This document discusses goals, feedback, and evidence-based teaching. It emphasizes focusing teaching efforts on areas that will make the biggest difference for students. Effective feedback is difficult but important - it should help students progress and believe that effort leads to success. Formative assessment via feedback is highlighted as an effective way to check student understanding and guide further learning. The document provides examples of low-tech formative assessment techniques like mini-whiteboards and traffic light signals.

1. Goals & Feedback
Evidence Based Teaching
Gareth Edwards
Staff Development - Sep 2014

2. Evidence Based - Focus your work
• What can I change about my teaching that is
going to make the biggest difference to my
students?
• Any teacher can try out new ideas, but the
danger is we spend a lot of time trying out
new ideas that don’t help our students.
• Given that college is a one shot deal for our
students, we need to be really picky about the
things we work on.

3. Feedback
Definition
• Information about reactions to a product, a
person’s performance of a task, etc. which is
used as a basis for improvement.
(Oxford Dictionary)

4. Why give feedback?
• Setting goals and objectives helps the learner
see where they are going.
• Providing feedback shows them how far they
have come on their learning journey.

5. Feedback
• Research shows that:
1. Much of the feedback that students get has
little or no effect on their learning
2. Some kinds of feedback are actually
counterproductive

6. Difficulty!!!
• What is clear through the research conducted
is that providing feedback is VERY difficult.
• Get it wrong and students
1. Give up
2. Reject the feedback
3. Choose an easier goal

7. How do we give feedback then?
1. Give feedback that helps them move forward
2. Reinforce the belief that effort leads to
success
3. Ability is incremental rather than fixed
(Growth Mindset – Carol Dweck)
Smart is not something you are, it is something
you get.

8. AfL
• Setting goals and objectives helps the learner
see where they are going.
• Providing feedback shows them how far they
are on this learning journey.
• Assessment for Learning (AfL} is an example of
this.

9. FORMATIVE ASSESSMENT
FEEDBACK GIVEN TO A STUDENT WHICH
INCREASES THEIR LEARNING.
SUMMATIVE ASSESSMENT
A TEST OR TASK WHICH IS MARKED BY THE
TEACHER AND THE STUDENT RECIEVES A
NUMERICAL MARK, GRADE ETC…

10. What the research says…
• Research shows that summative tests have an
overall slight negative effect on learning and
should be used as little as possible.
• Formative Assessment is a highly effective
learning device.

11. Classroom Culture
• Through your formative assessment you are
trying to find out whether the student
understands the task, question etc.
• By doing this you will be able to provide
meaningful feedback which will help them move
forward.
• To do this you need to create a classroom culture
where it is okay to be wrong.
• Students should feel safe enough to make
mistakes.
• If they’re not making mistakes, they are not being
challenged.

12. Something to take away…
Mini-Whiteboards
• Gets all students engaged
• Found out if they understand instantly
• Ask a question, get students to write answer
and hold up
• Quickly eye-ball the class
• Quick and effective

13. Something to take away…
Traffic Lights
• Everyone has 3 cups
• Beginning of lesson
• Signal to the teacher they are going too fast
• Stop and ask a question
• Simple, low tech ideas
• Ways to improve the quality of information
you get from your students.

14. Thanks for listening