Te Kete Wānaka
Learning, Teaching and Library
Student feedback during semester
Receiving feedback during a semester can help you fine-tune your teaching. There are several techniques you have access to.
Feedback is a valuable source of information to help you improve your teaching and to provide evidence of the quality of your teaching as part of your teaching portfolio*. Feedback allows you to identify both the elements that enhance learning as well as those that may be creating obstacles for your students. Take some time to explore the different evaluation options available and decide which approach you will take in each of your courses. Once you have implemented your evaluation approach, remember to allocate time to review the feedback and reflect on what it means for your teaching.
* Note: The Annual Salary Review and Promotions process encourages the use of multiple sources of evidence with respect to teaching and facilitation of learning. This includes peer reviews of teaching and the development of structured teaching portfolios.
In addition to the end-of-semester course evaluations, there are several techniques to obtain student feedback during the semester. These techniques give you feedback when you need it and give you an opportunity to respond to student concerns during the semester. Techniques include mid-semester feedback, specific feedback, the Minute Paper, and the Muddiest Point. Remember to also seek feedback from your Student Rep.
An overview of each of these techniques is provided below including some tips for their effective implementation in your course.
Mid-semester feedback is a good way to hear from students about how the course is going prior to the end-of-semester course evaluation, allowing for early intervention if necessary. It also reinforces with your students that you take their learning seriously.
Plan to gather mid-semester feedback prior to the mid-semester study break. This will give you time before teaching begins again to give due consideration to the ideas presented and how you can use them as a means towards positive change.
To gain maximum benefit from the feedback you collect:
- Summarise the main points made.
- Consider students’ suggestions for change or improvement.
- Identify any changes that can be made and what you will do about them.
- Identify any changes that are not able to be made now and why.
- Discuss the process and your plans with your students when teaching begins again.
Options for obtaining mid-semester feedback include circulating a paper form in one of your class sessions (A5 size is often sufficient) or using a Questionnaire or Feedback activity on your Akoraka | Learn course page. A wide response is a good response, so allow a few minutes at the end of a class session to explain why you are seeking feedback and give students time to answer the questions. Remember to keep the exercise meaningful – we don’t want to waste anyone’s time, yours or theirs. But it is important to only ask questions for which you are genuinely interested in hearing the student response. Use open-ended questions that encourage students to focus on how things are going and limit the number of questions.
Suggested questions are:
- What helps your learning in this course?
- What obstacles are there to your learning in this course?
- What could be changed to help you learn better?
Remember to thank students for their feedback.
Mid-semester feedback and end-of-semester course evaluations often provide generic comments about the course overall. However, there may be some specific elements of your course that you would like to receive student feedback on. For example, you may have introduced a new topic or module in your course or made some modifications from a previous offering. You can ask students to comment on these in their mid-semester feedback and/or end-of-semester course evaluation, or you can seek specific feedback from students at the time.
Some options for obtaining feedback include:
- Allocating some class time for a discussion – this works well in smaller classes and in third year or postgraduate courses where students are often more confident about sharing their views.
- Developing some specific questions that you would like student feedback on and circulating these to students via a paper form or via the Questionnaire or Feedback activity on your Akoraka | Learn course page.
Like mid-semester feedback, to gain maximum benefit from any specific feedback you collect:
- Summarise the main points made.
- Consider students’ suggestions for change or improvement.
- Identify any changes that can be made to other areas of the course and what you will do about them.
- Identify any changes that are not able to be made now to other areas of the course and why.
- Discuss the process and your plans with your students soon after the feedback was received.
Example questions that you could modify to suit include:
- What aspects of [topic x/the guest lecture/the field trip/the group activity/...] did you find most beneficial and why?
- What aspects of [topic x/the guest lecture/the field trip/the group activity/...] should be improved and why?
- What aspects of [topic x/the guest lecture/the field trip/the group activity/...] would you like to see included in other [topics/guest lectures/field trips/group activities]?
Remember to thank students for their feedback.
The clue is in the name, the Minute Paper. It is quick and easy to implement and gives you useful feedback for a minimal investment of time and energy. This technique allows you to gauge student understanding of a particular topic and to show respect for and interest in student feedback thereby encouraging active listening and engagement. For students who are hesitant about asking questions in class, it can provide a safe means to do so. Through identifying what students are finding useful and what they are finding difficult, you can focus subsequent explanations more effectively or present more examples to clarify those points.
To use the Minute Paper:
- Reserve a few minutes at the end of a class session – long enough to ask the question, to allow students to respond and to collect their responses.
- Ask students to respond briefly to two questions (see suggested questions below). Remind them not to include their names. Let the students know how much time they will have and when they can expect your feedback.
- Students write their responses on paper (you may like to supply this) or you can set up a Padlet, Questionnaire or Feedback activity on your Akoraka | Learn course page.
- Look through the students’ responses, tabulating the main responses and noting any useful comments.
- In the next class, use their responses to review your main points, address misconceptions and answer any common questions. You could also post a response to student questions in a Forum on your Akoraka | Learn course page.
Suggested questions are:
- What was the most useful or meaningful thing you learned during this class session?
- What question(s) remain uppermost in your mind as we end this class session?
Caveats:
- If Minute Papers are over or poorly used, students will begin to see the technique as a gimmick not worth taking seriously.
- When students seem to confuse trivial details with significant themes or ask questions you have already answered, remind yourself that they receive the material and make sense of it differently than you do. Hold your feedback until you overcome the irritation this may cause.
- To prevent individual disappointment, let the class know in advance that you may not have time to comment on every point and question submitted.
- Responding to Minute Papers can take longer than expected – one question may lead to more.
Reference: Angelo, T. A., & Cross, K. P. (1993). Classroom assessment techniques: A handbook for college teachers (2nd ed.). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Another quick and easy technique that you can implement to gain timely and useful feedback. It boils it down to one issue and one point of clarity. The murky problem becomes clearer.
To use the Muddiest Point:
- Decide what you want feedback on: an entire class session, or one specific element?
- Reserve a few minutes at the end of the class session – long enough to ask the question, to allow students to respond and to collect their responses.
- Let students know beforehand how much time they have to respond, and how you will use their responses.
- Students write their responses on paper (you may like to supply this) or you can set up a Padlet, Questionnaire or Feedback activity on your Akoraka | Learn course page.
- Collect student responses and skim to identify the main areas of difficulty for the class.
- Respond to the students’ feedback during the next time the class meets or as soon as possible afterwards. You could also post a response to student questions in a Forum on your Akoraka | Learn course page or develop a learning activity such as a Video, Lesson, or Quiz to help students’ understanding of the class material.
Key question:
What was the “muddiest” point in this session? (i.e. what was the least clear to you?)
Caveats:
- Asking students to focus only on what they do not understand has its drawbacks; such an emphasis can undermine both the students’ and your own confidence in what is being learnt. Check on what students do understand as well to restore some balance.
- Some students may have difficulty explaining what they do not understand. It takes time to develop this skill of self-evaluation.
- Do not give students the impression that all muddy points will necessarily be cleared up in a few minutes at the next session – some are muddier than others and may only come clear over a longer time period.
- Do not spend so much time responding to muddy points that you lose momentum in your course. Be flexible but set an upper time limit that you are prepared to use for feedback on muddy points.
Reference: Angelo, T. A., & Cross, K. P. (1993). Classroom assessment techniques: A handbook for college teachers (2nd ed.). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
