FEEDBACK & ASSESSMENTS

The following is taken from Power Up: Making the Shift to 1:1 Teaching

and Learning. It provides a

clear, simple explanation on the power of feedback!
Feedback is . . .

Informative

Timely

Feedback isnt . . .

A grade

Praise.

Useful

Mutually beneficial

This generation of students is programmed for digesting rapid, continuous feedback. Just consider
their participation in computer and video games; they innately understand what it means to learn
through the feedback loop. Grant Wiggins (2012) notes that if you play Angry Birds, Halo, Guitar Hero,
or Tetris, you know that the key to substantial improvement is that the feedback is both timely and
ongoing. When you fail,

you can immediately start over sometimes even right where you left off
to get another opportunity to receive and learn from the feedback. Our students are ready for a
kind of immediate feedback that is rare in most classrooms. The challenges of providing effective

feedback are many. The good news is that 1: 1 technology gives us a tremendous advantage by offering
innovative approaches to problem solving our way through obstacles. With 1: 1 technology, we can
provide more feedback, more efficiently, and in many more forms than we could before. We can turn
around a set of quizzes or checks for understanding in a matter of seconds. We can easily collect the
data we need to make informed decisions about our instruction. We can shortcut the task of giving the
same comment over and over again. We can easily add follow-up instruction to help students fix
common errors. We can separate feedback from grades to encourage students to focus on growth and
learning. We can monitor student writing during the drafting phase without having to wait for a paper
to be turned in.

Neebe, Diana; Roberts, Jennifer (2015-06-01). Power Up: Making the Shift to 1:1 Teaching and
Learning (Kindle Locations 2642-2654). Stenhouse Publishers. Kindle Edition.
Numerous types of feedback exist and can be used in various ways depending on what is being taught.
Try these to see what works best for you.

Collaborative Feedback
Sometimes we ask students to collaborate by giving each other feedback and offering revisions
after they have done work individually. Students who learn to give their peers specific feedback
can offer significant contributions to the final project. Try these tools for collaborative
feedback:
Google Docs
Trello.com
Minecraft Edu

Audio Feedback
Our students are most responsive to feedback when our comments are personalized and the
tone is clear and kind. Sometimes, despite our best intentions, written comments lack that
conversational feeling and serve only to distance the teacher from the student. Recording
feedback often takes less time than writing personalized feedback, because most of us speak
faster than we can write or type. Also, recording feedback has the effect of a conversation
without requiring us to find time to meet with every student. Try these tools for audio
feedback:
Kaizena
Quick Time
Sound Clock
Crowd-Sourcing ~ Blogging
Instead of writing for just us, students could write on a wider stage where they can
crowd-source their feedback, too. Modern day students have come to expect the type of
responses they receive from their social networks: instant, numerous, and positive. Although
teacher feedback is critical, students also benefit from being in immediate conversation with
their audience and hearing from a variety of voices with differing opinions. Fortunately, when it
comes to engaging with an authentic audience, the opportunities online are limitless. Through

3
blogs, students can also engage in a virtual exchange with peers anywhere. Blogging can make
global collaborations possible. Try these tools for blogging with students:
WordPress
Blogger
Tumblr
Edublogs
KidBlog

E-Publishing:
Another way to extend a students readership is through electronic publishing, or ePub. Try
these tools for e-publishing student writing:
Pages and Word: Apple Pages or Microsoft Word both allow you to save documents in
PDF format, which you can then post on your learning management system or school
website.
Google Docs: Google Docs has a great shortcut for making any document a web page.
Students can draft, collaborate, and edit within Docs, and when they are ready to share
their work, simply click File/ Publish to the Web.
iBooks Author (Mac only): Apple iBooks gives a more professional look and can be
published through the iBookstore.
Blurb: It is easy to create an electronic book through publishing sites such as blurb.com.
Choose from templates for layout, or start with a completely blank slate. Collaborate by
sharing a single log-in.

Connecting with Professionals:

What better audience than a workplace professional? Schoolwork gains relevance when
students have the opportunity to connect with adults who have expertise and experience in
their fields of interest. When we encourage our students to appeal to a real audience for their
concerns, the research they conduct becomes more meaningful and potentially transformative.
A few minutes of online research can connect students with a community of supporters who
never knew they were needed until they were asked. Try these tools for connecting with
professionals:
YellowPaged.com
LinkedIn.com

Face-to-Face Audience:
Using 1: 1 devices gives students access to VoIP services (Voice over Internet Protocol). If you
have used Skype or FaceTime before, you were using VoIP. In the same way that the Internet
can connect students to each other half a world away, VoIP can provide face-to-face
correspondence. Instead of, or in addition to, blogging back and forth, students can meet online
for a videoconference. Try these tools for connecting face to face:
Google Hangouts
Skype or FaceTime

