeds back into further dialogue or responses.
Conceptual model of dialogic feedback
Using video technology as a self-reflection tool in assessment feedback
In this section, we present findings from a pilot project exploring the role iPad video technology can play in enhancing dialogic feedback interactions between teachers and students. This work was undertaken to pilot methodologies to capture feedback interactions in teacher-constructed assessment for students with and without disabilities.
Use of video technology to facilitate feedback and self-reflection
There is a long research tradition of using technology to facilitate feedback. For example, there is a substantial body of research on automated feedback provided to students in computer-based assessment (e.g., Van der Kleij, Feskens, & Eggen, 2015). The majority of such studies use written feedback and make limited use of multimodality. The value of audio and video technology has been noted as a more engaging means to provide feedback to students (e.g., Cann, 2014; Crook et al., 2012). Although, many technological applications allow for feedback to be delivered to students in various ways, such research has been conducted from a traditional model of feedback (Figure 1), in which there is limited opportunity for student voice.
Video technology is becoming increasingly more accessible to teachers, for example, through tablets available in classrooms. Video has proven to be a useful self-reflection tool for teachers which can enhance the quality of their teaching (Tripp & Rich, 2012) and feedback practices (Van den Bergh, Ros, & Beijaard, 2014). Although the review by Tripp and Rich (2012) identified that video was particularly powerful as it “helped teachers to literally see their teaching from a different perspective” (p. 686), our literature search identified no previous documentation of the use of video technology as a stimulus for both teacher and student reflection on feedback practices. The work reported in this article is therefore innovative in informing the use of technology for effective feedback.
Method
In this pilot study, the researchers used an iPad to video-record one-on-one teacher-student feedback conversations (intended to take 10–15 minutes) about a piece of student work. The added value of using an iPad compared to other video technology was the possibility to replay the video to participants immediately, with a screen size that allowed ease of viewing and operation by the participant. After the video recording, the teacher and student in turn participated in individual video-stimulated recall (VSR) interviews (Lyle, 2003), which were audio-recorded, as they watched the video back on the iPad. The visual image therefore presented the participants with an authentic record of the interaction on which to reflect, including body language, facial expressions and affective reactions. The participants were asked to stop the video at points they identified as relevant, and comment on these instances. The researcher sometimes asked questions to elaborate on certain points. By interviewing the teacher and student separately, we were able to capture the individual perspectives of both teachers and students of the value of specific instances in the feedback conversation. Neither teachers nor students were prompted about the importance of feedback as a part of this research. It was our intention to understand their interpretation of feedback and the aspects they considered important and valuable in feedback conversations. Teachers and students did not obtain access to the other person's interview, as this was one of the ethical requirements. In future research, it would be worthwhile to include such an element to further support discussions around feedback discourse.
Six teacher-student pairs in Year 9 at two Australian private schools (Schools 1 and 2) and one Government school (School 3) participated in this project. We purposefully chose a range of subject contexts. Table 1 provides an overview of the participants’ characteristics and contexts.
| Teacher-student pairs | Teacher-student pairs | Teacher-student pairs | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| School 1 | School 2 | School 3 | ||||
| A | B | C | D | E | F | |
| Subject | Science | Science | Health and Physical Education | English | English | Health and Physical Education |
| Semester | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| Teacher gender | Female | Female | Male | Female | Female | Male |
| Teaching experience (years) | 14 | 15 | 15 | 11 | 12 | 10 |
| Number of years teacher has taught student | 1 | 2 | 0.5 | 1.5 | 0.5 | 0.5 |
| Student gender | Female | Female | Female | Male | Female | Female |
| Student characteristics as described by teacher | High ability, under achieving | Learning disability; Individual learning plan | Average ability | Learning difficulties (written expression) | High ability, high achieving | High ability, high achieving |
Teachers and students were volunteer participants. Potential teacher participants were nominated by principals as expert teachers and reflective practitioners. Potential student participants were nominated by teachers to represent the diverse nature of students in Australian schools, including students with learning disabilities/difficulties. The Australian Curriculum is built on the proposition that “many students with disability are able to achieve educational standards commensurate with their peers, as long as the necessary adjustments are made to the way in which they are taught (pedagogy) and to the means through which they demonstrate their learning (assessment)” (Australian Curriculum Assessment and Reporting Authority, 2012, p. 20). All of the students in this study were integrated in regular classroom settings with one of the students on an individual learning plan that involved adjustments to assessment.
