Teachers Need Real Feedback by Bill Gates examines and discusses a critical issue in education for teachers, the importance of feedback. When I watched this video I thought, well of course feedback is important. Then I began to wonder, what it would be like if I didn’t receive feedback throughout my educational journey. I would have felt very lost and confused, it would have frustrated me to not know if I was improving or strategies I could use to create more engaging lessons and activities for my students.
Bill focuses more on the education system in the U.S. in his TED talk, although there were a few points in which Canada was highlighted. I learned something new today – Canada ranks 6th in the world in reading proficiency. The country that ranks number one in reading proficiency is Shanghai, China.
The teachers in Shanghai, China have a system that requires them to get a chance to watch master teachers teach, attend weekly study groups to talk about what is working in their classrooms and what is not, and each teacher is required to observe and give other teachers feedback. I thought that this is really interesting because not only does it encourage collaboration, it also encourages teachers to provide feedback and evidence supporting the feedback. Therefore, validation of feedback would be more accurate with the evidence.
Another interesting fact Bill mentions is, 11/14 countries have a system for helping teachers improve. The first thought I had is why wouldn’t every country in the world develop a system to help teachers improve? Teachers educate and care for youth as young as three years old, and they continue to mentor, educate, care for, guide, support, mould, etc. until the child reaches adulthood. If we want our youth to be successful and help them acquire the skills (problem solving, social, behavioural, concrete thinking, etc.) they need to not only reach success, but remain capable, teachers need to know their individual growth areas, improvement in instructional teaching strategies, and ways to set and attain goals that show how progress is evident.
In Regina, Saskatchewan at the University of Regina, the education program provides multiple opportunities for pre-service teachers to observe teachers and peers teaching, the teaching strategies used, and writing prompts to engage in critical thinking about what we observed and suggestions on what could be done for the teaching to become more effective for students. Every year in the education program at the University of Regina, pre-service teachers have opportunities to go into the classrooms and watch master teachers teach, which is also something that is critical. Everyone has a different teaching style, just like everyone has a different birth mark. During the four years of the program, students have the opportunity to see many teachers and many different instructional teaching strategies along with the physical supports that are necessary for the classroom to function. I am also aware that in Saskatchewan, there is a mentoring aspect when newly graduated teachers emerge from university and pursue the field of teaching. I am so happy to hear this! Sometimes, I feel like we are expected to know all the answers. I know we aren’t but it is nice to be able to have someone to turn to when you may not know an answer. It is also beneficial because mentoring master teachers can provide suggestions to improve teaching, classroom management and together collaboration can occur which benefits not only the teachers but the students. I am looking forward to finding a mentor when I enter the field because I believe there are a lot of really great ideas and practices out in the world that I haven’t discovered yet!
Sarah Brown Wessling is a teaching in Johnston, Iowa. In the video, Sarah talks about instructional teaching strategies she utilizes in the classroom:
1. Using video to improve teaching.
2. Think – Pair – Share
Sarah talks about the positive benefits of using video to record classes, lectures, and teaching strategies. Sarah sets up a mini camera in her classroom prior to class, after the class she observes her teaching and classroom dynamics, then proceeds to write notes about what occurred and ideas for how she can improve. This strategy Sarah utilizes promotes individual professional growth in numerous areas such as classroom management, instructional teaching strategies and methodology. In one of her clips, I noticed that Sarah asked students a question, she encouraged the students to turn to a partner and talk about it and then they would engage in a discussion as class. Think-pair-share is an awesome teaching strategy! It encourages individual critical thinking, problem solving skills, engages students in collaboration and prepares them for opportunities to engage in logical reasoning.
