Leading Assessment Feedback Practices in Schools

DESIGNING QUALITY ASSESSMENT FEEDBACK PRACTICES IN SCHOOLS rachel Goh ALWAYS LEARNING PEARSON

Published by Pearson Education South Asia Pte Ltd 23/25 First Lok Yang Road, Jurong Singapore 629733 Custom Programme Manager: Ang Teck Chuan Project Editor: Esther Yap Prepress Executive: Kimberly Yap Pearson Asia Pacific offices: Bangkok, Beijing, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong, Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur, Manila, Seoul, Singapore, Taipei, Tokyo Printed in Singapore 4  3  2   1 16 15 14 13  ISBN 978-981-31-3026-5 Cover Art: Eunice Gan Copyright © Pearson Education South Asia Pte Ltd 2021. All rights reserved. This publication is protected by Copyright and permission should be obtained from the publisher prior to any prohibited reproduction, storage in a retrieval system, or transmission in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or likewise. For information regarding permission(s), write to: Rights and Permissions Department. http://pearson.com/asia FM.indd 2 6/15/2021 5:26:20 PM

Designing Quality Assessment Feedback Practices in Schools This book examines the principles of quality assessment feedback design and the related practice of engaging students in feedback. It seeks to answer the following questions: What constitutes effective feedback? What should feedback do for students’ learning outcomes and learner growth? How can assessment feedback practices support students’ learning in the present and beyond? The book is structured into two major parts. The first part, ‘Principles of a learner-centred assessment feedback design’, provides readers with an understanding of the Big Ideas of effective feedback and the principles for quality feedback design. It is intended to support teachers in helping students identify and close their learning gaps, make them want and be good enough to fix their gap, and persuade them to go beyond fixes and gaps. The book offers insights into myriad issues that affect and are also affected by students’ engagement with feedback, and advocates for students taking ownership of their learning and playing an active role in the feedback process. It cautions against a narrow conception of feedback that focuses only on error identification and correction, emphasises student compliance, and is undergirded by a deficit view of students. Such an orientation towards feedback fosters students’ dependency on teacher feedback and is counter-productive in developing students as self-regulated learners. The second part of the book, ‘Theory into practice’, provides examples developed by classroom teachers and knowledgeable others that demonstrate a sound understanding of assessment feedback. The various chapters focus on assessment feedback practices in the humanities, languages, mathematics, sciences, applied subjects, and those enabled by technology. Assessment feedback is initiated by teachers and driven by teacher feedback literacy and is intended for students whose response to feedback is shaped by and shapes their student feedback literacy. This book considers the challenges of students’ engagement with feedback while offering practitioners solutions that are practical and situated in context to navigate the ensuing tensions in helping students achieve learning outcomes and learner growth from feedback. This book provides readers with concrete examples of how to design assessment feedback practices to suit their specific context and enhance the learning of not just some, but all learners in their classrooms. It will be a valuable resource for teachers, school leaders, and teacher educators who are keen to better engage students in feedback, and researchers interested in the field of assessment feedback. Rachel Goh is a Teaching Fellow in the Learning Sciences and Assessment Academic Group at the National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. She is seconded from the Ministry of Education, Singapore. As a Senior Teacher of English Language for several years, she has championed action research, led professional learning teams, and mentored beginning teachers, and out of which, grew her interest in teacher learning, lesson study, and assessment for learning. Her personal learning goal is to grow in the ability to walk alongside all learners in their learning and forming of their educational being. i

Table of Contents 1 13 Introduction 35 Acknowledgements 51 Part I 67 Principles of a learner-centred assessment feedback design 81 99 1. What should assessment feedback do for students’ learning? 119 141 Big Ideas of effective feedback 161 2. How do you design quality assessment feedback? A trifecta of 169 199 practices: Feed up standards, feedback dialogue, and feed forward by design 3. Why bother with students’ cognitive, affective, and behavioural engagement with feedback Part II Theory into practice 4. Assessment Feedback Practices in Humanities 5. Assessment Feedback Practices in Languages 6. Assessment Feedback Practices in Mathematics 7. Assessment Feedback Practices in Sciences 8. Assessment Feedback Practices in Applied Subjects 9. The role of Artificial Intelligence in helping teachers differentiate learning and feedback on student writing Mark Stanley 10. Nurturing Self-regulated Learners through AI-supported Feedback Tay Hui Yong 11. Assessment Feedback Practices in a Secondary School: Helping learners become more independent across disciplines Conclusion v

