Feedback

The Main Element of Qualitative -Descriptive Evaluation

DR.Bahman Gharahdaghi

Researcher, Author, and Instructor of Qualitative -Descriptive Evaluation Programs

Introduction

A new evaluation program started in high schools eight years ago dubbed Qualitative-Descriptive Evaluation Program.  This program stands out because of its clear logical-methodical process.  Nevertheless, it still faces many problems.

As surveys indicated, this program has failed to create significant changes in the views of many education stakeholders to attract collective cooperation.  One potential reason for this slow change of view could be the lack of interest shown in the issue by public media especially television.  However, an important development about this program is that it has received stamp of approval from Higher Education Commission.

Education scholars are expected to contribute toward the advancement of this cause based on their knowledge and understandings of the existing theorems so that we do not stand witness to the dissolution of yet another program with desirable tenets.

The main element of this program is feedback.

This article was prepared based on author’s personal knowledge and experience on the subject, the available new resources, and a summary of Feedback Management (Garedaghi and Shokohi, 2010).  Author’s ambition in writing this article was to provide simple and applicable guidelines to clear the path for interested practitioners.

The origin of feedback did not stem form education or educational process.  Feedback became an issue in control science and communication, or cybernetics.  Evidences show that feedback had made significant contribution to the development of many cybernetic and social models (Richardson 1991).

Cybernetics is a general principle in system theory and is associated with independence, self-regulation, and interaction built around a feedback mechanism as its backbone.

Feedback is generally associated with Norbert Wiener and invent of cybernetics after World War II (Mayor, 1970).  Development of cybernetics took place during 1940s and 1950s, yet, feedback in its general form enjoys a longer history as far back as ancient Greece.

Feedback enjoys a high position in education – as a dynamic social system – in spite of its short history.  It is the main guiding tool in teaching-learning process.  Feedback is an activity that facilitates a deeper learning process in classrooms (Hassani, 2010, p. 209).

Grading was the traditional way of providing feedback in educational system.  We all have mixed experiences about grades.  Use of grading or ranking as feedback is deprecated today in educational systems especially in qualitative-descriptive evaluation because of the following reasons.

• Lack of an understandable communication language

• Lack of proper interpretation of students’ achievements and shortcomings

• Lack of contribution to students’ learning progress and improvements

• Lack of ability to indicate what students have learned and what skills they have applied

• Lack of ability to create awareness in students about the status of their efforts, progress, and achievements

• Lack of clear indication about students educational standing to guide selection of proper steps in their future learning process

Descriptive feedback, as the main element of Qualitative-Descriptive Evaluation Program, is a proper substitute for the traditional grading and ranking system.  Feedback has an important role in achieving educational objectives, introducing learning improvement, elevating educational quality, and improving student performance.

Feedback is a connecting bridge between expectations of the education program and students thinking.  It acts like a magnet taking attention of stakeholders (i.e. parents and students).  Feedback can turn into an important tool in the hands of educators.

Feedback Definition

Feedback is an inseparable element of teaching-learning process.  It is an element that can turn teaching-learning environment into a dynamic and effective process (Hassani, 2010, p.226)

Feedback has many definitions. Norbert Wiener offered his classic definition as a mechanism for controlling a system by re-inputting the results of past performance back into the system (Spink, 1997, p.382).

What is the meaning of feedback in education?

A simple definition of feedback in education is the return of performance outcome to the students by the environment (teacher-student and student).

A more specific definition of feedback in education can be a verbal or written expression of a teacher’s opinion or reaction on learning status of a student expressed in teacher’s own verbal or written statements delivered throughout the teaching-learning process.

Feedback represents a teacher’s cognitive, meta-cognitive and personal judgment.  Timely feedback to students can help them realize their current standing to decide on the next steps to further their education (Gharedaghi, 2009, p.118). 

Feedback Types

Feedback should answer three important questions (Rastgar, 2010, p.8):

• Where are we going? (What are the objectives?)

• How do we get there?

• What is the next step?

A search into current resources on the subject revealed different ways of classification based on author(s) views.  Some classifications offered by well-known scholars (Hassani, Shookohi, Khosh Kholgh, Rastegar, and others) are listed below:

• verbal or written, from communication point view;

• cognitive, meta-cognitive, or emotional, from content point of view;

• teachers, parents, classmates, or students, from source point of view;

• process or final, from timing point of view;

• qualitative or quantitative, from evaluative point of view;

Regardless of the scientific basis for any of the offered classifications, my own experience in conducting many workshops on the subject and my interaction with colleagues indicate that offering numerous classifications of feedback can only contribute to more confusion leading to misunderstanding and limited effect use of this important tool.

