Learning intentions

• To know what is meant by high quality formative feedback

• To know the steps needed to provide high quality formative feedback in your classroom

• To understand how formative feedback can impact on students’ learning

Activity 1a

Exploring effective feedback

What do we mean by formative feedback?

‘Feedback to any student should be about the particular qualities of his or her work, with advice on what he or she can do to improve, and should avoid comparisons with other students.’

Inside the Black Box, Black & Wiliam, 1998

Characteristics of formative feedback

the desired goal

some understanding of how to close the gap

evidence on where they are now

Feedback should provide:

Timing of formative feedback

• Feedback during the learning

• Allow time for improvement

Activity 1b

Formative statements

Why is formative feedback important?

• Focuses on improvement

• De-emphasises competition

• Improves motivation and learning ambition

Types of feedback

Oral feedback

• During the lesson/activity• Personal and immediate• Interactive (two-way)

Effective Oral FeedbackActivity: Student tests a number of household substances with

litmus paper.Learning intentions: Plan and conduct a fair test

Classify substancesIdentify common acids and bases

You are getting better at carrying out an investigation. Well done!

Good girl, you have completed the report very neatly

Good strategy, you have tested all the substances with the blue litmus paper and recorded your results. Do you think it would help to use the blue litmus paper?

Well done. I see you recorded all your results. How do acids effect litmus paper?

Focusing the feedback

‘I recognised things in myself like commenting about the handwriting and spelling, when I should be commenting on the learning intention. It’s been a real revelation to me. I’m aware of it all the time now and when I hear myself starting to say “you’ve left a capital letter out there”, I stop really quickly now and go back to talking about the learning intention.’

Teacher from S. Clarke’s research project

Types of feedback

Written Feedback

• Tends to be after the task is complete• Comments only

Learning from feedback

• Do you allow time for students to read your comments?

• Do you allow time for improvements to be made to the work?

• Can students read/understand your marking comments?

How do students interpret your feedback?

• ‘Develop these ideas further…’- ‘Teachers expect you to know what they mean in comments.’ - ‘It would be good if teachers wrote how you could improve your work more.’

• ‘Good work …’

- ‘Good’ doesn’t help much – he’s just saying that it’s not really very good. I’d like it if he just told the truth.’

- ‘If I get a ‘good’ , I often don’t know what I’ve done good’

• ‘You must try harder…’

- ‘I get ‘try harder’ a lot, but it doesn’t really help me do any better‘

A controversial question about marking

Which is most effective in helping students improve?

• Mark/grade only (e.g. 4/10, B+)

• Mark/grade and comment

• Comment only

Comment-only marking is the best way to help students improve

Groups of students given:

Improvement in work

Interest in subject

Marks/grades only Nil + for high attainers- for middle/low

Marks/grades + comments

Nil + for high attainers- for middle/low

Comments only 30% + for all groups

Research findings, Black & Wiliam,1998

A suggested strategy for written feedback

• Find two successes in the piece of work based on the features of quality

• Find the part of the work that has most scope for an immediate ‘jump’ (not simply the worst part)

• Write a short prompt telling the child exactly what to do to this part of their work

• Provide time for them to read, process and respond to your prompt

Prompts for improvement

• A reminder prompt is most suitable for able children ‘Say more about how you feel about this person.’

• A scaffold prompt scaffolds the learning for children who need more support than a simple reminder

‘Can you describe how this person is a ‘good friend’?’

‘Describe something that happened that showed they are a good friend.’

• An example prompt can be extremely successful with all children, but especially with average or below average children

‘Choose one of these or your own: “He is a good friend because he never says unkind things about me”, “My friend is a friend because he never tells me lies.”’Shirley Clarke

Reminder prompt

Learning intention: To explore the structure and function of different organs and systems

- ‘The heart beats faster when we run.’

Emma, how might this affect how we breathe?

‘When we run our heart beats faster, this pumps blood to our lungs quicker, and we breath faster to get more oxygen into

our blood.’

Scaffold prompt

Learning intention: To use dialogue to give the reader an impression of character

- ‘Emil smiled and whimmpered, “Put it in your pocit.”’

‘Emil smiled slyly’

Complete this with a powerful adverb:

Emil smiled …………..

Example prompt

Learning intention: To classify living things‘All living thing in the garden can be divided into plants and animals, depending on how get food’

‘ ‘All living thing in the garden can be divided into plants and animals, grass is a plant as it makes it’s own food and birds are animals as they cannot make their own food..’

Name one example of each and think of how they get or make their

food.

Activity 2

Prompts for improvement

Final suggestions

For effective formative feedback:

• Relate the feedback to the learning intention and features of quality

• Identify where success has occurred

• Set a goal for improvement

• Show where and how improvement could take place

• Allow time for students to make improvements

• Start small