Audio and screen visual feedback to support student learning

Feedback has been highlighted as the most powerful influence on student achievement, but students are often less satisfied with feedback than with other aspects of the student experience. It is hence important that ways of offering feedback are found that are useful both for improving learning and for gaining student satisfaction. This ongoing study was designed to explore and to improve feedback in a variety of differing contexts, two of which are reported here: i) audio feedback on a first year undergraduate written assignment in Geography (product-oriented feedback); and ii) video feedback from ongoing laboratory sessions with first-year Biosciences students (process-oriented feedback). These contexts have been selected as offering different ways of working and for highlighting a number of issues and areas for further development. Student and staff views have been gained via surveys, focus groups, individual interviews and ‘stimulated recall’ sessions. Findings suggest that students have high expectations in relation to feedback; many anticipate the kinds of individual face-to-face interaction they experienced in school and are not easily satisfied by other ways of working. In addition, offering audio or video feedback that is supportive to learning in both affective and cognitive terms is not necessarily easy. In the context of written assignments there is still much to be learned about appropriateness of length, tone, the register of language, the balance between praise and criticism, and the best contexts and timing for audio feedback. In the context of large classes for laboratory sessions, further research is needed on how lecturers and demonstrators can give ongoing feedback that is useful when captured for replay in video form, and also about how effective video taken in class might be then used for training purposes in order to enable student demonstrators to be more effective and knowledgeable when offering feedback to student

Satisfying students needs for timely, informative feedback with the constraints and issues of time, quality and consistency

The role of technology in Assessment, Feedback and Faculty Affordances This poster is a retrospective look at the challenges of providing consistent feedback to students and the role that technology can play in supporting this. The UK’s National Student Survey reports feedback to be a problem area within Business Management programmes and the introduction of £9,000 fees for students has placed further pressure on Academic staff to enhance the quality of feedback on assessments. One pragmatic approach taken is the introduction of electronic marking, to provide quality feedback and create another useful learning tool. Giving consideration to four categories of the management of assessment and reviewing the available options, the use of Turnitin Assignments became the preferred choice of electronic marking software. The use of the Turnitin system including rubric and quick marks allowed for consistency of standards in marking, ensuring integrity in the process and enhancing the quality of results. This was designed to provide specific feedback both positive and developmental and focussed on being student centred whilst being an efficient, easy to use software with a faster method of marking. Feedback from the students about this process was overwhelmingly positive, evidenced in the Module Evaluation Questionnaires (MEQ) with such comments as “useful”, “personal”, “helped me improve”, “quicker (return) and more detailed”. The student response also highlighted advantages of such feedback as being available online and accessible in the student’s own time and being able to re-read and refer to at a later date (e.g. when the next assignment was due), as many students downloaded the report for future reference. Additionally, a small number of students commented on the helpfulness for dyslexic students. A further advantage of this system is the ability to see whom has observed their feedback. This functionality enabled a teacher to direct students to their feedback and use this for more meaningful student reflection through face to face dialogue, building on student learning and reflective practice through a coaching approach. Notwithstanding the student advantages and learning benefits through the use of online assessment marking and feedback through the Turnitin system, it also created affordances for Academic staff and Faculty to gain efficiencies, enabling more focus on pedagogy and transformation of learning. Overall, the use of Turnitin as a system for online assessment provides students and the module leader with a positive experience; in the quality of the formative or summative feedback given, managing multiple markers and ensuring the consistency of feedback and finally Faculty with efficiency and pedagogy benefits. Keywords: feedback, technology, electronic feedback, quality, quality assurance, marking consistency, students, student learning, Higher Education, multiple marker

A qualitative assessment of providing quality electronically mediated feedback for students in higher education

Abstract: The subject of feedback for students is one of the most important contributors to the student experience and attracts one of the lowest responses within the National Union of Students survey. This paper reports on the feasibility of providing feedback on written assignments by marking electronically using the comments function on Microsoft Word and also providing verbal feedback via use of a hand held digital voice recorder. The students (post graduate part-time business students) were surveyed as to their response to this feedback. The paper reports the feedback from both the tutor and the student perspective and examines the impact on the experience of both groups. The results were positively in favour of the use of audio feedback but are different to results in other studies in that it is concluded that a combination of both typed and verbal feedback was preferred by the students. Keywords: audio-feedback; feedback; written feedback; electronically mediated feedback; recorded feedback; online submission; assessment; student experience; National Student Survey; NSS

