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Assessment of Mathematics and Science Teachers’ Knowledge and Practice of Feed-back System in Junior High Schools in Hohoe, Ghana
Abstract
Aim: Teachers' knowledge of feedback systems encompasses their understanding of the purpose and types of feedback, as well as their knowledge of how to design and implement effective feedback processes. The practice of feedback systems refers to the extent to which they implement feedback processes in the classroom. This includes the frequency and quality of feedback provided to students, as well as the use of feedback to guide instructional decisions. Assessing teachers' knowledge and practice of feedback systems in junior high schools is important because effective feedback practices are essential for promoting student learning and academic achievement. This study aimed to assess mathematics and science teachers' Knowledge and Practice of feedback systems in junior high schools in Hohoe, Ghana. Methods: A survey research design was used to collect data from 104 mathematics and science teachers using a self-administered questionnaire. Descriptive statistics, Mann-Whitney U test, and Pearson's correlation coefficient were used to analyze the data. Results: The results showed that the mean Knowledge score of mathematics and science teachers was 3.12, indicating a majority agreement level of knowledge of feedback system. The mean practice score was 2.12, indicating a majority disagreement level of practice of feedback system in the classroom. There was no significant difference in knowledge and practice scores between male and female teachers. However, an inverse correlation was found between knowledge and practice scores, indicating that teachers with higher knowledge of feedback systems may not necessarily be effective at implementing those systems in practice. Conclusion: It was observed that majority of the participants do not practice feedback in their teaching. Recommendations: There is need for professional development programs and policies that support effective feedback practices in the classroom. Further research is needed to identify the contextual factors that influence teachers' feedback practices and their understanding of feedback purposes in Ghana.
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Effective feedback is a powerful educational intervention to support learning. Hattie and Timperley have developed a feedback model in which they define three different functions and four different levels of feedback. Although the model is widely used in educational practice, there is little known about how the model is used in education nor about the optimal distribution of the different types of feedback. In the current case study, we used an explanatory sequential mixed method design to investigate how lecturers use the model and how its use can be optimized. For this, 349 feedback comments from 22 lecturers were analysed, and 5 feedback experts participated in a focus group interview. The results show that most of the feedback given by the lecturers is task-oriented feedback and that current feedback practices can be improved by focusing more on the combination of feedup, feedback, and feedforward. In addition, results indicate that the level (task, process, self-regulation, person) of the feedback is more difficult to determine before hand and should be tailored to the learning goal. The design of the assessment form plays an important role in this alignment.
Universities around the world are encouraging teachers to provide more constructive feedback to support student learning, but do teachers know how to distinguish constructive feedback? What pedagogical practice is considered as feedback and what is not? For example, is a rubric a type of feedback? To date, very limited research has answered these questions from university teachers’ perspectives and the current study aims to address this gap. In this study, ten teacher training workshops were conducted in a university in Hong Kong, with an intention to enhance teachers’ competence in assessment and feedback. During the workshops, we first adopted Poll Everywhere to survey whether teachers (N = 248) recognise six types of common pedagogical practices as feedback, and subsequently used this as a base to discuss with teachers the reasons
behind their responses. Findings reveal teachers’ varied perceptions of these practices as feedback, which may be related to their varied understandings of feedback purposes. The paper calls for an explicit acknowledgement of the multiple purposes of feedback, and concludes with implications for teacher feedback literacy in higher education.
Examining EFL (English as a foreign language) teachers’ beliefs and cognition has become an essential area of research as teachers are seen as active decision makers. This study addresses teachers’ beliefs as specific to the strategies they employ when providing corrective feedback to students’ writing. Drawing on Ellis’s typology of written corrective feedback and Borg’s teacher cognition theory, this survey study investigated university EFL lecturers’ self-reported strategy use in the provision of feedback to students’ written compositions. A total of 254 respondents completed this survey from universities in Thailand, China, and Vietnam. The findings showed that the teachers provided different types of strategies, namely, high-demand (e.g., students’ response to feedback required), low-demand (e.g., correcting all errors), and no-demand feedback in relation to their students’ proficiency levels. Their choices of high-demand feedback strategies seemed to be associated with their pre- and in-service professional training experiences as well as contextual factors including local cultural influence and limited resources; whereas their uses of no-demand and low-demand feedback strategies seemed to be associated with their prior language learning experiences and classroom teaching practice. This study also revealed an inconsistency between teachers’ cognition about provision of feedback and their reported feedback strategy use. Pedagogical implications and directions for future research were also proposed.
