Challenges to Providing Effective Feedback

by Jessie L. Moore

October 20, 2022

60-Second SoTL – Episode 8

This week’s episode features a recent article from the open-access journal, Teaching & Learning Inquiry, and explores instructors’ perspectives on challenges to providing effective feedback:

Paris, Brit M. 2022. “Instructors’ Perspectives of Challenges and Barriers to Providing Effective Feedback.” Teaching and Learning Inquiry 10. https://doi.org/10.20343/teachlearninqu.10.3

View a transcript of this episode.

The episode was hosted by Jessie L. Moore, Director of the Center for Engaged Learning and Professor of Professional Writing & Rhetoric. 60-Second SoTL is produced by the Center for Engaged Learning at Elon University.

Read More about Effective Feedback Processes

  • Agius, Natalie M., and Ann Wilkinson. 2014. “Students’ and Teachers’ Views of Written Feedback at Undergraduate Level: A Literature Review.” Nurse Education Today 34 (4): 552–559. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nedt.2013.07.005
  • Boud, David, and Elizabeth Molloy. 2013. “Rethinking Models of Feedback for Learning: The Challenge of Design.” Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education 38 (6): 698–712. https://doi.org/10.1080/02602938.2012.691462
  • Carless, David, and David Boud. 2018. “The Development of Student Feedback Literacy: Enabling Uptake of Feedback.” Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education 2938 (May): 1–11. https://doi.org/10.1080/02602938.2018.1463354 [Open Access]
  • Carless, David, and Naomi Winstone. 2020. “Teacher Feedback Literacy and Its Interplay with Student Feedback Literacy Feedback Literacy.” Teaching in Higher Education, 1–14. https://doi.org/10.1080/13562517.2020.1782372
  • Dawson, Phillip, Michael Henderson, Paige Mahoney, Michael Phillips, Tracii Ryan, David Boud, and Elizabeth Molloy. 2019. “What Makes for Effective Feedback: Staff and Student Perspectives.” Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education 44 (1): 25–36. https://doi.org/10.1080/02602938.2018.1467877 [Open Access]
  • Eli Review. n.d. “Feedback and Improvement: Becoming a Better Writer by Helping Other Writers.” https://elireview.com/content/students/feedback [Open Access]
  • Eli Review. n.d. “The Pedagogy: Feedback and Revision.” https://elireview.com/learn/pedagogy/ [Open Access]
  • Henderson, Michael, Tracii Ryan, and Michael Phillips. 2019. “The Challenges of Feedback in Higher Education.” Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education 44 (8): 1237–52. https://doi.org/10.1080/02602938.2019.1599815
  • Henderson, Michael, Tracii Ryan, David Boud, Phillip Dawson, Michael Phillips, Elizabeth Molloy, and Paige Mahoney. 2019a. “The Usefulness of Feedback.” Active Learning in Higher Education, September, 146978741987239. https://doi.org/10.1177/1469787419872393 [Open Access]
  • Henderson, Michael, Michael Phillips, Tracii Ryan, David Boud, Elizabeth Molloy, and Paige Mahoney. 2019b. “Conditions That Enable Effective Feedback.” Higher Education Research and Development 38 (7): 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1080/07294360.2019.1657807 [Open Access]
  • To, Jessica. 2021. “Using Learner-Centred Feedback Design to Promote Students’ Engagement with Feedback.” Higher Education Research and Development, February, 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1080/07294360.2021.1882403
  • Winstone, Naomi E., and David Carless. 2019. Designing Effective Feedback Processes in Higher Education. Abingdon: Routledge.

Read More about Feedback from CEL’s Blog

Man writing objectives on a whiteboard. White quoted text reads: "For students to give, receive, and learn from feedback, they must understand exactly what they are asked to demonstrate.”

Implementing Effective Feedback Practices: Strategy 2

In part one of this two-part blog, I revisited results from my students who completed the feedback literacy behavior scale (Dawson et al. 2023). I identified two areas in which students demonstrated room for improvement: (1) seeking feedback information; and…

White quoted text on background of arrow jumping up wooden steps.

Implementing Effective Feedback Practices: Strategy 1 

Two blog posts ago, I shared my early spring semester plans for giving students effective feedback and promoting their feedback literacy in an early college calculus course. Going into that semester, I realized that to promote student feedback literacy, it…

White text on orange diagonal shape reads: "Allowing students to use multiple sources of evidence and a reflective process to self-assess their growth and performance in class has been hit or miss for me, to be honest...” with checkbox in background. Elon log bottom right corner.

Perspectives on Alternative Grading 

“Traditional” grading is a term used to describe the most common form of grading in an academic setting. In recent years, it has been seen that courses implementing this grading system “tend to be more oriented towards product over process,…

White tet on a background of blue and yellow cyclical arrows reads: "The feedback loop has helped me to think about feedback use in cycles, in contrast to feedback approaches that simply justify a mark or grade.”

Assessing Student Feedback Literacy 

In the last blog post, I discussed my initial plans for feedback this semester. A few insights have helped me to plan effective feedback strategies. The feedback loop (Clark and Talbert 2023) structures students’ engagement with feedback they receive to…

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