Feedback is important to all in the education system, teachers and students! Teachers provide two types of feedback to students:
1. Descriptive feedback
2. Evaluative feedback.
Evaluative feedback can consist of a grade, number or rubrics and checklists that show students where they have strengths and where they didn’t do very well. Descriptive feedback is verbal or written and it doesn’t just give a grade or a number. Descriptive feedback may come in the form of rubrics but it explains to the students their particular areas of strengths and the areas for growth. Descriptive feedback provides evidence of students actions, behaviours and individual work which helps them set goals to improve. Teachers work with students to plan goals and establish steps to goal achievement, and students have a better understanding of their responsibility and accountability in learning. As you can tell, descriptive feedback is more beneficial. During my pre-internship, I made it a priority to provide descriptive feedback as much as I could. From a teachers point of view, receiving “satisfactory” as feedback is considered evaluative feedback it is not descriptive feedback. “Satisfactory” doesn’t tell you individual areas of strength, growth areas, observations of teaching strategies, classroom management, and what can be done for improvement. I believe it is important for students and teachers to receive descriptive feedback.
Mrs. Stinson 
I think you provide some awesome reflection about this topic! It was a great read. Here is my “feedback” ;).
When you start teaching, you are usually observed your first 1-2 years (depending on the division you work for). After that, you’re kind of left to your own devices. My division observes every 5 years after your first year, so I will get that feedback. However, the profession of teaching is quite autonomous in the sense that often you are left with your class alone, leaving nobody to provide feedback on anything. I think, as teachers, if we want feedback, we need to take the steps to ask for it.
I often get students to give me feedback on what we’re doing and what they’re learning. I’ll have them fill out private/personal questionnaires where they tell me where they’re at, how they’re doing, what is meeting their needs and what isn’t, etc. While student feedback sometimes needs to be taken with a grain of salt, I have found that it has informed my practice tremendously.
Another important point is to collaborate once you are a teacher! Sometimes teachers work alone because they are so used to it: it is only in the recent past that we have begun to collaborate more regularly. The teaching culture of the past has often made it so that teachers work more independently without discovering what others are doing. NOW MORE THAN EVER, it is important to collaborate, not only for the benefit of students, but for the benefit of teachers! What better way to get feedback on your ideas, practices and strategies than to share with your peers? I have found this year, in collaborating with other teachers, that I have been able to ditch poor practice or ideas, modify “meh” kinds of practices and really refine practices that I was already pretty good at. I’m not sure if this makes sense, but I think professional collaboration is the best form of feedback you can get.
Not sure if any of this is helpful, but these are my thoughts. 🙂
Hi Renee,
I do appreciate your feedback and thoughts – ALL of it! First, I am really glad that you have mentioned you seek students feedback and input. I continuously asked for feedback and input from my students during my pre-internship. Asking for feedback allows you to be able to get to know your learners, identify students’ learning styles, modify and adapt future lessons, change or provide project and alternative assignments, and it can tell you if you are meeting, exceeding or need to help students with expectations. I also noticed the students were eager to provide feedback to me because it gives them a voice and a sense of value.
Secondly, I do agree that it is critical to collaborate with other teachers! I think the lack of collaboration in the past occurred for a variety of reasons – one that stands out to me most is that in my generation everything was all about competition. You wanted to be the very best, hold all the knowledge, keep your own secrets, tips and tricks! I am glad to see the shift in teacher collaboration. Some teachers have awesome ideas and suggestions, if they didn’t share we may not know what works and doesn’t work for some learners. It benefits everyone to share ideas, suggestions and information. The only competition we are in as educators is learning from and teaching students to become the most capable, productive and successful members of society! Every teacher should want that for their students!
Shandra…WOW! This was a really good read. Your writing is so insightful and carefully organized. I like that you took time to reflect on these videos and see how they were applicable to not only you but to other teachers as well. Also, I didn’t realize that there were mentorship programs for us once we have graduated from the Bachelor of Education program, this is good to know! I love that you talked about Think-Pair-Share as well, I hadn’t heard much about this strategy until just this last semester. I also agree with what you said about descriptive feedback and being more beneficial than evaluative feedback. This has certainly been true in many of my university courses. It is always so frustrating when a grade is slapped onto an assignment, that has had hours poured into it, without even the simplest comment on how to improve for the next assignment. This is something I have truly begun to appreciate and value in teachers that practice descriptive feedback and your post is such a good reminder that we need to practice descriptive feedback with our students as well.
Renee, thank you for touching on teacher collaboration! I think this is so important and that these blogs that we are working on is one way that we can collaborate and learn together as peers!
Great read ladies!
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