Screencast feedback is higher in quantity, more explicit and engaging, and may better enable uptake compared to written feedback. However, most studies deploy screencast feedback as the ‘transmission’ of feedback comments (Mahoney, Macfarlane, & Ajjawi, 2019). This does little more than ‘replace’ written feedback (Pitt & Winstone, 2020) and does not consider the importance of learner agency and action within the uptake process.

However, this limitation can be overcome if screencast feedback is conceptually positioned and deployed in a way that supports agency by providing technology-mediated opportunities for learners to initiate and sustain feedback uptake-oriented dialogues with providers. Drawing on a qualitative case in practice, using reflections (N=14) and surveys (N=14) to progressively focus interviews with 13 undergraduate advanced writing students in South Korea, three themes were developed to illustrate the potential of the feedback practice.

In the first theme, screencast feedback appeared to enhance understanding of feedback and helped learners understand the gap between current and target performance and to set and achieve feedback enactment goals.

In the second theme, documentary evidence revealed that participants asked eight different types of questions about feedback, including initial feedback requests, questions on changes made and on those to make. Dialogues were also used to reject feedback. Data suggest dialogues resulted in feedback uptake or learning which may not have been possible without them. The perceived informality and ease of initiating technology-mediated dialogues reportedly increased willingness to interact.

In the third theme, participants revealed that viewing screencast feedback increased the feeling of connection with the teacher. This, along with enhanced perceptions of teacher effort in providing feedback, encouraged the perception of support and care from the teacher. This, in turn, encouraged trust and motivation to engage with and use feedback.

The findings demonstrate that although screencast feedback was perceived to be of higher quality and easier to use, there were still occasions in which further dialogue was needed to understand, reject, or complete the learning and uptake process from feedback. Thus, the findings illustrate a potentially worthwhile trade off between the teacher resources needed to field additional questions from learners, efficiency gains in learning from feedback and potentially greater satisfaction with interpersonal aspects of the feedback experience. Thus, the findings have both theoretical and practical implications and are especially relevant to those teaching in higher education settings who wish to support feedback engagement and uptake and improve student-teacher relationships through a dialogic and relational approach.