Abstract
Providing feedback is one of the most influential means of teachers to enhance student learning. In this dissertation, we first focused on what is known from research about effective (i.e. learning-enhancing) feedback. Effective feedback, mostly studied from a cognitive psychologist point of view, should, according to the literature, be specific,
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goal-related, and not too elaborated. Praise and feedback-on-the -self are considered to be ineffective types of feedback. From positive psychology stance, additions are that providing more positive than negative feedback influences the experienced emotion, and hence learning. Moreover it seems that feedback on character strengths as a type of feedback on the self does enhance learning. Praise might indirectly influence learning, through the creation of ‘emotional spaces’. Progress feedback, information that performance has improved compared with a previous performance in a similar task, seems to be a valuable addition to the common view of feedback as discrepancy feedback, which is described as information about the gap between a current level of performance and a goal. For our second study, we videotaped 78 teachers in their classroom and analyzed the recordings on the occurrence of effective feedback. Teachers did not provide much effective feedback, with no differences related to age or experience. Subsequently, in our third study, we focused on the professional development of experienced teachers in providing learning-enhancing feedback. Research already showed that traditional professional development interventions, such as workshops or symposia did not help teachers change their classroom behavior. Hence, we studied the effectiveness of a multi-component professional development program, entitled FeTiP (Feedback Theory into Practice), aiming to enhance effective teacher feedback by teachers in secondary education. The program was aimed at three levels, the whole team level (two training sessions), the small collegial group level (video-coaching), and the individual level (feedback conversation about actual classroom feedback behavior, modelling in the classroom, and synchronous coaching). Interventions were carried out both outside and inside the classroom. We found that teachers did indeed change their classroom behavior as a result of the FeTiP program. They showed significant progress in the frequency of their feedback, they provided significantly more specific feedback, and their ratio of positive and negative feedback improved. Again, we did not find differences for age or experience. For our fourth study, we analyzed changes in the teachers’ feedback behavior, based on the analyses of video-recordings at four moments in time: (1) before starting the FeTiP program, (2) after the training sessions, (3) after the modelling and practice intervention, and (4) after the data-driven feedback interventions (feedback conversation, synchronous coaching, and video-coaching). Next, we did an exploratory search for possible change patterns. There seemed to be three possible change patterns, namely ‘Ongoing learning’, ‘Learning from explicit modeling and feedback’, and ‘Learning from data-driven feedback’. Findings from the teachers’ learner reports showed that stimulating teachers’ confidence through feedback, and providing opportunities to observe the effect of specific feedback on students were helpful in teachers’ learning processes. Data-driven feedback encouraged the teachers, particularly those who showed resistance, to change their classroom behavior.
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