Abstract
Students may feel that they receive feedback throughout the school day: "You need more examples in your report." "I'm so pleased by your poster." "This paper...
Abstract
Students may feel that they receive feedback throughout the school day: "You need more examples in your report." "I'm so pleased by your poster." "This paper is not your best work—you earned a C." "Great job!" But such comments—in which teachers offer advice, praise, criticism, or evaluation—don't provide the kind of descriptive feedback that can help students improve their performance, writes Grant Wiggins in this article.
Feedback, says Wiggins, is "information about how we are doing in our efforts to reach a goal." Helpful feedback is always goal-referenced: The performer has a clear goal, and the feedback tells whether he or she is on track or needs to make adjustments. Helpful feedback is also tangible, actionable, user-friendly, timely, ongoing, and consistent. Fortunately, the teacher is not the only possible source of effective feedback—peers, other teachers, technology, and instruction that builds in intrinsic feedback are equally powerful. But it's essential to provide as much descriptive feedback as possible, says Wiggins, because "the research shows that less teaching plus more feedback is the key to achieving greater learning."
Check the word document for more details.