I personally believe the following classification fits best with this discussion:

1. process (classroom) feedback

2. final feedback

 Process (Classroom) Feedback

Process feedback are the same descriptive, cognitive, and meta-cognitive feedback teachers give students to guide them to applying better learning methods or processes and understanding their own strength and weaknesses in learning different subjects.

Students can understand their status and decide what they need to do when they receive continued, objective, varying, descriptive, simple, and understandable feedback (Gharadaghi, 2009, p 118).  Feedback should be understandable and motivating to serve this purpose.  Feedback should also be relevant to student’s knowledge base, past experiences, and motivating (Rastgar, 2010).

Teachers can communicate their evaluation of students’ performance with feedbacks based on the learning objectives with considerations given to students’ ages, understanding, emotional conditions, and performance.

A nurturing feedback can drive students further in their learning path.  Conversely, a feedback with no consideration for students’ abilities and accomplishments will not bear a fruitful result.

Teachers cannot expect students to be motivated to perform when they do not feel good about themselves, do not recognize their accomplishments, do not have a proper review of their past performance, and are not driven by the dream of their future achievements. 

Feedback should develop confidence, aptitude, and competence in students.  Selection of proper wording with positive effects is important for an effective feedback.  Furthermore, feedback should be true and sincere.  A teacher may unwittingly turn into an obstacle in the progress of student when student feels that his feedback is deceptive, unreal, and exaggerated.

When a teacher addresses a student with nice and general purpose words without any emotional bearing, he may not only fail to motivate, but instead, may induce disappointment and displeasure in the student.  The student feels that the teacher was not pleased with his accomplishments and therefore, does not really care about him.

What feedback is suitable?  What is the best way to deliver a suitable feedback?  From where do we know that our feedback is suitable?

For the purpose of clarification, we classify process feedback into three groups:

1. Permissible Process Feedback

2. Permissible Process Feedback with Sufficient Care

3. Impermissible Process Feedback

What is important for any type of feedback is that it should consider student status and be delivered by observing the principle of not too much, not too little, but just enough (Rastgar, 2010).

Permissible Process Feedback

A permissible process feedback is one that considers acquired qualities of learner rather than innate qualities.  Reading, hearing, and feeling such feedback can be motivational.

A permissible process feedback will feed into student confidence, competence, and beliefs if delivered after deliberation, with complete understanding of student status, and with the intention to elevate student’s spontaneous abilities.  It will drive the student toward heightened efforts and activities.

Permissible Feedback

Permissible feedback emphasizes students’ strong points and accomplishments.  Teacher pays attention to any minuscule achievements and any strong points to encourage and reinforce those qualities in the students.  This scheme has wonderful results in the case of students with weak abilities. 

A teacher should not fail to notice when a tumultuous student who always presents problems to others does a work well or observes classroom rules.  The teacher should take the opportunity to give a prompt and timely feedback to such student such as “Thanks my son, you did a good work and I’m pleased about your conduct.”

A nice line of wording gives the student a clear signal that how much value the teacher puts on good conduct.  To maintain and reinforce such behavior in the student, the teacher publicizes the student’s behavior by talking about it to school superintendent, parents, classmates, and others. 

These feedbacks have three important characteristics:

• They highlight student’s achievements and strong points

• They carefully point out student weaknesses

• They provide practical guidance according to students individual differences

Examples

• Sweety your dictation was good. Write carefully once from line one to four of your lesson to learn better.  Make sure you write accents in red.

• I am satisfied with your dictation. To make it better, make a statement with …….

• I am very glad that you do your homework with extra care every time.

• Your work shows that you are making progress in……….

Permissible Process Feedback with Required Care

Permissible process feedback with required care are divided into two groups:

• In the first group of feedbacks teachers recognizes students’ weak points and provide simple and understandable guidance to students.

In this scheme, teachers do not closely pay attention to students’ abilities as was done in previous group.  Even when they pay attention to students’ abilities, it is rather limited.  They normally pay attention to students’ weak points rather than recognizing the miraculous effects of emphasizing on what students can accomplish.

Teachers should understand that any encouragement they give is a reaction to learner’s natural and psychological needs.  A proper feedback can reinforce self-value and self-confidence in students providing extra drive for more achievements – the positive effects punishments can never deliver.

