Teachers’ and students’ attitudes towards feedback: Contradictions and development trends

Introduction. The study is based on one of the findings of J. Hattie’s meta-analysis, which proves the importance of feedback in the educational process as a critical factor affecting the quality of learning outcomes. However, the issue about the significance of this factor and its perception by education researchers and direct participants in educational relations (teachers and students) is still open to question. An objective answer to this question will develop practical steps to develop literacy in applying feedback in modern school education.

Aim. Based on the data of a comprehensive empirical study, the present research is aimed to identify and analyse the value aspect of the attitude to feedback from teachers and students as an integral part of academic literacy.

Methodology and research methods. To mark the general didactic boundaries of the theoretical discussion, the authors chose the feedback literacy model, which consists of four components: the acceptance of the value of feedback, the ability to make judgments, the control of emotions, and the ability to act on the basis of feedback. The comprehensive empirical research consisted of two stages in 2020–2021; it was conducted on representative samples of high school students and teachers from different regions of Russia. At the first stage, the authors studied value attitude to feedback among high school students. A representative group of high school students (n = 2710) took part in the cross-sectional research. The cross-sectional research outcomes were developed in a field experiment with school children from 16 to 18 years old (n = 137) trained according to the unified programme. At the second stage, a comparative research among teachers (n = 134) was carried out using the method of a written survey containing closed and open questions about teachers’ understanding of the feedback phenomenon and their attitude towards it. This survey also included the data obtained from the survey of school children at the first stage, aiming for their expert evaluation by teachers. Thus, teachers were motivated to display a reflective and expert position, making it possible to obtain a more holistic view of the research subject.

Results. As a result of the present research, it was found that Russian teachers understand the concept of feedback quite fully, although such an understanding is more intuitive than mastered in practice. Marks for progress are perceived by teachers as low-quality, formalised feedback, and alternative methods (comments on the student’s work) as resource-consuming and, therefore, not applicable in daily practice.

The research outcomes showed that adolescents perceive feedback more as the teacher’s prerogative and not as their opportunity to develop their learning ability. At the same time, modern school children want to receive feedback in the form of a detailed commentary, although they do not have experience with it. In the context of a positive encouragement of students to request feedback from a teacher, adolescents are ready to quickly change their scholarly communication with an adult to achieve better results.

According to the results obtained, teachers consider students generally unable to interpret correctly unmarked feedback and formulate their request for it. Other external circumstances hindering the development of qualitative feedback practices include, in the opinion of teachers, the dominance of the point system of assessment in school; organisational and bureaucratic costs that limit the teacher’s search in the field of feedback methods; parents’ attitude towards formal (marking) results; the inability of students to objectively perceive feedback other than formal assessment.

The results of the study demonstrate that teachers, on the whole, give a low rating to the readiness of school children to work with detailed feedback and to request it, linking this with the lack of formation of emotional, cognitive and communication skills in their students that they need to request, perceive and interpret full feedback.

Scientific novelty. The study confirmed the relevance of the theoretical-empirical model “feedback literacy” for the school, although it was initially proposed for universities. The study compared for the first time the attitude to the concept of feedback on the part of different subjects of the educational process – students and teachers.

Practical significance. Based on empirical data, deficiencies and contradictions in teachers’ ideas about the practice of feedback were identified, and the readiness of students to use feedback resources in student-centred (personalised) learning was assessed. Applying the feedback literacy model to the context of the modern Russian school has made it possible to identify the semantic, value and communicative deficiencies of quality feedback that arise at the initial stage of its development, which can be a demanded practical result for international educational practices.

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