Analysis
The video recording was used as an opportunity for teachers and students to review and reflect on the feedback conversations. The video recordings of feedback conversations and VSR interviews were transcribed. The main sources of analysis for this article are the VSR interviews. A general overview of the nature of the feedback conversations is provided as background information. The VSR interview transcripts were analysed to create an overview of video stops for each conversation. The nature of comments made during the VSR interviews by teachers and students was coded using a classification developed from initial analysis of participant responses.
Results
The six feedback interactions were very different in nature. These are discussed briefly to give context to the discussion of how video technologies assisted us to gain a deeper analysis of feedback conversations, in particular how these conversations are framed to enable or inhibit student voice.
Description of feedback conversations
Conversation A had a strong focus on content, most of the teacher feedback focused on what went wrong and where the student needed to improve (addressing “the gap”). During the feedback conversation, the student frequently used one word expressions like “yeah” and “okay,” did not ask any questions, and demonstrated apparent limited engagement with the feedback.
In Conversation B, there was a strong focus on confidence building for the student. The teacher reported a trusting relationship with the student. The teacher's feedback mostly came in the form of questions, inviting the student to demonstrate what she had learned, to recall prior knowledge and to analyse the quality of her work. The teacher used scaffolding techniques to help the student elaborate on her responses when she was unsure of the content.
Conversation C involved the teacher playing table tennis with the student and providing continuous feedback, occasionally stopping the play to question and analyse the performance with the student. The teacher's feedback was largely based on questioning to encourage the student to think about how she could improve. The student responded non-verbally as well as verbally with extended responses, and immediately acted on the feedback.
In Conversation D, the teacher used questions to encourage the student to articulate his knowledge and thinking, and to prompt self-evaluation. The student was actively engaged in the feedback session and provided explanations of his work. When the student had difficulty providing a response, the teacher gave cues to scaffold a response or at times provided the explanation. A focus of this interaction was for the student to recognise his strengths as well as areas for improvement.
In Conversation E, the teacher and student were engaged in a dialogue about the student's writing. The teacher purposefully posed questions that invited the student to analyse her work. The student identified aspects of her work where she wanted to improve. This resulted in the teacher having a better understanding of the student's learning needs.
Conversation F was based on the student's self-assessment of her individual and team performance. The teacher asked for justification of her evaluation as well as specifically asking for advice on how he could improve his teaching. The dialogue between the teacher and student was easily flowing. The student gave elaborated, self-reflective responses which added to the teacher's understanding of the student as a learner. She also took the role of feedback sender (Figure 2).
Quantitative descriptions of the feedback conversations and VSR interviews are presented in Table 2. The first point of interest is the percentage of teacher versus student talk in the feedback conversations. From Table 2 it is evident that in Conversation F the teacher and student were engaged in a dialogue where each contributed equally to the analysis of the student's work. Conversation C appears to be in direct contrast to this. However, the student's responses, when provided, were reflective and demonstrated her understanding to the teacher. In addition, the student used much gesturing in response to the teacher's questions, indicating that she understood how to respond in this context. In Conversation A, the student appears to make a moderate contribution. However, her responses barely progressed beyond “yeah” and “okay” as the teacher informed her of the content on which she needed to work. Thus, the quantified characteristics of the conversations and reflections could give a distorted view of the nature of these feedback conversations and the extent to which students had a voice in these conversations identified through the qualitative descriptions.
| Characteristic | Feedback conversation | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| A | B | C | D | E | F | |
| Length of video conversation in minutes | 14:39 | 6:59 | 17:50 | 16:49 | 6:06 | 14:12 |
| No. words teacher talk | 2356 | 1136 | 1120 | 2506 | 985 | 1100 |
| No. words student talk | 164 | 141 | 39 | 341 | 253 | 1049 |
| % teacher talka | 93 | 89 | 97 | 88 | 80 | 51 |
| % student talka | 7 | 11 | 3 | 12 | 20 | 49 |
| VSR interviews | ||||||
| Length interview teacher | 26:55 | 19:14 | 31:17 | 34:53 | 14:46 | 33:52 |
| Length interview student | 25:12 | 15:55 | 22:36 | 23:44 | 13:32 | 21:33 |
| Number of video stops teacher | 17 | 12 | 11 | 30 | 9 | 19 |
| Number of video stops student | 7 | 3 | 3 | 9 | 4 | 10 |
| Number of overlapping video stops | 6 | 1 | 1 | 8 | 4 | 7 |
- aBased on number of words spoken.