Delivering positive incentives to students can create opportunities for them to discover their abilities, capacities, and strong points.  Such discoveries can create a positive and valuable image in students’ minds that ultimately lead to higher feelings of self-worth. 

Examples

• It is necessary to do ….

• Need to improve more in ….

• It seems you have problem in

• You seem to have problem writing …. Pay attention to ….. before you write

• A group of feedbacks teachers repeatedly give for any kind of student activities without paying attention to their motivational properties. Examples of this type of feedbacks are:

• My dear angle, you did a good job with your dictation

• My dear angle, you did well in your exercise

• My sweety, you did your homework well

• My beauty, you have such a nice handwriting

• I discovered you make beautiful statements

Hassani believes teachers use these rhythmic feedbacks too frequently these days.  He considers these feedbacks as incomplete and bars teachers from using them excessively because they may become stereotypical.

Students should receive motivational feedbacks only when they are not facing special problems and, therefore, do not require guidance.  Most rhythmic phrases fit into this type of persuasive feedbacks.

Impermissible Process Feedback

Impermissible process feedback can be classified into two types:

• The first group of impermissible feedback is made of the ranking indicators that teachers mistakenly use as descriptive feedback. Examples: as expected, close to expected, need additional efforts, need to learn more, very good, good, acceptable, and the like.  Teachers can generally use these ranking indicators in students’ progress reports or visual measurement tools.  The use of them for any other purpose is not permissible.

• The second group of impermissible feedback is made of the ones that create negative feelings, build a sense of hate for school, exacerbate feeling of inadequacy, or hearing or reading them is threatening.

Examples: You are not capable, you always make mistakes, you are not able, you never can…, why can’t you be like… , why your writing is so awful, it is the last time you …

These statements are stereotypical, attach a negative image, and are crushing to students. They come to believe that they really have insurmountable shortcomings and consequently lose their confidence and motivation to overcome their weaknesses.

Approaches to Deliver Process (Classroom) Feedback

Process (classroom) feedback can be delivered in three ways:

• Verbal Feedback

• Written Feedback

• Verbal-Written Feedback

Verbal Feedbacks

Verbal feedbacks are delivered to students through facial expressions, tone of voice, body language, and variety of statements, including expressive, descriptive, or rhythmic statements in Farsi or native language or a mix of both.

These feedbacks are most effective when delivered in timely and understandable fashion, when they consider the differences in students, and when and where student is most receptive.  Teachers can immediately witness the effect of their feedback in students when they observe these conditions

Khosh Kholgh believes that teachers should consider the same principles and conditions for verbal feedback as they use for written feedback (2010, p. 107).

These principles and conditions are content preparation, delivery approach, self-regulation, judgment criterion, effects and applications, value, clarity, tone of voice, and delivery of message.  Most of the feedbacks teachers give during teaching-learning process fall into this category.

These feedbacks can be delivered individually or in groups.  The tone of voice is important in the quality of delivery and acceptability of these feedbacks.  They can be motivational or prohibitive.  Using descriptive names and adjectives in delivery increases the impact.  Teachers should never use diminution, ridicule, or sarcasm in their delivery (Rastegar, 2010)  

The problem with this type of feedbacks stem from their verbal nature.  They are short lived and student’s mental reactions influence their effectiveness.  A student will likely remember the positive aspects of feedback if he or she is positive and optimistic at the time of delivery.  On the contrary, the student will commit the negative aspects to memory if he or she has negative and tense feelings (Brown, 2007).

Verbal feedbacks provide an opportunity for constructive communication with students.  They may also be used as means to express an opinion, to present a point of view, to elevate self- confidence and the like.  When a student receives teacher’s reaction to his behavior or performance will respond accordingly.  Reaction process produces many learning opportunities.  A teacher can use these opportunities for increasing knowledge, correcting attitude, and reinforcing skills.

Written Process Feedback

Written process feedbacks are poetic, rhythmic or graphic expressions made by teacher on student works.  Teachers should use this type of feedbacks when they believe on their impact.  Anything that is reflected on student records should contain teacher’s written feedback.

When to use written feedback

Teachers may use written feedback in the following cases:

• When student has serious and basic problems in one of the activities and teacher opts to write a feedback in order to communicate to parents what they need to do to help the student.

• When parents should be notified about student’s performance.

• When student work is attached to student’s record card.

