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Theory into Practice: Feedback Feeds Teaching and Learning

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What should a teacher tell a student about how she is doing? About her academic work? About her classroom personality and behavior? About how she is making progress this year? Should it be praise? Critique? Reinforcement? Correction? Should it be what a student wants to hear or what a learner needs to know? Feedback is not simple.

In simple terms, at the end of the assignment or unit a teacher and the children being taught want to wind up at the same point – successful teaching causing successful learning. As a teacher gives feedback to children, the same processes of assessment pertain to the teacher’s progress in meeting teaching goals. A master teacher uses feedback to improve her own teaching.

In his highly informative study of how teacher and school behaviors affect student achievement, John Hattie assigns feedback to students a score of .79. As the average effect size is .40, feedback is one of the more powerful strategies teachers can use to move the needle of student achievement. The right feedback delivered at the right time in the right way makes a difference. If not, not so much.

John Hattie – Effect Size Study

Hattie, however, also notes that 89% of the talk in a classroom is teacher talk. He admonishes teachers to talk less and listen more. And this is a key to providing effective feedback. Listen to and watch for the moment to give a student the most effective information to affect her learning.

What is feedback?

Interestingly, there are two definitions of the word feedback that a teacher should know. The first definition is – helpful information that is given to someone to say what can be done to improve a performance or a product or their work. Feedback is relevant information. The second definition is technical yet truly fits school – an annoying and unwanted sound caused by signals being returned to an electronic sound system. Other feedback is disruptive noise.

Hattie listened to and surveyed students about feedback. His study said that 80% of the feedback a student receives comes from other students. As we consider Hattie’s findings, we nod in agreement that student-to-student talk categorized as feedback is social commentary, praise, complaint or just talk. This means that 80% of the feedback a student receives is not relevant information related to their learning achievement. It is the 20% feedback from a teacher to a student that has a potential for positively helping a student to learn.

What do we know about feedback?

In this discussion, we will consider feedback as information from a teacher to a student(s).

Feedback is categorized as either formative or summative.

  • Formative feedback is given during the learning process. Formative feedback while children are engaged in their learning should be given frequently. This is forward looking feedback. When given within their engagement, children can apply the feedback immediately.
  • Summative feedback is given after the learning process has been completed. This is backward looking feedback, usually after evaluation and a grade has been assigned. Sometimes summative feedback can help motivate a student for the next learning, but usually it is a “post-game recap.”

Feedback that feeds learning answers three questions.

  1. What is the goal and is the goal clearly understood? Once a child is engaged in the assignment, the goal often gets lost in the doing of the assignment. For example, a second-grade child may be fully engaged in completing 10 multiplication problems but not in understanding the process and logic of multiplication. Formative feedback from the teacher focuses a child on learning from the assignment not just doing the assignment. Children of all ages face this dilemma; they focus on doing all the assignments rather than what the assignment teaches them.
  2. How is the child doing in achieving the goal(s)? Feedback that confirms that a child is understanding the goal of the assignment powerfully reinforces the progression of learning. In writing a five-paragraph essay, a teacher can give feedback about the quality of the introductory paragraph that reinforces that step and sets a positive beginning for the next step. Being told that she is on the right track motivates a child to keep working.
  3. What action should the child engage in next? “Next” feedback is often a well-phrased question. “Have your considered …?” asks by asking the child to stop and think? The pause suggests there are several options. Or “Take another look at the goal and the steps in the process” alerts a child that their process is incomplete and allows a correction before ending the assignment.

Feedback is about the learning process not the details within the process. For example, a teacher may see child needs assistance organizing a written assignment and at the same time see mistakes in spelling or capitalization in the written answer. Feedback should focus on key issues before minor issues. Corrective feedback should address the bigger issue of organization before addressing the smaller issue of mechanics.

Feedback is learning goal-oriented and praise is person-oriented. Constructive feedback always is information that focuses on the learning goal and assignments to achieve the goals. Praise or criticism is usually not academic but personal. “You are really smart today” or “… looking good today” is nice for a child to hear but does not inform their learning.