Comparison of VSR video stops
So, alright he didn't say what I was hoping he would get towards…but I knew that he was on the right track towards articulating what the problem was. So instead of telling him what the problem was I chose asking the question to further draw out from his understanding what it might have been.
Stop 1: Student B: when we were doing the actual prac… she would explain it really well, and when I would go ask for help, she would explain it really clearly.
Stop 2: Student B: when I did the diagram, I showed how the glass changed directions. Yeah. I forgot to say that.
Student B was confident in talking about what she was good at and the areas she now needed to work on. The limited amount of stops that she made during the VSR may be due to the limited and concise teaching points that she now had to work on, and because one of her foci was to highlight other aspects of her work that she was doing well. In comparison, in conversation E, the teacher's VSR stops were reflective of her feedback strategy, in particular whether she had enabled or inhibited the student to have a voice in this conversation. The student, who was identified as high achieving, was likewise reflective of how she had been given opportunities to express her opinion, and how her teacher responded to her feedback about her learning needs. The teachers’ feedback aligned with the learning needs of the students and their VSR stops focussed on why they responded in a particular way or were reflective on how they could improve their practice. It was evident from this qualitative analysis of the VSR video stops that how teachers structured their feedback impacted on student voice. Figure 3 illustrates the contrasting video stops and their qualitative nature, demonstrating the diverse nature of teacher and student comments on the videos. An overview of each teacher-student diagram follows.
Student and teacher video stops in video-stimulated recall interview
C = content; SC = relation to assessment task standards and criteria (rubric); S = strategy for improvement; U = student understanding/response to feedback; RF = reflection on feedback strategy; KO = knowledge of the other (teacher-student; student-teacher); KS = knowledge of self as a learner; E = experience and reflection on being video-taped; R = value of video reflection and insights; V+ = recognition of student voice/teacher shaping conversation to stimulate student voice; (V-) = lack of student voice.
Teacher A identified that the video made her aware that her feedback had focussed on content information, and was often focussed on corrections rather than recognising strengths. She noted Student A's minimal responses to her feedback and commented when this changed: “she's finally listening to me there. I've relaxed and I'm actually engaging with her” (7:47). She observed the student's engagement based on her body language (nodding, eye contact). Teacher A discussed changes to her feedback practice to involve her students. She indicated her desire to use video recording in future feedback sessions, in order to continually examine and improve her practice.
Student A indicated that she found the feedback conversation helpful. Her primary response during the VSR was to use the session as another opportunity to listen to the teacher's feedback, which she indicated was a great amount of information to comprehend. Her comments on the video mostly focused on the content of the feedback, and how she could improve her future work.
Teacher B reflected on her feedback practices as purposefully asking questions and building student confidence. The video made her realise that she sometimes still provided Student B with information instead of requiring the student to respond: “I often feed her too much information and I was aware I had done that a few parts through the feedback. So, for that one … I let her come to that on her own” (2:30). Teacher B identified times when she had provided opportunities for Student B to have a voice.
Student B indicated that she found the feedback conversation a positive and helpful experience. She reflected on Teacher B's feedback strategy and how this helps her improve: “I think she explained things really well” (1:05). She also commented on content and how she could use this information to improve her work.
As Teacher C watched the video, he constantly reflected on his feedback strategy and noted instances where he gave Student C voice: “it was about getting her to make the connection with the feet, not me, and asking her, ‘well, why did you hit the ball like that?’, without me telling her” (6:19).
Student C provided limited commentary on the video and her three stops were focussed on the content that she needed to improve: “I think that I wasn't holding the bat well enough and I wasn't moving the angles of it to… hit it better” (7:20).
Teacher D made frequent stops when reviewing the video, reflecting on her feedback strategy, drawing on her knowledge of Student D as a learner and how she was or was not allowing him to have a voice: “… if I was doing this again I would throw it over to him and say ‘You tell me what you think’ and I would zip it … I think he could have offered a lot at that point … so I really should have let him respond there more” (12:29).
Student D stopped the video at important content points and discussed these by identifying strategies that he would put in place to improve, demonstrating a strong personal commitment to taking action on the feedback: “Something I need to work on, commas and punctuation … ‘Cause that's not my strong point.” (2:49).
Teacher E commented on student voice in five of her six video stops. Her reflections covered her feedback strategy as well as how student E understood and responded to her feedback: “we're having more of a two-way conversation rather than me just telling her things. And so here she's taken what I've said but also added … dialogue as an area that she thinks that she has an issue” (4:48).
