What is it?
Audio feedback is the system of providing spoken comments on students assessed work, which are digitally recorded and made available to each student.
Why would I use it?
- It is richer than written feedback, “as the expression, nuance, tone and personal input add layers of meaning for the listener” (Carruthers et al, 2015). The increased level of personalisation means that students are more likely to be motivated to engage with it.
- It both increases the amount of feedback that can be given within a certain time, and reduces the amount of time spent on writing feedback. Turnitin Feedback Studio in KEATS supports audio feedback mode.
- It can give depth to feedback rather than long list of edits or comments without context or relative weight (Chiang, 2009).
- It is perhaps more useful for students who have trouble with written feedback and the language used in criteria as spoken interaction is likely to be more natural. It can be flexibly stored and revisited.
Known Issues
- It is still one directional information transfer. To mitigate this, you can include a dialogic tool such as the Interactive Cover sheet, where you respond directly to students’ request for feedback. Or you can ask students to reply and post it to you.
- It is hard to ensure standardisation of feedback; therefore, bear this in mind if considering it as summative feedback.
- It is not a means of saving time initially because the script still needs to be read and the audio feedback to be semi-scripted in order to be coherent.
How has it been used?
- From the University of Leicester, A Word in Your Ear Conference Proceedings
- France and Wheeler (2007) provide an example from Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences. Geoscience students were given feedback on their assignments using podcasting. Benefits from the study indicated students appreciated both generic and specific feedback as well as the ‘tone of delivery’ of the feedback.
- Dr Jack Fosten from King’s Business School shows how his students find audio feedback useful when using Turnitin.
How do students use feedback?
- In this podcast, Dr Naomi Winstone discusses her research of how students use and internalise feedback: