TY - CONF

T1 - Evaluating assessment feedback in Higher Education: Principles of good practice

AU - Grange, Laura

PY - 2019/7

Y1 - 2019/7

N2 - Development of best practice in assessment feedback is a key issue in Higher Education. Despite there being a strong evidence base promoting feedback as a primary driver of student success and the “most powerful single moderator that enhances achievement”, clear guidance on how these learning effects are realised is lacking. This study evaluates the utility of a series of teaching innovations implemented in a compulsory skills module for final year Marine Biology undergraduate students from a single higher education institution in England. Innovations included the provision of timely and focussed feedback, and the engagement of students in the process of module assessment, peer-led feedback and self-assessment activities. As part of this study students were provided with anonymous questionnaires and polled for their opinions both prior to and following the innovations. Focus group interviewing was also conducted. The findings identify three key priorities integral to effective assessment feedback practice: assessment literacy, marking consistency, and the timeliness and quality of feedback. In response, although there was a notable increase in the number of individual students improving their performance between assessment points, this was not the case for all metrics of module assessment. For example, there was no significant change in the mean or median marks recorded for the overall module nor the mean or median performance of the student body for individual pieces of assessment after the innovations were implemented. However, overall students perceived the assessment feedback innovations positively and encouraged implementation of the teaching enhancements both sooner in their academic journey and more widely throughout their degree programme. Future research should focus on the divergence in staff and student perceptions of feedback, as well as emphasise the importance of responsibility sharing and the active engagement of students in the feedback process, thereby building students’ feedback literacy levels and promoting more sustainable assessment feedback practice. 

AB - Development of best practice in assessment feedback is a key issue in Higher Education. Despite there being a strong evidence base promoting feedback as a primary driver of student success and the “most powerful single moderator that enhances achievement”, clear guidance on how these learning effects are realised is lacking. This study evaluates the utility of a series of teaching innovations implemented in a compulsory skills module for final year Marine Biology undergraduate students from a single higher education institution in England. Innovations included the provision of timely and focussed feedback, and the engagement of students in the process of module assessment, peer-led feedback and self-assessment activities. As part of this study students were provided with anonymous questionnaires and polled for their opinions both prior to and following the innovations. Focus group interviewing was also conducted. The findings identify three key priorities integral to effective assessment feedback practice: assessment literacy, marking consistency, and the timeliness and quality of feedback. In response, although there was a notable increase in the number of individual students improving their performance between assessment points, this was not the case for all metrics of module assessment. For example, there was no significant change in the mean or median marks recorded for the overall module nor the mean or median performance of the student body for individual pieces of assessment after the innovations were implemented. However, overall students perceived the assessment feedback innovations positively and encouraged implementation of the teaching enhancements both sooner in their academic journey and more widely throughout their degree programme. Future research should focus on the divergence in staff and student perceptions of feedback, as well as emphasise the importance of responsibility sharing and the active engagement of students in the feedback process, thereby building students’ feedback literacy levels and promoting more sustainable assessment feedback practice. 

M3 - Abstract

T2 - 4th Horizons in STEM Higher Education Conference

Y2 - 3 July 2019 through 4 July 2019

ER -