Assessment for All Learners Home About Us Focus Featured News Noteworthy Assignments Publications Professional Dev Archive Recent issue Big Ideas of Effective Feedback Assessment Fit for Learner by Kelvin Tan  2020 has by Rachel Goh  often been punned... Latest Singapore Research This is an excerpt from the introductory chapter of the book on Assessment Feedback “Designing Quality Assessment Feedback Practices in Schools”. Assessment Feedback Want to be the first to know when it is published? Sign up here to Research – Affective,... be on our Book Launch mailing list. Big Ideas of Effective Feedback “Class, I’ve marked your essays and given you comments,” announces the teacher. Restless by Rachel Goh  This is an murmuring fills the classroom as students collect back their assignments in dreary excerpt from... anticipation of corrections to be done. “Luckily, I passed,” exclaims a student, heaving a sigh The Riverside Lighthouse of relief. A few students scrutinize their papers, seemingly trying hard to decipher the Assessment Journey in teacher’s handwriting. Others browse quickly through the written comments, satisfied that 2020 they’ve understood the teacher’s feedback. 2020 was an opportune and vital year to introduce... How would you want your students to receive and respond to feedback comments? Lessons from HBL - A reflection on the Knowing what feedback should do for students’ learning hinges on understanding its role in Assessment for experiences of learners Learning (AfL). AfL has been defined in the MOE Assessment Glossary as “assessment that supports with dyslexia teaching and learning with specific use of learner-centred approaches and strategies. It is primarily used by Siti Asjamiah Binte for ensuring (emphasis mine) that the intended learning outcomes are achieved by students” (Ministry of Asmuri, Senior Education Singapore, 2017). Educational... News This article seeks to clarify what feedback should do for students’ learning by introducing three Big Ideas In Conversation 2020: E- of effective feedback: Pedagogy in Support of... Noteworthy Assignments 1. Effective feedback should help students find and fix their learning gap. by Michelle Yap, Karima 2. Effective feedback should make students want and be good enough to fix their gap. Syahirah and Adeline 3. Effective feedback should persuade students to go beyond fixes and gaps. Wang... Journal Articles In rethinking about what feedback should do for student learning based on the three Big Ideas, I would like Heng, T. T., Song, L., & Tan, to offer a definition of effective assessment feedback practice: It is not about teachers unilaterally giving K. (2021).... feedback to students. It is not about telling students what their weaknesses are without reservations. It is Courses and Seminars not about getting students to do corrections. Effective assessment feedback practice is ultimately about Assessment Fit for Learners personally persuading and convincing each learner of the value, and values of learning your subject Seminar Date: 1 April... discipline. What is your idea of effective assessment feedback practice? Read the following examples and pen down what would make the feedback practice more effective. Example 1.1 Subject/Topic/Level: Science/Food chains and food web/Primary 6 Contributed by Teo Guat Soon Part A: Description of assessment challenge

From the analysis of students’ responses, two Issues were observed. For part (a), students were not able to give an explanation to support their choice of a food producer. For part (b), students failed to state what “affected” meant and did not make a distinction between the terms “main food source” and “only food source” in their reasoning. Part B: Description of assessment feedback practice The teacher collected the students’ assignments and selected a few responses that were representative of student misconceptions and/or poor conceptual reasoning. The next lesson, she gave each student a copy of the collated unmarked samples of anonymised students’ answers. As part of a whole class discussion, she got students to compare the selected samples, and notice wrong concept(s) or wrong term(s) used, and the evidence of a lack of conceptual reasoning. As the teacher elicited and consolidated the learning points, the students took notes of their specific gaps on the worksheet. Finally, the teacher got the students to work on their refined answer. The teacher marked the refined answers with ticks to annotate the gaps that were closed, and with crosses and cues to highlight gaps that students still need to address. Example 1.1.2 illustrates the feedback provided. The teacher had moved away from the typical practice of marking students’ assignments, going through the answers in class, and getting students to copy down the model answer as corrections. She has instead taken effort to select weak and stronger exemplars of students’ work and have them make judgement on how well the answers have addressed the question requirements. Unpacking the criteria of good performance also enabled students to compare them against their own answers to address their own specific learning gaps. This example illustrates that there is a critical difference between giving feedback and feedback as practice. Feedback as practice moves from the act of teacher telling students all their mistakes toward the co-construction of knowledge through showing and concluding.

Big Idea 1: The key to effective feedback is helping students find and fix their learning gap. What should feedback do for student learning? Assessment feedback should help all students find and fix their learning gap. Assessment feedback should help develop students’ capacity to make judgement and take requisite action. Helping students find and fix their learning gap will ensure that they develop the capacity to make judgement and utilize feedback for improvement. Example 1.2 Subject/Focus: Chinese Language/Spelling Contributed by Tay Choon Hong Part A: Description of assessment challenge The motivation to learn Chinese can be low for some students due to the fact that their preferred mode of communication is through English. The strokes of Chinese characters are also relatively more difficult to master. Some students are also easily content with what they have achieved. They are not motivated to put in more effort in their work. What should the teacher do? (a) Tell the students what their weaknesses are without reservations, or (b) Tell the student what they are capable of achieving. Which one is a better choice for motivating the student to improve? Part B: Description of assessment feedback practice The answer to the above question about the teacher’s necessary action seems pretty obvious. The teacher was cognizant that feedback comments could influence students’ self-perception of their competence and shape their beliefs about their learning ability. It led him to want to practise positive feedback so that students would be more willing to act on the feedback. Example 1.2.1 and Example 1.2.2 shows the teacher’s comments to a student on his performance across two spelling tests. He had noticed from previous spelling tests that the student tended to make careless mistakes in writing the strokes for the Chinese characters so he wrote a comment to have the student see him to address this concern, which the student eventually did. The teacher continued practising positive feedback in the next spelling test as shown in Example 1.2.2 by encouraging the student to continue to apply the method taught so that he could achieve his best performance. The teacher reflected that in his past feedback practice, there was a tendency to focus on the weaknesses of students instead of their potential. Adopting a formative assessment mindset helped in shifting attention to what students could potentially do. While acknowledging that writing such comments can be time consuming, the capital investment has yielded benefits for students in terms of a greater motivation to learn. The teacher described what has been helpful in practising positive feedback: (a) Thinking from the perspective of the learner: How are they likely to react to the written/verbal feedback; (b) Including comments with a positive connotation to try again instead of merely directing students to do corrections; and (c) Giving students a concrete opportunity to act on the feedback. Big Idea 2: The key to effective feedback is making students want and be good enough to fix their gap. What should feedback do for students’ learning? Assessment feedback should make all students want and be good enough to fix their learning gap. Assessment feedback should build students’ motivation and ability to use feedback to enhance learning for the long term. Making students want and be good

