Drifting towards disengagement: consuming andor squandering not developing

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Drifting towards disengagement consuming and/or
squandering not developing?

• Liam McCann and Gary Saunders
• Lincoln University

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• The view that todays students are ill-prepared
  for H.E. is oft asserted (see Jobbins 2003 quoted
  in Leathwood, 2005, p314)
• This was illustrated by student comments in our
  research
• from A level to degree level I thought it was
  completely a new ball game (2nd year male
  student)
• in A level and GCSE I was just told what I had
  to write down and what I had to learn which was
  easy just given to you on a plate (Respondent 4)

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• There is widespread acceptance of the important
  role played in learning of helpful feedback
  (Ramsden, 1992 quoted in Gibbs Simpson 2004,
  p10)
• or appropriate feedback (Chickery Gamson,
  1987 quoted ibid p16)
• But what exactly that suitable feedback
  actually is, remains vague and poorly defined.
  Understandably?

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• Our research exposed that there is considerable
  variations in good feedback and effective
  feedback and what some students value, some
  others may reject.
• There is a clear need for us to recognize this
  and try to offer equally diverse varieties of
  feedback to students
• One size does not fit all.

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• Weaver (2006) discusses in detail the values
  which students attach to their feedback.
• But students views of what they like should
  not dictate the feedback we provide. E.g.
• positive feedback may not always be best
• . I preferred it when I got a kick in the teeth
  and thought Ive actually got to pull my finger
  out

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• A minority of academics elsewhere do not value
  feedbacks influence in learning
• Maclellen (2001, p313) found 6 of academics who
  believed feedback never improves learning.
• We did not find this here!
• On the contrary staff were positive about
  feedback but frustrated that, despite 89 of
  students valuing individual oral feedback, some
  students did not attend appointments for
  additional oral feedback.

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• If feedback is viewed as part of the necessary
  process of communication (Higgins, et al 2001
  p270) between staff and students
• Then we must be clear about the capabilities of
  those who we are speaking to and what they
  expect to hear
• If consumerism mediates students receptiveness
  to feedback (Ding, 1998 cited in Higgins et al,
  2001, p271) we must be aware of this influence.
• What they expect to be given.

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• Higgins believe that The student makes an
  emotional investment in an assignment and expects
  some return on that investment. (2001, p272)
• We found this this investment was far too
  uncommon.
• Many students stated that they wrote what they
  thought the tutor expected rather than what they
  believed.

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• We want to contextualise feedback within the
  damaging consequences of the current assessment
  culture.
• Thomson (2000) argues the assessment process and
  the resulting school league tables generate a
  pass at all costs culture in which pupils are
  spoon-fed the information they need to pass a
  given exam and make their school look good in the
  league tables.
• These essentially Fordist educational policies
  and practices result in students who are not
  merely deskilled but who are also alienated from,
  and indifferent to, the educational product which
  they produce. (see Fielding Rikowski, 1996)

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• We must recognise also that much of what is
  taught in H.E. contrasts with wider cultural
  orthodoxies and ideologies.
• The opportunities for students studying certain
  subjects to get wider approval for their efforts
  to make sense of many complex issues they
  encounter is limited.
• This too may invite surface learning as their
  own explanations are often marginalized as
  weak, overly anecdotal, ill-considered and under
  researched.
• But their family and friends may commend such
  explanations as meritorious and commonsense.

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• Thus the knowledge and expertise of some H.E.
  subjects may struggle when its worth is
  marginalised and/or ridiculed and this too may
  explain many students preference for surface
  learning contemporarily.
• So is our feedback as bad as the N.S.S. appears
  to show?

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• We must recognise, take pride in and be less
  defensive about the efforts and developments in
  feedback which have been considerable in recent
  years.
• Currently in HE the plethora of Quality Boxes,
  end of unit/module evaluations and reports,
  double marking and moderation, external examiner
  reports, periodic subject reviews and the like,
  all try to monitor and ensure, amongst other
  things, the general quality and constructiveness
  of the feedback which academics provide to
  students.

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• But despite devoting so much time and effort to
  ensuring diverse forms of constructive feedback,
  too many students appeared to be impervious to
  much our best efforts.
• We found 29.6 of students not expressing
  appreciation for the value of feedback in
  assisting improvements in their future assessment
  performance.
• So What works?

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• Our students said they simply had not previously
  experienced feedback which was formative, which
  asked them to consider and reflect.
• They were far more familiar with didactic
  instructions and felt ill-equipped for the new
  assessment and research demands of H.E.

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• Students need to recognise their role in
  responding to feedback, all feedback.
• All students should be encouraged to reflect on
  all of their assessments, their performance
  therein and the feedback and even the mark they
  receive and potential reasons for this and
  lessons to be learnt.
• Perhaps we need to shift the emphasis to
  feeding forward into a piece of work, rather
  than simply feeding back (Higgins et al p274).
• But we cannot feed forward unless we can
  understand what the student expects from
  feedback.

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• We must emphasise/clarify what students can and
  cannot expect in feedback!
• We strongly believe that the National Student
  Surveys poor satisfaction results for feedback
  do not correlate with implicitly widespread poor
  quality of the feedback which students allegedly
  receive.

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• We must not simply meet demands that students may
  make The big words they use. You know they come
  up with some fabulous words. It needs a bit of
  clarification right away (Male 2nd year
  student). Rather students must recognize their
  responsibility to familiarize themselves with
  what such words mean.
• We argue it is essential that students are taught
  to understand how they should use feedback.
• Academics recognize and we found no evidence that
  they shirk the clear challenges of meeting the
  educational demands of an increasingly far
  broader spectrum of abilities, but students must
  also be made to realize what we expect of them.

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• If the objective is to get the student to engage
  in appropriate action which leads to some closure
  of the gap (Sadler 1989, p121).
• The problem is that too often students are
  literally debilitated by such variety, choice and
  room for their own distinct approaches.
• One tutor was recently explaining to a student
  that they would have to think about the best way
  to approach their research task, having outlined
  the range of options available and their specific
  strengths and weakness, the student replied that
  they didnt want to have to think about such,
  they wanted to be told what to do.
• We must also consider the changing institutional
  rules which delimit and actually work against our
  ability to meet the diverse needs of students.

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• Should we merely provide students with the
  feedback they like?
• Our answer is unreservedly no, the student as
  consumer simply does not understand what may be
  good for them despite what the N.S.S. might
  suggest
• Are students deskilled in thinking?
• Despite the increase demands of students we do
  have in place clear mechanisms to support
  students appropriately in their educational
  endeavours.

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• Finally can we meet the challenge of how to
  encourage disengaged learners to become critical
  thinkers and producers of knowledge?
• The quality of feedback we encountered and the
  vast majority of students appreciation of that
  contradicts the N.S.S. findings and we firmly
  believe that N.S.S. dissatisfaction is largely
  the consequence of previous feedback which spoon
  feed students and deskilled and debilitated them
  as independent learners.
• Our efforts have largely gone unrecognised and
  unappreciated! We have to try to change that!

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