All of Student E's video stops overlapped with Teacher E's. The student was reflective of the feedback strategy and aware that she had a voice in the conversation: “I think it's also the fact that she suggested to me … how I can improve that particular feature that I said I need improvement on, is really valuable when it comes to feedback” (4:48).
Teacher F made observations of his feedback strategy as well as Student F's response. His comments reflected his knowledge of the student and how best to encourage her to articulate her thinking: “That's a very bad question I've asked her, very wordy, long-winded, bad question, and then I didn't even ask the question, I just talked” (1:55).
Student F made many stops in the video, reflecting on Teacher F's feedback strategy and how he gave her a voice in this conversation. It was evident that she understood how this teacher worked: “with the questions, he's asking us questions and things you need to do, and if he doesn't know something he'll ask. So he's very open-minded as well” (7:21).
Discussion
The purpose of this pilot project was to explore the role that iPad video technology could play to capture teacher-student interactions and as a self-reflection tool for both teachers and students to realise student voice in feedback conversations. Our analysis of the video and interview data have revealed three critical findings related to the value of the methodology to investigate student voice as an aspect of dialogic feedback practices: the importance of teacher responsiveness to students’ learning and personal characteristics when providing feedback; the criticality of teachers structuring feedback in a way that facilitates student voice in feedback conversations; and the value of the iPad for teacher and student reflective responses to their learning.
The results have demonstrated the value of the methodology which enabled us to directly compare and analyse the nature of the feedback conversation and the convergences and divergences of teacher and student reflection on the salient points within these conversations. Their comments on the videos gave initial insights into how teachers and students perceive and understand feedback. The results illustrate the different degrees of student voice and the complex nature of feedback interactions, particularly as teachers work to include students in feedback as a dialogic practice.
We found that the teachers tailored their feedback based on their knowledge of the student that included both cognitive and affective dimensions. Thus, teachers B and D when providing feedback to their students with learning difficulties were cognisant of remaining supportive and encouraging, tempering advice to improve with acknowledgment of skills that had been demonstrated. However, this is an aspect of quality feedback (Hattie & Timperley, 2007) and was evident in every feedback interaction. The discerning feature evident in this study was knowledge of the student and awareness on the teachers’ part of the type of feedback required for each learner's stage of learning as well as their personal characteristics. The depth and individuality of teacher-student feedback interactions were most critical.
The methodology was also of value to teachers and students as a self-reflective tool on the feedback strategy and content. Watching the video provided an opportunity for self-reflection of their involvement in the feedback process from a unique angle, an important first step in encouraging them to participate in feedback as a dialogic practice. Teachers and students may use this information to self-regulate and subsequently modify their feedback and learning practices (Figure 2).
Through use of the video recording, teachers can view the feedback conversation from a new perspective. It should enable them to understand how students respond to feedback by examining student responses, not only through verbal expressions but also through, for example, gestures and facial expressions. This was evident in every teacher's VSR interview but particularly for Teacher A, who expressed intent to change her feedback practice. All of the teachers in this study appeared to know their students well, drawing on this knowledge to explain their feedback strategy. While some had taught the student for only one semester, others had been teaching the student for nearly two years. The length of time teachers had taught students did not appear to impact on the dialogic nature of the feedback interactions. Rather, the feedback strategy used by the teacher appeared to be a key factor in shaping these conversations to facilitate student voice.
Most importantly, using video technology, students are given a voice in the feedback process: they can watch the video and gain further understandings of the intentions of the conversation and can record their own responses to and further questions for the teacher about the feedback. The extent to which watching the video helped students to self-regulate varied. It appeared to be related to how the teacher structured their feedback, and the students’ ability to articulate their understanding of themselves as learners. For example, Student A responded to the feedback with a one-word acknowledgment and stopped the video on content points whereas Student D responded to the feedback with elaborated discussion of points and stopped the video at points to reflect on the feedback and demonstrated his ownership of follow-up actions. Student F participated almost equally in the feedback conversation, reflecting on her actions as well as providing the teacher with requested feedback on his teaching practice.
When conversations focussed mainly on content and how to improve, students in the VSR interviews reflected mostly on the content they needed to learn. When teachers structured their feedback as a dialogue by asking questions and requesting students to self-assess and provide feedback to the teacher, students’ VSR comments were more reflective of the value of the feedback for themselves and demonstrated reflection at a metacognitive level. In these cases, students demonstrated ownership of their learning and commitment to act on feedback. For example, Student E informed the teacher of an aspect in her work that she wanted to improve. Dialogic feedback encouraged student voice and enhanced self-regulation of both teacher and student.