Nursing IT: A Peer Assisted Learning Project for Nursing and IT Students

Previous research indicated that nursing students lack IT competence, Fetter (2009), but have strong social skills. Equally observations by the Placement Employability Experience Unit in the Faculty of ACES have identified that IT students are technically able, but weaker in social skills. Employers are seeking graduate with a broad skill range in both subject specific and employability skills, (Ehiyazaryan and Baraclough 2009). Therefore this project aimed to address these issues through a peer learning activity. It is recognised that peer assisted learners can communicate to one another in a language that both understand, Smith et al, (2007). The symbiotic activity was offered as a venture opportunity for level 5 computing students to manage in the Venture Matrix at Sheffield Hallam University. The Venture Matrix is a managed risk enterprise and entrepreneurial environment open to all students, and offers a framework in which students can operate micro-businesses to develop and apply their subject knowledge and employability skills to support real business opportunities/activities offered in the Venture Matrix, Laughton (2010). The Nursing IT venture was offered as business activity with the aims of providing an opportunity; • for computing students to apply their IT skills and develop their employability skills • to meet the individualised IT learning needs of the Level 4 nursing students. The value of the learning in the venture was evaluated by both sets of students. This IT service was offered by the computing students to all level 4 student nurses who commenced their course September 2009 and January 2010. Analysis of post project student questionnaires, evaluations and staff discussions showed that all stakeholders recognised the potential and sustainability of this service. The key learning point are that the project:-·created good cross-faculty communication and sharing of expertises both staff and students: although only a small number of nursing students took the opportunity to use the service they valued the support they received: the computing students enjoyed the opportunity to disseminate their IT skills

Does Mechanism Matter? Student Recall of Electronic versus Handwritten Feedback

Student consumption and recall of feedback are necessary preconditions of successful formative assessment. Drawing on Sadler’s (1998) definition of formative assessment as that which is intended to accelerate learning and improve performance through the providing of feedback, we examine how the mechanism of transmission may impact student retention of feedback content. We proceed from the premise that such retention is necessary for feedback to function as a component of formative assessment. Although researchers have written extensively on best practices in feedback content (e.g., Nicol & Macfarlane-Dick, 2006) and student and instructor attitudes toward electronic feedback versus handwritten feedback (e.g., Thomson, 2008), comparatively little research addresses whether the form of feedback influences student consumption and retention. Our research found that whereas students who preferred or received handwritten feedback recall more feedback (quantity), those who actually received electronic feedback recall comments more accurately (quality). We encourage instructors to working with either format to adhere to accepted standards for good feedback practice

Learners’ Engagement and Perception on Corrective Feedback of Online Tools Towards Students’ Essay Writing in EFL Context

Written, oral and online corrective feedback have become interesting topic for developing learners’ writing skills in a second or foreign language context. The study aims at discovering the correlation between Learners’ engagement and perception on the use of online tools towards Students’ writing. Determining students perception on online CF was also the main concern. Multiple correlation used for analyzing data collected from 150 respondents through questionnaires and academic writing test. The study reveals that coefficient correlation between learners’ Engagement and perception. is .996 and significant value 2-tailed is .000, which is greater than p-value .05. Furthermore, The Sig value of F change is.000, lower than the 0.05 p-value threshold; the value R.996 which is higher than sig. 0.05. Hence, it is a considerable and an extremely high degree association between students' level of involvement and perceptions of students' essay writing abilities. Values of students’ perception in percentage distribution indicate the preference of online CF in terms of perceived usefulness, ease of use, self-efficacy and behavioral intention.  Further study may concern on multifactorial analysis for providing more comprehensive study

Students’ feelings about the online submission of assignments using Turnitin

The integration of information and communication technologies (ICTs) into teaching and learning, and the implementation of computer-mediated methods of instruction in the form of e-learning in higher education, have led to the emergence of new methods of submitting assignments electronically. One of these methods employs a learning management system (LMS) for teaching, learning and assessment. While significant research has been conducted on this phenomenon in developed countries, little has been published on how students experience and perceive this method of submission in a developing country such as South Africa, where a slow pace of technological innovation in education has been reported. The mixed methods study on which this article is based reports on how the Moodle LMS was used in a business management education (BME) course of a Bachelor of Education undergraduate degree, where students had to submit assignments through Turnitin. The qualitative component had a sample of 15 participants selected from 156 students using phenomenography as a methodological approach. Personal reflective journals, focus group discussions and individual interviews were qualitative data sources. A questionnaire was used to collect quantitative data that was analysed using the statistical package for social sciences (SPSS). The study found that participants viewed this method of submitting assignments as a conduit for monitoring plagiarism in BME. Findings from the study may offer insight into how emerging economies might engage with the crucial aspect of developing student consciousness about the importance of speedy and safe delivery of assignments in ways that promote academic honesty.

Temporal issues in e-learning research: A literature review

Time is a critical factor in learning, but time is also a very complicated factor that has many facets. Time can be as follows: time needed to prepare a course or lesson (ie, for the instructor to gather materials and design/develop a course or lesson), time needed to follow a course or lesson (ie, the planned, nominal study time that the institution allots for the learner in minutes and/or hours per day or the number of weeks per semester/year that the course encompasses), lifetime of a course (ie, how long a course can be used before it needs to be revised and/or is out of date), time that a student needs for study (ie, both in and out of class), time that an instructor needs and/or uses to teach a course (ie, the number of hours per day both during and beyond the “school” day for preparation, correction, feedback and marking of products and exams), “transaction” time costs (eg, the amount of travel time needed to attend a course or to log into an online course) and even time that a learner can make effective use of the knowledge gained (ie, half-life of the information in a course). Time can also be seen as an effectiveness factor (ie, the amount learned in a specific time period; learning more in the same time period is more effective learning) and/or efficiency factor (ie, the amount of time needed to learn something; learning the same amount in less time is more efficient learning). Time can, finally, be seen as a solitary factor or as part of a temporal pattern inwhich other factors play a role such aswork time, family time, down time, etc