Teachers are the pivot of Ghana's new educational reform and their expertise in the use of the recommended assessment strategies need to be evaluated from time to time to enhance teaching and learning. This survey research approach sought to measure the use of Assessment as Learning strategy among basic school teachers in Ghana. The features, strategies and principles underpinning Assessment as Learning strategy formed the basis of the construction of 7 item likert scale with a reliability coefficient of 0.995. A sample size of 100 was computed at 95% confidence interval and randomly selected from the population. With respect to the use of Assessment as Learning strategy, significant differences were found for teaching division, teaching experience and gender. From the findings, the mean difference of 1.281 explains that class teachers demonstrated greater skills (M:3.75, SD:.436) with respect to assessing students in ways that make them reflect on their own work on regular basis through self and peer assessment, than their subject teacher counterparts(M:2.47, SD: 0.507). Also, with a mean difference of 1.526,class teachers (M: 3.59, Original Research Article Senyefia et al.; JSRR, 26(3): 109-118, 2020; Article no.JSRR.56382 110 SD: .496) exhibited higher skills of providing safe environment and support for students to take chances, than their subject teacher counterparts(M:2.06, SD: .246).Again, the absolute mean difference of 1.085 explains that teachers with at least 4 years of teaching experience (M:3.82, SD:.389)demonstrated greater skills with respect to providing for the development of independent learners than their counterparts(M:2.73, SD:0.447) with lesser years of teaching experience. Female teachers (M: 3.90, SD: .303) demonstrated greater skills with respect to providing for the development of independent learners than their male counterparts (M: 2.76, SD: 0.431)with a mean difference of 1.140.The overall performance of the teachers with regards to the Assessment as Learning strategy was found to be 57% using the grand mean as the threshold criterion. The findings provide a basis for Ghana Education Service to provide in-service professional learning training aimed at enhancing teachers' knowledge of formative assessment with the ultimate goal of enhancing students' learning and achievement.
The purpose of this study was to analyse the methodology and results of previous studies (1990 to 2016) on formative assessment practices of teachers at all levels of education in Ghana. Due to limited documentation of formative assessment studies in Ghana, literature review covered 10 research articles, abstracts, books accessed
electronically or printed materials. They were collected for reading purpose. Of these, 7 studies were finally selected for meta-analysis on the basis of formative assessment implementation through literature review. These include 5 qualitative case studies and 2 mixed studies. Results revealed that, formative assessment is well embraced and practiced among teachers at all levels of education in Ghana. Moreover, methodologies adopted by previous studies on formative assessment practices in Ghana were credible since they were all exploring various aspect of formative assessment practices. It is however, recommended that future educational researchers shift attention to quantitative dimensions of the phenomenon, this would allow for large sample size and inferential study.
Feedback is frequently highlighted as a key contributor to students’ learning. This literature study argues that the focus of some of the feedback literature appears too narrow to understand what is going on in a classroom. Parts of the feedback literature show the relationship between feedback and learning approximate to a process-product model that predicts learning outcomes. The authors claim that feedback has to be studied in a classroom context and as a part of the teaching process to become more useful for teachers and pupils. Feedback research is thus discussed in light of other research traditions: Didaktik theory and classroom research in the last three decades. The article is based on a critical reading of feedback literature from a Didaktik perspective in order to enhance the complexity of the feedback concept. Our North-Continental Didaktik perspective focuses the importance of subject matter, the difference between subject matter and meaning, and the relative autonomy of teaching and learning activities. Classroom research from guided reading is employed as an example of how classroom research may contribute to explore classroom reality subject matter-based feedback in a school context.
