Develop Feedback Practices

As I was exposed to more teaching theories and grew my experience as a Writing Mentor, I developed three specific feedback practices that I believe have been successful in my classes.

Feedback Practice #1: Limit Comments

A few weeks into my Writing Mentor position, I read George Cooper et al.'s "Protocols and Process in Online Tutoring," which helped me understand the importance of limiting the amount of writing feedback I offered to students. Rather than overwhelm the student with numerous comments, the authors argue it is better to hone in on just a few areas for revision.

Offering limited comments — though sometimes hard to do — allows the student to focus on a few main items for improvement. It also contributes to the idea that I am simply responding to students' writing and am not taking control over their essays. This way, students can retain ownership over their own writing.

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Feedback Practice #2: Ask Questions

In Richard Beach's "Demonstrating Techniques for Response in the Writing Conference," he encourages instructors to ask students to describe the purpose or goal of their writing.

This description can be invaluable to a teacher. Understanding a student's writing goal makes it easier to pinpoint revision opportunities. The teacher can then frame the conversation around how to best meet the writing goal.

Prior to reading Beach's work, I would begin live, online writing workshops by sharing what I believed to be the student's thesis statement on a virtual whiteboard. My intent was to use this whiteboard to help me emphasize how each piece of the essay (and therefore each revision) should bolster the student's thesis statement.

However, after reading Beach's article, I realized that this is not an effective feedback practice. Now, when I begin writing workshops, I begin by prompting the "describing" step that Beach calls for: I first ask the students what they wanted to prove or accomplish with their essay and ask them to identify their thesis statement. To my surprise, some students had trouble picking out this sentence, which sparked some much-needed conversation about what a thesis statement was, how to construct it, where to put it, and what their particular writing/communication goal was for the essay.

After having these conversations, I believe I was able to make much more progress with the students than if I had told them what I thought their thesis statement was and how they could revise their essay to better support that statement. By asking students their writing goal, they become an engaged participant in a conversation about how to best meet that goal.

Time and time again, asking students to describe their writing goals has proven to be a very helpful practice and I plan to continue using this practice in the future.

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Feedback Practice #3: Use Clear, Direct Language

In his "About Responding to Student Writing," Peter Elbow writes:

Besides, magisterial shorthand words like “Awkward” are often extremely unclear. I’ve been trying to learn to translate that word into what is more accurate and honest with phrases like, “I stumbled here,” or “I’m lost,” or “This felt roundabout.” Even though it sometimes costs me a few more words, I try to avoid an impersonal God/truth voice in my comments.

While I was preparing feedback to a student's essay via Google Docs, I couldn't help but think of this passage from Elbow's article. I was about to comment that the student's writing felt awkward to me, but I remembered Elbow's critique. Rather than giving her this vague, unhelpful feedback, I decided to figure out what exactly was "awkward" about it. After reviewing her work, I realized that her essay had a great deal of the passive voice.

During our video call feedback session, I confessed that I almost gave her this useless comment, but I went on to explain why it felt "awkward" to me. She mentioned that she got the "awkward" comment a lot, but — after I explained the passive voice — she shared that she now felt more confident about revising her drafts in all of her classes. Using clear, direct feedback allowed me to communicate more effectively and helped my student conquer her insecurity about "awkward" writing.

I think using clear, direct feedback empowers students to revise their work with more confidence. With this power, I think students are able to feel like active agents in their own writing, rather than students dependent on mysterious feedback patterns.

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These three feedback strategies –– using limited comments, asking questions, and using direct language –– have each improved my interactions with students. I believe they have led to the most positive change and give students the tools they need for success in writing.