Strategies for Stronger Feedback

Instant Feedback:
It is most important to provide efficient and timely feedback so that our students can think
about their learning in the moment and reflect on their mistakes without waiting the lengthy
period of time it takes us to assess their work. Immediate feedback can drive instruction while
showing students what they need to work on. Gamification is a form of providing instant
feedback in which students earn badges for mastering content and can progress through
learning stages based on recent assessments, much like they would in a video game. Try these
tools for instant feedback:
Google Forms Quiz
Socrative
Nearpod
Poll Everywhere
Flubaroo
Hemmingway App

Peer Feedback:
Students care what their classmates have to say about their work. When designing
opportunities for students to hear from their classmates, everyone benefits. Try these tools for
peer feedback:
Google Comments
Blog Comments

5
Google Forms
PeerMark from Turnitin

Global Feedback:
This is a method for giving feedback to the whole class at the same time. Providing significant
feedback in a timely manner is the most difficult aspect of assessment. Usually, theres a
trade-off. Either students receive brief notes fairly quickly, or longer, more in-depth
commentary a while after submitting their work. Its beneficial to give global feedback for
certain types of assessments, not all. Try these tools for global feedback:
Discussion Board
Course Announcements
Video Think-Aloud

Frequent Feedback:
This form of feedback addresses the common frustration of writing the same comment over
and over again on multiple assignments. A good idea is to provide a coding system for the
marks placed on students essays. Then, give students a copy of the key and when they receive
their graded work, spend some time figuring out the code. There is still the issue of what
happens when students still dont understand why the error is wrong, or how to fix it? Try
these tools for frequent feedback:
GradeMark
Google Docs
Kaizena

Reflecting on Feedback:
For feedback to be most effective to students, they need to reflect on their own work. One of
the best ways to do this is to have students keep track of their own progress and reflect on it.
Reflection can take many forms, including writing about areas of strength and weakness or
reviewing previous feedback before starting a new assignment. Fortunately, with our 1:1
program, we have numerous tools for allowing our students to take charge of their feedback
and apply it to future learning. Try these tools for reflecting on feedback:
Google Form
Google Voice

With a 1: 1 classroom and the digital tools available to us today, we can offer our students
personalized and prompt feedback in a variety of ways. When we can see student work in process
through Google Drive and assess understanding on the spot with classroom feedback tools such as
Socrative, we are armed with the information we need to make sound pedagogical decisions.

Assessing Unconventional Assignments

Students love when we ask them to publish their work. But when the audience changes from teacher
to the web, and the format moves from a test to a project, assessing becomes more of a challenge. The
set standards we have used for decades may no longer seem appropriate, and it is really easy to get
swept away by digitally enhanced assignments.
When it comes to unconventional assignments, we tend to assess each student in two ways:
First: We focus on the process, with a rubric detailing the individual steps along the way; such as
meeting interim deadlines, bringing in research, completing storyboards, or actively participating in
group brainstorming, etc.
Second: We emphasizes the product, which is a score we determine together teacher and student
for the finished product (or it should be done together).
Although we consider a range of criteria when assessing any piece of student work, we must factor in a
few additional considerations when we fold technology into the mix. We should ask ourselves these
questions:
What is the learning curve like for the software and/or hardware students are using for this project?

What should students reasonably be able to teach themselves about this technological tool or
technique?
How many other times have students done this type of project? (If its the fifth time students have
used screencasting software, the expectations will be higher than they were the first time).
To save time reinventing rubrics for every project, a good idea is to create a common rubric. This way,
with each individual assignment, an additional element can be added specific to any assignment. The
following is an example of the possibilities using a common rubric:
Exceeds Expectations

Expectations

Needs Work

Subject Matter:
Design Layout:
Notice the expectations are listed in the center and can be adapted to fit the assignment. The columns
on either side of the expectations column are blank so that individualized feedback for each student
can be addressed.
Assessing Websites and Blogs
Assessing Digital Portfolios: The first discussion teachers have with students is to be careful about
their digital footprint. In Power Up: Making the Shift to 1:1 Teaching and Learning, the digital

footprint is referred to as a digital tattoo because it is hard to remove. The work students put online
will represent them now, and we want them to be able to build on it in the future. A digital portfolio
(DP) is an organized online space where a student posts his or her best work. A DP can be built from a
variety of tools, but most are based off a website or a blog. Teaching students to create digital
portfolios allows them to access their creative side and also prepares them for the technical demands
of their potential future careers. A few examples are Google Sites, Weebly, Wix, WordPress, and
Blogger.
Assessing Multimedia Presentations: We have entered a brave new world of multimedia production.

The digital tools and the audience they give us access to can motivate students to dive deeply into

content material and create professional representations of their learning. First and foremost, we must
still assess the understandings, critical-thinking skills, and content mastery critical to our subject
areas. Our assessment criteria has been changed by new forms of communication, but teaching our
students to master content and choose the appropriate tools are the core values to which we must
always return.