Lastly, feedback is like fertilizer on a lawn – applied at the right time, it causes growth. But overly applied, it can burn out the grass. Children need time to process teacher feedback. Give it and then listen and watch for its effects.

Feedback fed right.

Madeline Hunter told us that teaching is a million decisions about what to do, why to do it, and how to do it to cause learning. Giving feedback is one of those decisions, because if teacher talk is not purposeful it falls into that category of classroom noise.

As a checklist, consider these points in your feedback strategy. Remember, feedback feeds what a child needs to hear to be a successful learner and is not what a teacher just wants to say to a child.

  • Is it goal-oriented?
  • Does it lead to student action?
  • Is it process not person focused?
  • Does it provide reinforcement as well as clarification/correction?
  • Is it timely in the learning process?
  • Is it chunked and not too much or too little?
  • Is it formative or summative?
  • Is it proximal to the child’s learning curve?
  • Will it make a difference in learning outcomes?
  • Does it lead the child to be self-assessing in the future?

If you have affirmative checks on any or some of these, give the feedback.

Feedback is targeted to what a child needs to hear not what a class needs to hear. When a teacher decides that the entire class or a large group of students need the same feedback. Whole class or large group information is a lesson or a tier-two intervention not feedback.

And now that you know what feedback, you also know that feedback is not delivered with a red pen.

The Big Duh!

Feedback is part of a teacher’s total instructional design. Once a teacher launches a lesson, the teacher is not an impartial observer. As a shepherd herds sheep toward home, a teacher uses feedback to ensure that all children reach their learning destination successfully. Every child engaged in the process of a lesson can profit from a teacher’s feedback, not just the lost sheep. Some feedback causes a child to succeed in the lesson and other feedback causes a child to really succeed – all children can use a teacher’s good feedback.

Feedback: Recalibrating the superlative

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Say what you mean and mean what you say.  Words matter and the selection of words used as educational feedback to children matters greatly.  As teachers, coaches, directors, and mentors, we provide thousands of feedback words to children every day.  How calibrated are your words so that you are saying exactly what you should say?

I observe that feedback to children over time becomes gratuitous and conversational.  Listen to the feedback you hear around you.  We typically say what the listener expects and wants to hear and we say it without specific learning context.  We make our feedback pleasing, non-critical, and uninformative – easy feedback is easy to give.  As we launch the 22-23 school year, the words we choose as feedback should be recalibrated so that we are saying not only what we mean to say but what children need to hear as we to cause them to learn.

Apply the term “authentic” to the distribution of feedback.  But, know what authentic means.  Merriam-Webster tells us authentic means “being actually and exactly what is claimed”.  Authentic is a clear and precise razor to apply to feedback.  Sharpen your vocabulary so that your feedback to a child explicitly describes the learning the child demonstrates and provides the necessary description, praise/criticism, reinforcement/correction, self-building, and direction that the child needs to hear.

The bell-shaped curve of statistical distribution can be applied to giving feedback.  Picture the bell in your mind’s eye and apply it graphically to the student work and work effort you observe.  The greatest amount of work from children daily meets our general expectations; it is the great space under the dome of the bell, especially when we apply the rule of 80 – 80% of children should successfully learn 80% of what we teach through initial instruction 80% of the time.  Statistically, we expect 66% of student work to be in this zone – the rule of 80 expands this zone that we think of as statistically average.  The margins of difference under this dome on either side of the true mean are small enough that minimal corrections through adjusted teaching move children to improved performances of learning.    

Sadly, we have maligned the word average – no one wants to be labeled average – but authentically, average describes the quality of learning children show us when they actually and exactly learn what they were taught.  Average is “on the target”.  As a better descriptor, use “expected” instead of average.

“That is exactly and clearly what I expected you to do.  Good work” is the qualitative feedback that should describe 80% of student work in school under the rule of 80.  How often do we hear these words?  Not very.

