Blog Post #3: Providing Meaningful & Timely Feedback through Social Learning Opportunities

After completing this week’s readings, I wanted to write a blog post about how to utilize some of the suggestions about practice and feedback from Ambrose’s chapter (#5) with Wenger’s research about social learning theory and communities of practice. The idea is to merge the concepts to reflect a classroom practice that would support student learning by offering more social opportunities to engage in reflective practice and peer feedback while also receiving adequate support from the faculty/teacher.

The importance of writing and critical thinking are essential skills for college and university students to acquire, yet can be some of the most difficult learning to achieve. Learning to write critically, to examine research, and to articulate an argument are skills that take considerable time to develop and require ongoing practice and support. Many universities often set up writing workshops and resource centres to help support students in the pursuit of strong academic writing to help equip them with the essential skills needed for success. Writing can also be especially challenging for ESL students or for students with learning disabilities. Specific cases like this will also require additional supports such as tutoring, resource facilitation, and more.

In any classroom, there will be broad diversity among student’s writing abilities and vast differences in their strengths and weaknesses as writers/researchers, yet they will all need to work to refine and edit their writing in order to be successful in their courses. If we consider the points made in both Ambrose’s chapter and the research offered by Wenger, then we can include many key elements to help devise strategies and techniques that can help students in very practical ways and that will be helpful to teachers who have limited time and resources to provide the kind of feedback and practice that are necessary.

In recognizing the importance of continual writing practice for students, it would be useful to break assignments down into smaller chunks so that they can work toward a larger goal by setting smaller objectives along the way. For example, if the assignment is to write an APA research essay, then perhaps the tasks can be broken down into increments whereby the topic and thesis are submitted first, followed by research and references, then submitting a first draft, etc. The pieces that get submitted can be weighted for a smaller grade and can provide incremental and meaningful feedback that can help direct the focus of the paper. Each step along the way allows the teacher an opportunity to provide meaningful and timely feedback and provides direction to help the student set goals for improving their performance. There is also an opportunity here to build in peer review and peer feedback whereby classmates review one another’s work and offer comments and critique. As Ambrose pointed out, peer critique will require guidance and instruction by the teacher; however, providing minimal instruction and guidance to help peers establish how to provide critique could save considerably compared to the teacher marking every individual piece of work. If classmates reviewed one another’s draft papers for content, errors, etc then the feedback could help support each learner to see their work through “fresh eyes” and integrate the feedback into the final draft.

To ensure this type of assignment worked well, it would be critical to provide clear direction on expectations including the use of a rubric. The use of a rubric will clearly identify what is required and how the assignment will be evaluated so that students know how their work will be assessed. The details of the assignment should be specific and provide the structure students need to reach performance measures. Students could even help to build the rubric by offering suggestions on how they think the work should be evaluated. Allowing the students to contribute to the rubric/evaluation scheme would lead to more student engagement and help to clarify expectations. Engaging in an exchange like this is also a social process that integrates other’s ideas and would help students to feel a vested interest in their mutual learning.

If the students engage in the development of a rubric and then the peer review session to evaluate one another’s drafts, they are essentially contributing to a learning community. The opportunity to interact and provide one another with insight into ways to improve and revise their work is a social process that will also support the individual student by helping them to re-evaluate and revise their own work after receiving the feedback from their peers. The role for the teacher in this process would be to consult/supervise as the students engage in the critique. The teacher could circulate throughout the classroom offering support and additional feedback where needed and collectively, the whole class would be immersed in shared learning and mutual engagement.

Hosting writing and review sessions like this could happen during regular class time, outside of regular hours (ie/ through workshops or lunch hours) or through social media sites such as wikis or blogs. As Wenger points out, the learning community can occur anywhere people can meet to share in and exchange ideas. If the students get interested in collaborating in this way, then they may be engaged enough to remain committed to supporting one another’s mutual learning on their own time. If regular feedback and practice sessions are established (in or outside of the classroom), then students will receive the timely and meaningful feedback they need to help build success while the teacher monitors and measures performance outcomes along the way.

I believe this approach is strongly in line with Vygotsky’s scaffolding approach (Zone of Proximal Development) because it provides the one-on-one tutoring support that is needed to challenge students without making the work too difficult. This technique/practice would further help all students to learn what to look for in terms of exemplary versus poor quality work, to identify patterns of errors, and learn to give and receive feedback constructively. This type of learning opportunity lends itself to the community of learning Wenger describes by generating social energy, building leadership, requiring trust, and giving the time needed to support and contribute to shared learning goals.

For interest purposes, the following are a few links that offer online writing workshops, access to rubrics, and additional readings related to collaborative learning...

Online Writing Courses/Workshops:
http://continuingstudies.wisc.edu/lsa/online/writing/?dcs=adwords&gclid=CKXnsYy1n7UCFSNqMgodTy8AbA

Rubistar (Creating Rubrics):
http://rubistar.4teachers.org/

Collaborative Learning Enhances Critical Thinking:
http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/JTE/v7n1/gokhale.jte-v7n1.html

Collaborative Learning Culture:
http://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/policyfunding/leadership/ideasintoactionspring.pdf