Teacher Feedback in the Classroom

1
Teacher Feedback in the Classroom

• Jennifer OBrien
• Educational Studies Presentation
• Trinity College, Hartford CT
• December 13th, 2004

2
Background Research

• Weiner (1986) attributional framework
• Attributing success to ability increases
  motivation, affect, esteem increases
  expectations for success in future
• Attributing failure to ability decreases
  motivation, affect, esteem decreases
  expectations for success in future
• Sandra Graham (1990) praise and blame
• over-praising success on easy tasks sends low
  ability message
• anger/blame in failure conditions sends high
  ability message
• developmental shift at about age 8 (Barker and
  Graham, 1978)

3
Descriptive Statistics

• N 26
• Elementary 10
• Middle 6
• High 9
• - Since no elementary school teacher
  participating taught student gtage 8, I grouped
  all elementary results and middle/high results to
  obtain gt8 and lt8 categories

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Self-Report
-teacher self-reports about feedback frequencies
did not differ significantly across student age
groups or achievement levels
frequency scale 1 rarely (1-2 times a
semester or less) 2 once in a while (more than
rarely, less than once per five hours of class 3
often (about once every five hours of class) 4
very frequently (more than once per five hours
of class
5
Average Teacher

• There was a significant interaction between
  student achievement level and age in teachers
  beliefs about the average teacher giving positive
  feedback among high-achieving students, average
  elementary teacher more frequent positive
  feedback than average middle/high school teacher

frequency scale 1 rarely (1-2 times a
semester or less) 2 once in a while (more than
rarely, less than once per five hours
of class 3 often (about once every five hours
of class) 4 very frequently (more than once per
five hours of class
6
Ideal Teacher
frequency scale 1 rarely (1-2 times a
semester or less) 2 once in a while (more than
rarely, less than once per five hours of class 3
often (about once every five hours of class) 4
very frequently (more than once per five hours
of class
- teacher beliefs about ideal feedback
frequencies did not differ significantly across
student age groups or achievement levels
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Positive vs. Negative
frequency scale 1 rarely (1-2 times a
semester or less) 2 once in a while (more than
rarely, less than once per five hours of class 3
often (about once every five hours of class) 4
very frequently (more than once per five hours
of class

• Across grade levels, teachers said
• they themselves gave more positive feedback than
  negative feedback, plt .01,
• ideally teachers should give more positive
  feedback than negative feedback, p lt .01,

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Average vs. Ideal
- the average elementary school teacher does give
significantly more positive feedback than
negative feedback, plt.05, - the average
middle/high school teacher does not give more
significantly more positive feedback than
negative feedback, p .16, ns.
frequency scale 1 rarely (1-2 times a
semester or less) 2 once in a while (more than
rarely, less than once per five hours
of class 3 often (about once every five hours
of class) 4 very frequently (more than once per
five hours of class
9
Benefits of Feedback
benefit scale 1 not at all 2 not very much 3
somewhat 4 very much

• across student age and achievement levels,
  teachers rated positive feedback more beneficial
  than negative
• significant differences between type of benefit,
  type of feedback, and student age

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Ratings of Reactions and Types of Feedback in
Different Achievement Situations
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References

• Barker, G. P. Graham, S. (1987). Developmental
  study of praise and blame as attributional cues.
  Journal of Educational Psychology, 79, 62-66.
• Diener, C. I., Dweck, C. S. (1978). An analysis
  of learned helplessness Continuous changes in
  performance, strategy, and achievement
  cognitions following failure. Journal of
  Personality and Social Psychology, 36, 451-462.
• Graham, S. (1990). Communicating low ability in
  the classroom  Bad things good teachers
  sometimes do. In S. Graham V.S. Folkes (Eds.),
  Attribution Theory  Applications to
  Achievement, Mental Health, and
  Interpersonal Conflict (pp. 17-36). Hillsdale,
  NJ  Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
• Kun, A., Weiner, B. (1973). Necessary versus
  sufficient causal schemata for success and
  failure. Journal of Personality, 7, 197-207.
• Schunk, D. (1983). Ability versus effort
  attributional feedback Differential effects on
  self-efficacy and achievement. Journal of
  Educational Psychology, 75, 848-856.
• Weiner, B. (1986). An attributional theory of
  motivation and emotion. New York Springer-Verlag