Our contemporary world values esteem over productivity and has difficulty with the word good.  Inspirational speakers at educational conventions and conferences tell us that good is not good enough.  Jim Collins told us how to Get From Good to Great and good has never been good enough since.  “Great” and its synonyms became the new gold standard driving feedback.  If good is average, then we must strive to be better than good and feedback on what we are told to expect has never been the same.

Blink twice every time you hear these words in your school today: excellent, fantastic, outstanding, superb, tremendous, terrific, wonderful, exceptional, splendid, phenomenal.  These are both synonyms for great and the most frequently used words to describe student work.  That is a lot of blinking.  Is all that we claim to be great really great or is great how we now label what we expect?  This is not what we mean, I think.

Recalibration of feedback means

  • understanding what is expected and describe it in actual and exact terms.  Don’t inflate to deflate, just describe what you observe against what you expect.

“You sounded out and pronounced those words exactly as they are spelled.”

“Your practice is paying off – you played that piece exactly as the music is written.”

“Your use of color and shading are very good and show you are paying attention to our demonstrations.”

“The corners in the box you built are exactly 90 degrees to each other.  Good job.”

“You all are keeping pace with each other as we walk to the cafeteria.  Thank you.”

  • using comparatives to describe things that are more than you expected.  Comparatives work because they describe more than you expected but keep you clear of over-exaggeration.

”Your mathematical reasoning is getting better.  You went beyond the numbers and gave an example of how we use rectangular shaped fields in athletics.”

“You are improving in listening to spoken Spanish and hearing it as Spanish not translated English.”

“You show a growing understanding of the scope of the universe beyond the stars we see at night”.

  • using superlatives to describe things that are well beyond what is expected and are so exemplary that they are unusual in frequency.  Superlatives add -est to your descriptors.

”That was exceptional – the best I have seen in years.”

“Outstanding.  You performed that as well as a person who has been playing for many years.”

“Your explanation was superb – college-like in your understanding of the concepts and how they work.”

“Perfect.  I could not have done better myself.”

“You get the blue ribbon.  That is the best lab work I have seen in years.”

Keep the model of what you expect students to say, do, perform, behave, and be in mind as you give them your feedback.  Then make your feedback exactly and actually descriptive of what you see and hear and feel about their work.

Lastly, keep a second thought in mind.  Children know honesty and sincerity when they hear and read it.  Your smile and a nod of approval may be all the honestly and sincerity a child needs to understand that they are meeting your expectations.  And, that after all, is what most children in school want to do – meet the expectations of their teachers.

“Tell Me” and “Show Me” If You Want To Be Understood

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I can hear Robert Shaw’s voice. “Do ya folla’?”, Quint, the shark-hunting captain of the Orca, asked Martin Brody (Roy Schneider) and Matt Hooper (Richard Dreyfus) in Jaws. “Do ya folla’?” was Quint’s way of checking if the Sheriff and oceanographer thoroughly understood what he was asking them to do.  The dangers of hunting a great white shark necessitated that Brody and Hooper followed Quint’s directions to the letter. Without exaggeration, the consequences to the future when we are teaching children can be just as serious as those in Jaws. Instead of being consumed by a shark, children may be consumed by errors of misunderstanding resulting for their failure to learn from you.

What is your checking query? As a classroom teacher or principal or curriculum director or facilities manager, how do you check to verify that those you are instructing or directing or mentoring or leading have a successful understanding of what you expect them to do? A checking query is essential. Not to have one is to be a pitcher throwing nine innings of a baseball game without ever hearing the umpire call “strike” or “ball.” Just like the pitcher watching for the umpire’s call, a teacher who models solutions to a math problem needs to know what each student heard, saw and understands regarding each possible solution. Without this feedback, the teacher should stop and not say another word. No feedback – no going forward.

In educationalese, “do you follow” can easily become one of two requests. Tell me. Show me. If you ask these two questions consistently, you will know if your students, teachers, and custodians are clear in their understanding of your expectations of their future performance. Those who study pedagogy, will recognize “Tell me/Show me” as application of Madeline Hunter’s “checking for understanding,” a timeless lesson design strategy.

What does “tell me” sound like?

