STUDENTS' GUIDE TO MAKING THE MOST OF FEEDBACK

This guide draws heavily on the work of Phil Race from Leeds Metropolitan University. His suggestions are sound and practical, and we gratefully acknowledge his insight, knowledge and guidance.

Feedback is a critical factor in helping you to adapt and adjust your learning strategies to ensure the successful completion of your degree.

The purpose of feedback is to help you overcome problems and weaknesses experienced in your last assignment/project, as well as to help you build on marks you receive in your studies, ensuring even better marks in the future. 

Feedback can come in many forms and from many sources. Making appropriate use of feedback will ensure your learning will be enhanced and your grades will improve to reflect this.

It's really up to you…!

Since feedback is recognised as being so crucial in the learning process, it is important you establish a strategy to manage it.  This will entail adopting a combination of tactics to ensure you receive feedback and then action the feedback you receive in a positive manner. 

There are really four main things to remember:

·         Seek feedback

·         Receive feedback with an open mind

·         Plan for improvement

·         Action your plan

The following suggestions aim to give you some practical advice to help you get the maximum benefit from all the feedback you receive.  It is important you choose tactics that best suit your individual needs in order to make the learning process work for you.

 1.  It is vitally important that you take responsibility for your own learning and assess your own work – that is, be ”your own worst critic”

 2.  Actively seek feedback  – don’t wait for it to come to you

 3.  Remember that ALL feedback  is valuable – whether it is praise or criticism.

 4.  Take criticism in the right spirit– your tutor/lecturer is there to help – so do not take a defensive approach to a negative comment.

 5.  Embrace positive feedback by building upon it and doing even better in your next assignment/project.  When your work scores really well, find out why.

 6.  Reflect on feedback from your tutors/lecturers by studying their comments and then re-reading your assignment to see how the comments apply.

 7.  Follow up on tutor/lecturer advice for further reading.

 8.  Feedback from anyone is of use to you.  Share feedback with one or more fellow students to see how the commentary on your work compares with theirs.

 9.  Always seek out from your tutor/lecturer further clarification on comments which you do not understand.

10.  Identify any feedback comments that you feel were unjustified and discuss with your tutor/lecturer.   

11.  Use your feedback to make an action plan.  Design yourself a simple pro-forma, or use the one provided here, so that you systematically use the feedback you receive to improve and develop your work continuously.  By routinely using this pro-forma each time you are given feedback, you will be in a position to track your feedback and create an ongoing record of how you are progressing in your studies. 

12.  An action plan is useless unless you follow through and make changes. Test yourself and examine whether you are prepared to responsibly do the right thing.

Be proactive...!

To assist you in receiving positive feedback on your work from the beginning of your studies, listed below are some proactive steps you can take:  

(a) Collect reading materials well in advance;

(b) Create a timetable for pre-reading, planning, drafting, and writing, checking and doing references; and

(c) Make good use of the resources and workshops offered to you by the university through Student Services – ‘Studying Smarter’ – these can be found on www.studentservices.uwa.edu.au/ss/learning/studying_smarter.  Here you will find assistance on how to make presentations, writing essays and assignments, doing research, effective reading, critical thinking, avoiding plagiarism, time management skills and more.