Problem of Practice

Our students often seem to rely on teachers telling them what to do and they place considerable emphasis on extrinsic motivators such as marks and ranks. Too often the responsibility for learning seems to lie with the teacher, rather than the student. This is particularly evident with the provision of feedback. Effective feedback is central to the learning process and requires a mindset of thinking and learning rather than performance and achievement. What evidence will demonstrate that our students and teachers are providing feedback which leads to deep thinking and powerful learning? How do we develop a shared understanding of what constitutes effective feedback between teachers, students and the wider school community?

Theory of Action

If we improve the quality and quantity of feedback, then students will take more responsibility for their own learning.

• We will audit patterns of feedback by conducting subject department and student surveys in order to consider how we could provide improved feedback.
• We will provide comments instead of marks wherever possible and when marks or grades are required we will provide comments prior to the marking/grading wherever possible.
• We will ensure that students spend more time following up comments than teachers spend marking the work by providing feedback that forces students to think and builds students’ capacities to educate themselves.
• We will develop a repertoire of feedback strategies that work for different subject areas and students.
• We will devise activities and questions that provide feedback about the effectiveness of our teaching, so as teachers we know what to do next.

Conclusion

This Theory of Action will be subject to ongoing revision. It is intended to make explicit the goals, frameworks and strategies relating to feedback that we take for granted, and to expose the gulf between what we say about our teaching practice and what is actually occurring. This Theory of Action will promote reflection, dialogue, collaboration, and develop a shared understanding of good practice in relation to feedback.