You are an art teacher. You have demonstrated how to mount a lump of clay on a potter’s wheel. With students gathered around, you demonstrated the “a, b, c’s” of centering an amount of fresh clay on the center of the wheel, how to use the heels of your palms and your thumbs to work and shape the clay, and how to use finger pressure to draw the clay vertically into the beginnings of a small bowl.  In a perfect world, every child now is ready to throw a bowl from a lump of clay.

Common practice is for the teacher to look at the faces of surrounding children and ask “Any questions?” And, with no children bold enough to show they did not see exactly what the teacher said or did, the teacher sends them to their wheels where more than half sit looking at the lump of clay wondering “What do I do now?”

“Tell me” is an easy question. No one has to straddle the potter’s bench to say “First, you …”. “Tell me” is verbal – just repeat back what I just said to you. The “tell” does not have to be word perfect. Just get the sequence right. Just describe how your hands should work on the clay.  Describe how the turning speed of the wheel does the work of moving the clay.  Describe in words that demonstrate that you have a mental imaging of what you are supposed to do when you sit at your wheel.

If enough students participate in oral feedback, you can generalize that they understand “well enough” what to do. The key is that a majority of the students participated in the “tell me” and those who did not gave adequate visible agreement in what was told.

If the “tell me” does not meet the teacher’s level of confidence, then re-teaching is in order. Re-teaching involves the same key words in a different story line. Re-teaching involves the correction of any parts of the “tell” that were clearly wrong. Re-teaching is aimed at causing all students to be able to contribute to the next “tell me.”

Then do the “tell me” again. And, again, if the second “tell” does not meet your confidence level. Subsequent re-teachings cannot be repeats of the first or even second. They must directly clarify the sequence of steps and correct the mistakes in the “tell”.

You are a principal discussing the school’s practices in using standards-based grading. “Tell me” should achieve the same feedback loop as the “tell me” of the art teacher. And, if you are a curriculum director leading an in-service on the use of formative assessments, your “tell me” will sound like the art teacher and principal’s “tell me.” The same is true for the facilities supervisor who is showing a new custodian how to use a floor scrubbing machine. The supervisor wants to hear an accurate verbal description of what the supervisor demonstrated.

“Tell me” is one of the simplest yet most often ignored or misused strategies for getting instructional feedback. Many leaders will use it once or twice and then believe that if their students and subordinates got it right once or twice, they will get it right each time new instruction is given in the future. Wrong! This may be true if the future instruction is a repeat of past instruction, but if it is new instruction, especially new and without transfer from other past instruction, “tell me” is essential.

You are half-way in confidently believing that students and subordinates understand your instruction or direction. Now, “show me.”

“Show me” is more strategic. A teacher or principal or director or supervisor does not have time to view a “show me” by every student and subordinate. So, pick one or two students to straddle the potters wheel and begin to throw a bowl or go to the SmartBoard to write out a solution to a math problem or construct a grading template for a given middle school writing standard or demonstrate how to set the height adjustments on a riding lawn mower and mow a field in a way that does not require subsequent raking.

“Show me’s” must be objective and subjective. The “show” of the persons selected may not be as perfect as the demonstration. Objectively, does the “show” meet minimum requirements? And, subjectively, the person evaluating the “show” must suspend everything else known about the person showing and observe only the demonstration of the “show”. Being objectively and subjectively fair often is hard in a “show me” but it is essential.

If you pick a representative student and rotate your picking so that all students and subordinates over time will be called upon to “show me”, you can use these selected shows to reinforce your confidence that your students and subordinates know what to do and also know how to do it.

“Tell me and show me” also conserve time. The minutes that it takes to ask students and subordinates to tell and show you what they have heard and observed you say and do is significantly less than the time and effort it would take to go forward with their unchecked work only to find later that their thinking and skills are all wrong. Reteaching after incorrect information has been practiced and reinforced takes a lot of time and very specific instruction to unlearn the incorrect and learn the correct. “Tell me and show me” is an efficient and effective way to assure readiness for independent practice of new learning.

So, now I ask you in my Quint voice, “Do ya follow?” Tell me.  Show me.