Assessment and Feedback Literacy

Exemplars have been shown to be one of the most effective ways to give students a better sense and understanding of criteria, task requirements, and to allow them to make their own judgements about quality. There are a number of ways in which this can be done.

• Give students examples of assignments (eg. using a compilation of previous year’s submissions to help protect student anonymity) and get them to discuss and feedback on why some are better than others (eg. by using a discussion forum). Ensure these exercises are done with the whole class and try to avoid giving ‘extra’ tips to individual students, to avoid the perception of bias and to avoid students sharing misconceptions.
• Using a similar sample of previous submissions, show what top, middle and bottom of the range of marks looks like, what ‘good’ and ‘bad’ looks like, and discuss what was done well and what errors might lose them marks, using the assessment criteria where appropriate.
• Illustrate standards by ‘live’ marking a piece of work and talking through the process, identifying the things that illustrate where this piece meets the assessment criteria and what you identify as good quality work.
• Provide indicative or model answers, particularly forin assessment tasks where there will be a single correct answer.
• If you only do one quick thing… Provide students with examples of work by previous students in an open discussion forum (live or virtual), engaging students in a short dialogue around what makes that example good.

Students in many Schools have reported that they find the brief information they are provided when assignments are set can be confusing and unclear. This can be addressed by:

• Providing a clear and specific brief for each assessment, including dates for submission and feedback, and details of the criteria
• Helping students to become familiar with assessment ‘jargon’: get students talking about terms like ‘criteria’, ‘weighting’, ‘agency’ and so on, or get them to play a game designed to clarify such terminology, such as Brown’s ‘Biscuit Game’
• Explaining new types of summative assessment tasks before they are used. When introducing a new assessment type (eg. a poster) students should be briefed on this, given the chance to practise practice and be given feedback on this as a formative task
• Working in partnership with your students to design a template to set out the nature of assessment tasks, including of the information they would find valuable to have. This can either be done for individual assessments in specific modules and/or across the School across the School in partnership with staff: student panels.
• Using five minutes in a lecture to give an explanation of what you will be looking for in that task, inviting students to post any queries they may still have. Rather than replying to these queries individually, use an online discussion forum or a further five minutes at the next available opportunity to run through and answer the queries raised.
• If you only do one quick thing… When introducing a major assignment/project, don't vaguely ask if there are, "Any questions?” Instead ask students to work in groups threes to identify
  • what experience they have of completing similar assignments
  • what success will look like in that assignment
  • what challenges the assignment poses

Many students report that they find assessment criteria unclear and the way they are used to be confusing and varied. Where students are introduced to criteria as broad guidance, or as a framework, rather than as a detailed mark scheme, research has found they are more likely to be satisfied with their use. Ways of supporting this include:

• Let students into the meaning of assessment criteria, by explaining and illustrating the assessment criteria to the whole group in lectures when a task is set. Make it really clear from the outset what students have to do to succeed. This does not mean ‘spoon-feeding’: rather creating a level playing field for students for the specialist kinds of assignment they will encounter in HE and to illustrate the qualities required.
• Ensure that feedback on formative submissions specifies the criteria for improvement, and that students are given opportunities to clarify how this feedback can be actioned Introduce a two-stage assignment, where the original ‘formative’ submission is given a ‘rough’ mark only, along with feedback that illustrates the specific criteria where they could improve. This helps students to better understand criteria and also gives them the opportunity to make immediate use of this feedback to improve their work and mark when the summative assessment is submitted. To help manage workloads, it is good idea to discuss this with students in advance, to agree that feedback will be provided on the first draft only, and that the final submission should comment on the ways this has been used.
• Work with your students to design the assessment criteria for a specific task. This can be done in a variety of ways, such as
  • by adapting existing criteria,
  • reviewing alignment with the learning outcomes
  • and generating discussion on what you should be looking for
  • and by sharing and discussing the different types of criteria that can be applied to different tasks

All of these tasks can also help students better appreciate the subjectivity of criteria and their role as guidance, not template. Experience has also shown that students can often think of better assessment criteria than the ones we produce.

• Get students to apply the assessment criteria to help them internalise how to achieve them in their own work. This can be achieved relatively quickly. For example, you could provide the students with: a short piece, such as a paragraph from an essay, an abstract from a draft paper, or sections from a report, or elements from a proposal, and ask them in small groups to discuss (and where appropriate weight the different criteria) and then develop a mark for that piece of work. Groups can then share and review the marks they would award.
• If you only do one quick thing… Clarify what the pass mark is and what it represents (a benchmark to be achieved or exceeded, rather than a score of right or wrong answers), particularly for students who might be used to getting straight As or marks in the 90s.

While some students may not initially be keen on self or peer assessment, either finding them uncomfortable to participate in, or believing that all assessment should be the responsibility of the tutor, there is an extensive research base that shows that the skills they will develop through self and peer assessment exercises are both valuable to future assignments and regarded as critical to their future.

