Effectiveness of feedback provision for undergraduate Psychology students

1
Effectiveness of feedback provision for
undergraduate Psychology students

• Dr Julie Hulme
• Dr Mark Forshaw
• Staffordshire University

2
Aims

• To provide some background information and
  findings from the miniproject
• To promote discussion of possible solutions to
  problems related to feedback

3
Background

• Feedback is generally perceived as a tool used
  after assessment to promote student learning
  (skills and topic)
• However, some staff believe that students do not
  read their feedback (Carless, 2006)
• Some students report that feedback is difficult
  to understand or that they do not have time to
  use it (e.g. Higgins, 2000). There are a variety
  of factors reported in the HE literature that
  might explain this.

4
Factors influencing student use of feedback

• Language (Higgins et al., 2002) which may be
  influenced by sex (Read et al., 2005),
  educational background (Weaver, 2006) and EFL
  (Anderson et al., 2001), as well as intended
  audience for feedback (student vs QA, Randall
  and Mirador, 2003)
• Timeliness (Rust et al., 2005)
• Emotional reactions to comments and to marks
  (Nesbit and Burton, 2006)

5
Tensions around feedback

• Tutors need to provide feedback efficiently
• It needs to be clear and constructive and
  facilitate student learning time consuming

6
Aims of the miniproject

• To establish an accurate picture of student and
  tutor perceptions of feedback within psychology
• To identify means of delivering meaningful
  feedback to psychology students without
  increasing workload for staff

7
Methodology

• Questionnaires were available online separate
  versions for staff and students from Sept 2007
  to Feb 2008
• Questions around experience of feedback and
  perceptions of its purposes and uses

8
Questionnaire Demographics

• 213 undergraduate students from a range of UK HE
  Psychology departments
• 88 male, 132 female
• Aged between 18 23
• 52 academic staff from a range of UK HE
  Psychology departments
• 22 male, 35 female
• Aged between 24 - 67

9
Questionnaire Experiences of feedback

• All staff report providing written feedback at
  least sometimes (60 always) the only type of
  work never receiving written feedback is exams
• They target feedback comments at the student,
  double markers and external examiners
• About half provide written comments in the text,
  about half provide a summary, a third use a
  standard tick sheet, and a third use a module
  specific tick sheet
• Student responses were consistent with this
  (except some receive feedback on exams)

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Reading feedback ()
11
Understanding feedback ()
Asking for clarification ()
12
Does feedback help students to learn?
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Types of feedback

• Feedback was provided and usually received on a
  range of issues psychological content and
  understanding, reading, writing style and
  grammar, structure and organisation, referencing
  and critical evaluation
• Written feedback was the most frequent type of
  feedback, but group and one-to-one verbal
  feedback were also used

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Types of feedback

• Staff and students largely agreed on the content
  of feedback and also on its helpfulness (mean
  ranking)

15
Timeliness ()

• Staff and students both reported return of
  feedback typically within 2-4 weeks

16
Relevance and transferability

• Both students and staff largely agree that
  feedback can help learning with other pieces of
  work on the same topic, and with other pieces of
  work of the same type (eg, essay, report).

17
Overall Quality ()
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Open questions

• Agreement that written feedback is not ideal,
  verbal preferred by both but workload an issue
  for staff.
• Staff feel that their feedback is easy to follow,
  but students do not always agree
• Students do not value feedback on grammar and
  referencing, whereas staff often think that this
  is useful.
• Problems with handwriting but typing time
  consuming.
• Repetition of feedback students not listening
  (staff), but students dont know what to do with
  it (students).
• Students report inconsistencies across tutors.
• Purpose students to improve grades, tutors to
  develop skills
• Students report collection can be difficult if
  distant but e-collection is impersonal

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Conclusions so far

• Psychology staff and students share agreement on
  many issues around feedback, some positives
• Both groups are aware that written communication
  is failing in some ways more detail, more
  specific, more constructive/improvement focussed,
  more verbal desired
• Staff workload issue
• Students understanding issue
• Situation in psychology resembles more generic
  research
• What to do about it?

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Discussion

• Is there a feedback problem?
• If so, how do you think we can address it?

21
Focus groups

• Students from 2 universities
• Staff from 3 universities
• 3-8 per group
• Student group run by postgraduate student
• Staff group run by lecturer
• Prompt questions
• Stimulus feedback

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What to do? Focus groups

• Constructive not destructive or descriptive
  feedback
• Collective definitions?
• Staff must write well, explain and support
• Students must read, understand and seek help
• Portfolio system?
• Personalised feedback?
• Typed not handwritten?
• Training for staff AND students?

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Next stages of miniproject

• eDelphi panel of staff and students for comments
• Hopefully pilot scheme in at least one university

24
Any further questions?

• j.a.hulme_at_staffs.ac.uk