Our research was inclusive of students with identified learning needs in mainstream education settings, including a student with an individual education plan. These participating students were at least as effective in engaging with the technology and process as students without identified learning needs. Although, the approach may not be suitable for all students with disability, this should not be assumed. In our previous work with a curriculum program for students with significant physical and intellectual disabilities (Queensland Curriculum and Assessment Authority, 2014), we noted the increased use of technology with these students and their increased development of agency in using technology for a range of purposes, including assistive technologies.
At the beginning of this article we proposed a new conceptual model of dialogic feedback that involved the teacher and student as being givers and receivers of feedback and through this process learning and self-regulating their responses. Our project has demonstrated that the teachers who actively encouraged students to have a voice in feedback conversations were learners through this dialogue. However, we also found that the video recording acted as a medium for feedback, facilitating the teachers and students to reflect on their interactions and how to improve these.
Conclusion and future research
Although students’ role in feedback processes has been identified as a significant factor in determining feedback effectiveness (Shute, 2008), it has received limited attention in the literature thus far. This article (a) summarised research on feedback in education and the role of the student in these processes and proposed a new conceptual model of the feedback process and (b) proposed a way forward in giving students a voice in feedback conversations using iPad video technology as a self-reflection tool for teachers and students.
The conceptual model of feedback as a dialogic process (Figure 2) depicts both teachers and students engaging as feedback providers and learners. Research clearly suggests that individual student's responses to feedback differ, and feedback does not automatically result in learning (Black & Wiliam, 1998; Shute, 2008). However, much feedback research has failed to consider the student as an active agent in the feedback process. Although research from the student perspective is emerging, more qualitative research is needed to better understand the complexities of feedback processes. Students need to be given a voice in feedback processes and need to be actively involved in research that focuses on feedback effects if we are to gain a better understanding of feedback and make feedback processes more effective.
This pilot project demonstrated that use of iPad video technology to record feedback sessions, and teacher and student use of these as a stimulus for reflection, is one way to give students a voice in feedback practices. Analyses showed the variance to which this occurred and, based on the knowledge we have, different degrees to which teachers gave voice to students and to which students achieved voice. All teachers identified the importance of providing students with more voice, with some expressing need to change their practice. Students who had a voice in feedback conversations indicated such opportunity as helpful to their learning.
Our future research will use this method to enable us to fully understand the potential for video technology in giving students a voice in the feedback process. Our pilot study focused on one-on-one teacher-student feedback interactions. In practice, teachers could commence with use of the video technology and stimulated recall with a small number of diverse students to examine their feedback approach with students at a general level. The involvement of all students individually in the classroom may be seen as an additional work pressure. However, more than a decade ago, the internationally-respected education system of Singapore introduced the philosophy “teach less, learn more” (OECD, 2010) to improve the breadth and depth of student learning. We posit that feedback research indicates that time allocated to engaging with students through this method will lead to positive learning for both teachers and students. The teachers in this study expressed the value of this form of feedback conversation, although were cognisant of time restrictions and application to everyday work in the classroom. However, they also explained how they could use insights gained from these one-to-one conversations to inform dialogic feedback practices in whole class interactions.
This methodology holds promise for feedback in larger classroom settings. In such a context, the teacher could videotape a lesson segment and identify feedback elements in a video-stimulated recall session. By conducting VSR interviews with multiple students, research could shed light on how individual students respond differently to the same feedback. Further partnerships between researchers, teachers and students will bring much-needed insights into how technology can be used to harness the power of feedback to support student learning as a dialogic practice.
Acknowledgements
This research was supported under Australian Research Council's Discovery Projects funding scheme (Project Number ARCDP15010169).
Statements on open data, ethics and conflict of interest
- The data described in this article are not accessible to other researchers as per written agreement with participants and ethical approval.
- The research was carried out under the guidelines described in the National Statement on Ethical Conduct in Human Research and has been approved by Australian Catholic University's Human Research Ethics Committee.
- The authors do not have a potential conflict of interest.
Biography
Dr Fabienne Van der Kleij is a Research Fellow, Dr Lenore Adie is the Senior Research Fellow and Professor Joy Cumming is a Research Area Director in the area of Assessment, Evaluation and Student Learning at the Learning Sciences Institute Australia of Australian Catholic University. Their research interests include (formative) assessment, student learning, teachers’ work, educational technology and feedback.