• Require students to complete a self-assessment sheet, attached to submitted assignments, structured around the criteria, so that they are obliged to reflect upon their own work against the criteria before they receive feedback
• Use peer feedback forms for formative assessments, requiring students to give targeted feedback mapped to the assessment criteria; for example, for a formative presentation, individual students might focus on one criteria each, such as content and structure, delivery, or visuals
• Consider encouraging students to use generative AI to generate feedback on written assignments, providing them with some guidance on effective prompts related to assessment criteria
• If you only do one quick thing… Run exercises in which students mark assignments, and then discuss their critiques and marks with those of other students

The ways in which students utilise the feedback comments made on assessments (or otherwise) has long been a source of frustration for academic staff. While it is easy to ‘blame’ students for making repeat errors, or not collecting their scripts, feedback comments are often unclear to students, both in terms of what the comments may mean and in relation to how they can be used to improve. Helping students develop these skills is helpful to all.

• Early formative feedback can help students to learn to manage their emotional reactions to feedback and respond constructively.
• Ask students to reflect on criteria or choose the areas where they want feedback when submitting assignments (elective feedback). Add a small box to coursework submission sheets that students can use to indicate the areas on which they would most welcome feedback
• Create opportunities in class for students to discuss the feedback they received in groups. Get them to post summaries in a discussion forum of key points raised in discussions Create opportunities and use tutorials for students to discuss their assignments, and the marks and feedback they received, with other students. Ask them to post a summary of key points raised in these discussions as to how they can best use the comments to tackle future assignments.
• Work with students to design a feedback pro-forma in Learning Central that links to the assessment criteria and/or the marking rubrics in the Feedback Studio.
• Use formative feedback in the early stages to establish the standard of work required. This can take the form of tutor comments on plans or extracts, or collective discussions in class, but the key function of formative assessment is to inform students what is on target and what needs of improvement. Provide plenty lots of dialogue opportunities, so anxieties can be dispelled around assessment.
• Make feedback SMART and actionable. Ensure that feedback is specific, positive, personalised and constructive and that the final points focus on how to improve.
• Ask students to reflect on criteria or choose the areas where they want feedback when submitting assignments (elective feedback). Add a small box to coursework submission sheets that students can use to indicate the areas on which they would most welcome feedback.
• If you only do one quick thing… Before feedback comments are provided on an assessment, remind students of the assessment criteria and/or marking rubrics, illustrating the value of them engaging with the feedback they will receive.

Take your pick of these related pages to this one:

Co-Creation in Assessment

Assessment Compendium

Feedback

Learning Design and Preparing to Teach

Learning Enhancement

Implementing the EAT Framework to enhance assessment literacy and feedback practices

Dr Sara Pons-Sanz SFHEA (Reader) and Dr Melody Pattison FHEA (Lecturer)

What did you do and why?

We (Dr Sara Pons-Sanz and Dr Melody Pattison) currently co-teach on the second year undergraduate module ‘Style and Genre’, which is associated with language and literature. Over the past few years, we have begun implementing some changes to the assessment practices in our module, using the EAT (Equity, Agency, Transparency) Framework (Evans, 2016). The EAT Framework has three components: Assessment Literacy, Assessment Design, and Assessment Feedback, and as part of the changes we have made to our module assessment, we have tried to cover as many of the issues linked to these three components as possible. We decided to make these changes to our module assessment so that it is more meaningful to the students and directly linked to their own learning and improving their assessment literacy.

The module initially consisted of three assessment tasks: a peer feedback task, a textual analysis, and an essay. Although we did not change the types of assessment tasks, we did update our approach to them:

The peer feedback task was initially an optional, formative task. The challenge with this was that many students either chose not to engage with it, or questioned why other students provided feedback for them instead of the module leaders. To address these issues, we turned it into a summative task, and asked students to engage with all three components to gain full marks: 1) submit a short textual analysis; 2) provide feedback on a classmate’s submission; 3) their own self-evaluation. Prior to completing this task, we devoted part of the seminar each week to a specific marking criterion, so students were familiar with them. To take inclusivity and confidentiality into account, all feedback was anonymous: students did not know who reviewed their work, or whose work they were reviewing.

For the textual analysis, students initially were asked to choose from a series of texts, to which they could apply their chosen theory. In our updated assessment, we replaced the set texts with complete free choice for the students. They now have the opportunity to choose any text they wish, and they are especially encouraged to choose a text they might have studied in another module; the idea around this is that they can then see the connections between different theoretical approaches applied to the same text.

Students were also asked to include a reflective paragraph at the end of the textual analysis outlining how/whether they found the peer review process helpful, and a paragraph at the end of the essay asking for feedback on specific marking criteria. These paragraphs are intended to help the student further reflect on their work and to identify areas themselves in which they would like more support.

What was the impact?

At both the beginning and end of the semester, we surveyed students on their understanding of the marking criteria and their confidence in evaluating and critiquing their own work. The results from these pre and post intervention surveys showed that the students’ confidence and understanding in these areas has improved over the course of the semester. In their textual analysis paragraph, as well as in mid-module and end of module evaluation surveys, students commented that they found the process to be helpful in understanding the assessment criteria and where they felt they did well or identified areas for further guidance.

What next?

We are now in the process of collating and writing up our findings to present to a wider audience, and to provide recommendations on the overall success of implementing the EAT Framework into our assessment practices. Student comments and survey results indicate that their assessment literacy has improved and the peer review process was a helpful component in building their skills and confidence in self-evaluation. We will continue to collect evaluations and comments from students to further build on our assessment practices over the coming years.