• When student has done an outstanding work and teacher wants to encourage his efforts and achievements by providing a motivating feedback.

• When absence of feedback may complicate decision making on student’s future.

Written feedbacks are the best options when teachers want students to think and contemplate on their own feedbacks (Rastgar, 2010).

Verbal Feedback:

Although it is best that students receive feedbacks on anything they do, but these feedbacks should not necessarily be in writing.  Teachers may give verbal feedback when time and place command.

Verbal feedbacks may be used in the following cases:

• When student should be informed about his performance;

• When student is ready to receive verbal feedback;

• When student cannot read;

• When student is in elementary school especially early in the school year;

• When there is no need to provide feedback to student parents;

• When teacher judges that recording feedback may not have high effect on student’s future performance;

• When teacher is observing student’s performance and believes that an on the spot and timely feedback is more in order.

Verbal-written Process Feedback:

Teachers should base their feedback on a clear outlook of where students stand and where they should go.  In other words, teachers should be aware of the learning and learners’ objectives when they deliver their feedback.  Feedbacks delivered in this fashion may guide students in the right direction toward their educational objectives and expectations.  In this way, teachers may deliver written- verbal feedbacks based on their own judgments and student status. 

Important characteristics of an effective feedback should be considered when delivering any feedback, written or verbal.  For this purpose, it is best to know:

• Student status;

• How is it possible to improve student status?

Feedback Characteristics:

Feedbacks should deliver three points in order to be understandable and have lasting effect regardless of being process or final, verbal or written (Khosh Kholgh, 2009).

1. Feedback should describe current performance as it is geared to achieving educational objectives.

2. Feedback should provide guidance to narrow the distance between current performance and educational objectives.

3. Feedback should provide opportunities for self- regulation and learning adjustments.

Educational scholars believe that feedbacks should have the following characteristics: 

• Should clearly and expressly indicate what student should do to fully satisfy educational expectations

• Should be simple and understandable

• Should reflect student accomplishment

• Should be continual and timely

• Should be student oriented and correspond to students’ performance differences;

• Should use positive, clear and meaningful words, phrases, and statements

• Should reflect student psychological and age characteristics.

1. B) Final Feedback

Final feedback is the student final  Portfolio that shows his accomplishments during school year complete with class ranking and course grades.  This  Portfolioprovides a picture of student educational standing and mannerism status (psychological, physical, and social).

Teachers prepare this  Portfoliotwo or three years during the course of school year, as may be required by educational programs, based on student records, teacher’s notes and bimonthly evaluation forms.  These report cards communicate students achievements and standing to stakeholders (parents, students, and school administration)

Resources

• Brawn, S., “Effective Teaching Technics”, Translated by Fathi Vagergah, K., Aiij Publishing, Tehran (2007)
• Gharedaghi, B. & Shokoohi, M., “Feedback Managment”, Koorosh Publishing, Tehran (2010)
• Gharedaghi, B. & Shokoohi, M., ” Portfolio Management, Sorting Knowledge, Ability, and Applying in Qualitative-Descriptive Evaluation”, Koorosh Publishing, Tehran (2009)
• Gharedaghi, B., “Learning Improvement through Paper and Pencil Tests”, Koorosh Publishing, Tehran (2010)
• Gharedaghi, B., “Today’s Children, Tomorrow’s Officials, An Introduction to Qualitative-Descriptive Evaluation (for Parents)”, Koorosh Publishing, Tehran (2010)
• Gharedaghi, B., “Observational Assessment, A New Approach in Qualitative-Descriptive Evaluation”, 2^nd Edition, Koorosh Publishing, Tehran (2010)
• Hasani, M., “A Practical Guide for Qualitative-Descriptive Evaluation in Classrooms”, 2^nd Edition, Abed Publishing, Tehran (2010)
• Khoshkholgh, I., ” Principles and a Practical Guide for Preparing and Presenting Descriptive Feedbacks in Classrooms” , Nashr Javan Emrooz Publishing, Tehran (2010)
• Mayr, O. “The Origins of Feedback Control”, The Press, Cambridge, MA, (1970)
• Rastgar, T., ” Descriptive Evaluation Means Effective Feedback”, Monadi Tarbiat Publishing, Tehran (2010)
• Richardson, G.P, “Feedback Thought in Social Science & Systems Theory”, University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, (1991)
• Spink, A., “Study of Interactive Feedback during Mediated Information Retrieval.” Journal of the American Society for Information Science. 48(5), (1997)