Flipping Feedback Anne Quinney CEL Theme Leader for Assessment and Feedback February 2017

Why flip it? Feedback often comes too late to be useful. Often the assignments we set test what the student doesn’t know, or didn’t grasp, rather than supporting the fullest possible learning and understanding. Too late (on completion of a unit of study) when the feedback cannot be used to develop understanding, rectify misunderstanding or generate new insights. Future assignments may be very different and cover very distinct areas of the curriculum. If feedback is provided during the unit of study feedback comments can be acted on to develop or consolidate learning. with little or no opportunity to ‘make good’ their learning, or to understand core concepts that the next level depends on. The exception is doctoral study where the work is commented on in detail at all stages.

How? 3 approaches Move from retrospective feedback to prospective feedforward Reconfigure teaching and learning activities to create more opportunities for ‘real-time’ feedback for learning Embed opportunities for giving, receiving and responding to feedback - and for recognising it as feedback All 3 emphasise feedback as a dialogue and an exchange of ideas. Reconfigure by…..Using audience response clickers; short in-class tests/quizzes; team challenges; recap Q & A on last session’s content; groupwork; developing an FAQ bank, making glossaries available. Embed – whole programme approach; develop and nurture feedback literacy (eg Strathclyde leaflet)

Feedforward on assignments Draft-comment-revise-resubmit. The trade –off is that less feedback will be provided on the final submission (perhaps a grade and a matrix). Parts-to-whole. Feedback on specific sections. Presentation-to-paper. Comments (peer and/or tutor) are used to develop the final written submission. Chaining and threading. Students indicate how they have addressed the comments on the previous assignments.

Real–time feedback Boot-grit feedback. Students are asked to feedback to the lecturer what they didn’t understand; what needs more explanation.(Clear as glass/clear as mud!) The tutor can post responses/explanations/clarification in the VLE. Audience response clickers. Rapid feedback on learning. Peer instruction can be used to discuss then re-choose an answer. The flipped classroom. In-class time for engagement and collaboration leading to deeper understanding. A tripling of learning gains is claimed in Physics at Harvard and other US universities – see Mazur’s work. Eg Mazur 2009. Flipped classroom – content in advance of class and can be consolidated by post-class activities. Frees the tutor from content coverage and enables focus to be on exploring understanding in a supported environment. (See Hutchings and Quinney 2015).

Embedded feedback Learning from the signature pedagogies of practice -based or studio-based disciplines (eg art or architecture) where feedback is frequent, open and in shared spaces. Creating feedback opportunities that have immediacy Feedback on ongoing tasks or work-in-progress Informal in-situ feedback Peer feedback – learning from and with one another

Doing it differently? How might you adjust or adapt your pedagogy to flip the feedback? Now? Next academic year? What needs to happen? Who could you call on as a network for support?

Further reading Cranston G and Lock G. 2012. Techniques to encourage interactive student learning in a laboratory setting. Engineering Education. 7 (1) pp2-10 Forsey M. 2013. Flipping the sociology classroom: towards a practice of online pedagogy. Journal of Sociology.49. pp471-485 Heaslip G. 2014. Student response systems and learner engagement in large classes. Active Learning in Higher Education. 15 (1)pp11-24 Hutchings M and Quinney A 2015. The Flipped Classroom, Disruptive Pedagogies, Enabling Technologies and Wicked Problems: Responding to 'the Bomb in the Basement'. Electronic Journal of E-Learning,13(2), pp. 106-119. Hounsell D. 2007.Towards more sustainable feedback to students. In: Boud D and Falchikov N eds. Rethinking assessment in higher education. Learning for the longer term. London: Routledge pp101-113Mazur E.2009. Farewell, lecture? Science. 323. (2nd Jan) pp50 McArthur J. 2011. Tipping out the boot grit: the use of ongoing feedback devices to enhance feedback dialogue. York: HEA, ESCalate Subject Centre. Nicol D. 2010. From monologue to dialogue: improving written feedback in mass higher education. Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education. 35 (5) pp501-517 Vardi I 2013. Effectively feeding forward from one written assessment task to the next. Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education. 38 (5) pp599-610.