enough to fix their gap will build their will and skill in receiving and responding to feedback for sustainable learning. Example 1.3 Subject/Topic/Level: Mathematics/Linear Law/Secondary 3 Contributed by Lee Chin Hock Part A: Description of assessment challenge A procedural understanding is required in the learning of Linear Law in mathematics. This is likewise in the learning of other subjects such as process skills in Science. Teachers will usually teach the concept and then use examples to demonstrate the steps to solve the questions. However, some students still encounter difficulty in solving such questions involving procedural understanding. In this case, the teacher noticed three common mistakes that students make in answering questions involving Linear Law: (a) Students encounter difficulty in joining all the points to plot the linear graph when most points are not nicely collinear; (b) Students do not extend the line to cut the vertical axis and as such, they are unable to find the Y- intercept; and (c) Students forget to replace Y and X with the actual labels of the axes instead they assume Y = y. Part B: Description of assessment feedback practice The teacher wanted to help students develop a checklist to guide their procedural thinking. By then, students were familiar with the conversion of a linear form to a non-linear equation. The learning focus was to help students with conversion of a non-linear form to a linear equation. He began at the feed up stage, using a question on converting a linear form to a non-linear graph to help students recall the procedural steps. He elicited students’ responses to draw up a checklist for the procedure. This helped students understand what a good checklist would involve. Using another question, the teacher demonstrated the steps involved in converting a non-linear form to a linear equation. Students were asked to create a checklist of the steps involved on their own. They could refer to the first checklist as needed. Selected students were then invited to present their checklist to the class for feedback. Through questions posed by the teacher as feedback, the presenting students were able to revise their checklist, and the ensuing class discussion also prompted other students to compare their checklist with those presented to identify and close the gaps in their procedure. A student-generated checklist is shown in Example 1.3.1. Later, an opportunity to transfer their learning to another topic was created. Students were asked to create a checklist on plotting a cumulative frequency curve. By then, they were able to do it independently without additional instructional scaffolding and a combination of peer feedback and teacher feedback could be employed. Big Idea 3: The key to effective feedback is persuading students to go beyond fixes and gaps. What should feedback do for students’ learning? Assessment feedback should persuade students to go beyond corrections in moving their learning forward. Assessment feedback should develop students to become self-regulated learners, capable of monitoring their learning in the long term. Persuading students to go beyond fixes and gaps will help develop their self-regulation for learning in and beyond the classroom.

How did the three Big Ideas connect-extend-challenge your thinking on what would make the feedback practice more effective? Share your thoughts with us in the AFAL community on this Padlet https://padlet.com/AFAL/BigIdeas Tags: Featured, Feb2021 Newer Post Home Older Post Theme images by Storman. Powered by Blogger. Search This Blog Search

Acknowledgements Working with others and soliciting feedback from many has the benefit of garnering rich perspectives to illumine the multiple aspects of the issue in discussion and offer productive ways forward. Likewise, this book has benefitted from the views of many collaborators and contributors. It would not have been possible without: • Kelvin Tan and Tay Hui Yong for their insightful feedback on the manuscript. Your perceptive comments have prompted my introspection about writing, feedback engagement, and advocacy for student voice. • Tay Hui Yong and Mark Stanley for contributing chapters and the educators whose work had informed these chapters. I have learnt a lot from your deep insights into tapping technology for feedback efficacy. Tay-Tan Lee Lian John LoCasio Mark Wooley Kate Williams Christopher Dossor Tracey Catling • All the teachers who contributed their assessment practice to inform our views of how and how well assessment feedback should be understood and practised in schools. You have demonstrated for us high standards of feedback efficacy and assessment leadership. Teo Guat Soon Tay Choon Hong Lee Chin Hock Serene Lam Lin Shaojie Haryani Hamidan Lis Hartini Lee Cheng Yen Haslinda Shafawi Nur Fauzi Abu Bakar Lee Jin Wee Joel iii