Enhancing feedback capabilities with the peer feedback module

Abstract

Feedback has a powerful impact on student learning (Hattie & Timperley, 2007). Although it has now become an essential component of higher education courses, learning how to receive and provide feedback can be difficult, as evidenced by dissatisfaction in student surveys on a global scale (e.g., MacKay et al., 2019). Carless and Boud (2018) argue that for feedback to be effective, students need to develop their feedback-related capabilities. 

To enhance student feedback capabilities, feedback should be viewed as a complex process that has the potential to enhance learning and which emphasizes student agency (Niemienen et al., 2021). Peer feedback offers a range of opportunities for promoting student agency, where students practice constructing, delivering, and receiving feedback (Nicol et al., 2014). In the shift to hybrid and digital learning contexts, such opportunities are frequently mediated by technology, which may require different or additional capabilities to traditional teacher-led feedback practices. 

A small body of work from the peer feedback literature has focused on what specific capabilities students need during the feedback process. For example, Han and Xu (2020) argue that the literacy needed for peer feedback includes cognitive readiness (making judgements and taking action) and social-affective readiness (appreciating feedback and managing affect). To expand on this, peer feedback has been conceptualized as entailing a cognitive aspect (knowing what to critique in the work), a critical thinking aspect (such as judging work), and a socio-emotional aspect (considering emotions and the social climate) (Cheng et al., 2023). 

With the understanding that feedback literacy can be developed over time (Malecka et al., 2022) and a recent focus on developing interventions to improve feedback skills (see Little et al., 2024), this poster presentation details the creation and development of a feedback literacy intervention which contains an online module to develop peer feedback skills. To participate in the intervention, students are required to reflect on their feedback literacy levels using a recently developed feedback literacy behaviour scale (FLBS) (Dawson et al., 2023). Following this, participants engage in a student-led, self-paced online module nested within the University’s learning management system. Each sub-module targets different peer feedback capabilities which have been categorized into five dimensions, including domain knowledge, using evaluative judgement, crafting and delivering the feedback message, managing the socio-emotional environment, and using motivation. After participation in the online module, students complete an organic and pre-existing peer feedback activity before assessing their feedback literacy levels once more through the FLBS (Dawson et al., 2023). A smaller sample of students are involved in focus groups, where insights into how the module has the potential to influence feedback capabilities are discussed. Participants also bring along student work to highlight how their feedback capabilities have been used. 

Through this intervention, learners may develop better feedback practices (including general feedback literacy). Crucially, they may also learn how to provide effective and helpful feedback information to their peers, which is one of the key requirements for moving beyond university and into the workforce.