“In the context of teaching in general, feedback is information that is given to the learner about his or her performance of a learning task, usually with the objective of improving this performance”. (Ur, 1996:242)
What is the objective of feedback then? To make sure learners completed the task or to help them improve their performance? Unfortunately, for most of us, it is the former option that counts. As Cotterall puts it, “Many language teachers are convinced of the importance of incorporating principles of learner autonomy into their practice.” (Cotterall, 2000: 109) If this is the case in most of our classes, why do we ignore the idea of autonomy when it comes to feedback?
Most probably, it is the time issue that determines the aim of feedback and the way we give it. When we go for the fastest way of feedback, it generally is the whole class feedback. It will only take a couple of minutes for one to have an overall idea of what the class did. How about the individuals? Who benefits from a chorus vocalizing the answers?
Personally, I’m one of those who are against the idea of whole class feedback. First of all, it is not motivating and only the strongest learners participate. It also prevents the teacher from understanding who made a mistake in which question and if the students are not brave enough to ask for an explanation, they won’t even know why they made a mistake. In her ‘Alternatives to Whole Class Feedback’, Amanda Gamble asserts that “One of the drawbacks of whole class, teacher-led feedback is that there is little chance for the students to discuss their answers. For feedback to be effective and worthwhile, students need the opportunity to talk about their answers so that they can see why the correct answer is right and why the incorrect one is wrong.” (Gamble, 2007: 78-81)
Although teachers mostly have a say in the feedback process, I’m more positive about student-driven feedback. As long as you and your learners get used to some alternatives to chorus vocalization, it won’t also take too much time. Alternative Student-Centred Feedback Methods can be suggested as follows;
a) Chain feedback: Learners nominate each other to answer the forthcoming question. This is one of my favourites as it keeps the TTT to a minimum and you avoid nominating the same learners again and again.
b) Playing ‘teacher’: An early bird acts as the teacher and gives feedback. (Seeing him/her using your feedback methods is even icing on the cake)
c) Writing on the board: This works well when accuracy is important in the activity. You may nominate the learners to write their answers on the board or they may even nominate each other as in the ‘chain feedback’. It is worth giving a try in kinaesthetic classes.
d) Sharing the feedback: Teacher provides two different answer keys to Student A and Student B. Each piece of paper has answers to different parts or questions so that the pair may work together to work out the answers.
e) Posted answers: Teacher may also post the answers on the classroom walls for learners to check them. This one is again suitable for learners who don’t like sitting at a desk all lesson.
f) Find Someone Who: Classical “find someone who” game can be designed as ‘Find Someone Who Has a Mistake’. In this way, individuals will have checked different learners’ answers and there will be a natural discussion and peer correction atmosphere in class.
Knowles (1975) also maintained that “there is convincing evidence that people who take the initiative in learning (pro-active learners) learn more things and learn better than do people who sit at the feet of teachers, passively waiting to be taught (reactive learners).” Therefore, above mentioned techniques will no doubt activate learner autonomy in the most crucial level of a lesson; feedback.
On the other hand, there might be some teachers who may well think whole class teacher-driven feedback is more effective. The advantages and disadvantages of classical whole class teacher-driven feedback can be listed as follows;
Advantages:
- It saves time.
- It is loud and will wake the sleepers up.
- It is more suitable for drilling and phonological accuracy.
Disadvantages:
- Teacher controls the process which results an increase in TTT.
- It is hard to differentiate who made a mistake.
- Weaker learners do not actively participate. It is generally the brave hearts who dominate it.
- It doesn’t leave much room for discussion.
- Learners do not learn, they just check the answers.
- There is no personal exchange of ideas. Interaction pattern is stable (open-class).
- It doesn’t give a clear idea of how to plan beyond the lesson. (Feedback is the most important tool for a Teacher to determine the follow-up areas.)
As a conclusion, I must restate that while learner-autonomy has been an ELT trend recently, it is surprising that there is not much study about learner-autonomy in feedback process. Consequently, I wanted to propose some alternative approaches to getting feedback in your language class. Changing the classical teacher-driven feedback methods with more student-centred ones will make the process more beneficial and communicative.
Bibliography:
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Cotterall, Sara. (2000). Promoting learner autonomy through the curriculum: principles for designing language courses. ELT J (2000) 54 (2): 109-117. doi: 10.1093/elt/54.2.109
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Gamble, Amanda. (2007) Methodology: Alternatives to Whole Class Feedback.
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Knowles, M. S. (1975) Self-Directed Learning. A guide for learners and teachers, Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall/Cambridge.
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Ur, Penny. (1996) A Course in Language Teaching. Cambridge University Press. Cambridge.
Tony Gurr said:
Fatih,
I’m impressed – you have really been bitten by the blogging bug 😉 Well, done.
So, feedback on feedback…I think many of us know (deep down in our heart-of-hearts) what Penny was getting at…the thing is that we do not always walk-our-talk. Feedback is the meat-and-two-veg of the wider reflective process (especially when helping LEARNers to grow as more reflective individuals).
A great deal of the feedback we give students is in the form of “grades” (from this quiz or that test) – grades function a bit like “shorthand” BUT they are not real feedback at all (basically because they tell us “nothing”)! Grades are also pretty uni-directional…most of the time.
As you point out, and is the case with TTT / SSS, we also do not do enough LEARNer-driven feedback and forget that we can do so much more reflection (in a group) when we draw on the talents and feedback of the other 20-25 people “in the room” 😉
I, for one, would love to see us adding more suggestions to the list you have started – especially of the type that involve LEARNers “playing teacher” 😉
Take care,
T..
fatihyucel said:
Thanks for the positive feedback on feedback Tony. The methods on my list were the first ones came to my mind. So I’m waiting for everyone to contribute if they have some brilliant tips to use in class about feedback.
davidmearns said:
Hi Fatih, this subject really interests me since my MA Dissertation was about Video Feedback. I can send it to you if you’d like to see my own research in Learner Autonomy through Video Feedback. That was two years ago, and now we give feedback to students in various forms, but the most exciting and the one that the students enjoyed the most is the ‘Can Do’ statements monthly interviews. I plan to write up about this in my blog this summer. The students gave it a 100 % thumbs up for its autonomous nature and subsequent focus on their progress.
fatihyucel said:
Hi David,
I’d be more than happy to see your MA Dissertation and thanks for the ‘feedback’ 😉 I’m still looking for alternative ways, video feedback might be a brilliant idea.
Fatih
davidmearns said:
The kids all love the VFB and VFeed forward paradigm. I will send you my dissertation forthwith and if you’d like me to do a workshop at your place on it, let me know.
fatihyucel said:
I’d be very happy about a workshop on F/b. Shall we plan it for next academic year though as this one is almost over now?
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