Feedback can promote teacher-student relations and student academic involvement, performance and self-regulation. However, some research indicates that teachers do not always employ feedback effectively. There is a need to promote teachers’ appropriate use of feedback in the classroom. We describe a long-term workshop designed to enhance teachers’ knowledge and skills in the use of feedback strategies, and appreciation of the importance of feedback. Twelve teachers participated in the workshop. Observations as well as teacher reports indicate that participation in the sessions and the follow-up classroom application enhanced teacher involvement, knowledge, competencies and positive feelings in the use of feedback strategies. A workshop for teachers that has specific objectives on feedback strategies, is presented along a school year, and involves reflective sessions intertwined with classroom application work, can effectively promote participants’ involvement, knowledge and competencies in the use of feedback, as well as their outlook toward the importance of these strategies.
The study was a quasi-experimental research project conducted to investigate the effect of performance assessment-driven instructions on the attitude and achievement in mathematics of senior high school students in Ghana at Ghana National College in Cape Coast. Two Form 1 science classes were used for the study and were assigned as experimental and control groups. These two classes were randomly chosen for the study. The experimental group consisted of forty-two students and control group forty students. Data was collected through the use of an open ended test in mathematics and a questionnaire on students' attitudes to mathematics. The questionnaire contained 15 Likert-type questions. The independent samples t-test was used to find the differences between the groups. The experimental group differed significantly on the post-test scores from the control group. This study identified that PA-driven instruction improved students' problem-solving abilities and increased student confidence in doing mathematics because they felt more competent in working mathematical problems.The study also explored students' attitude to mathematics through the use of a Likert-type questionnaire. The findings showed that students' attitudes toward mathematics were generally positive. It is recommended that Ghana Education Service should organise in-service training for mathematics teachers on the use of PA-driven instructions and mathematics teachers should also integrate performance assessment-based tasks in their students' exercises.
The impact of two types of written feedback (process-oriented, grade-oriented) on changes in mathematics achievement, interest and self-evaluation was compared – with a particular focus on the mediating role of feedback’s perceived usefulness. Participants, 146 ninth graders (aged 14 to 17 years), were assigned to either a process-oriented or a grade-oriented experimental feedback condition. They worked on mathematics tests, received feedback on their test results and completed surveys measuring feedback’s perceived usefulness, interest and self-evaluation. Results of path analysis showed that process-oriented feedback was perceived as more useful than grade-oriented feedback and that feedback’s perceived usefulness had a positive effect on changes in achievement and interest. Consistent with this, process-oriented feedback had a greater positive indirect effect than grade-oriented feedback on changes in mathematics achievement and interest via its perceived usefulness. There were no such effects on changes in self-evaluation. Potential explanations for these findings, educational implications and possible directions for future research are discussed.
Few studies have examined how teachers’ oral feedback in whole-class interactions is received, perceived and used by students to enhance learning. This paper details an in-depth study of secondary teachers’ and students’ reflective comments on classroom oral feedback. The study examined perceptions of teachers and students in English and mathematics classroom interactions. Key findings showed that much teacher feedback was not recognised by students, and that when feedback was recognised it was often not perceived as the teacher had intended. Further, feedback in mathematics was more often recognised and perceived as intended compared to English. If feedback is not received by students, or not perceived as intended by the provider, it is unlikely that the feedback message will achieve its intended effect of supporting student learning. The study provides evidence that feedback perceptions – and thus feedback effectiveness – are context-dependent, subject-dependent, and individual-dependent.
This paper reports on a case study conducted in an American university investigating the role of feedback within a distance education environment. Based on data gathered from online and hybrid undergraduate students in a teacher education program and supported by existing research, we describe how we support online learners by implementing a feedback system that incorporates multi-draft formative assessments and various feedback strategies. We describe these strategies (i.e. explicit feedback directions and feedback surveys) as well as data from formative assessments to demonstrate the impact of clear expectations and feedback on student performance in distance education. We present recommendations for online feedback and propose a feedback model for further study.
The notion that future performance can be affected by information about previous performance is often expressed in terms of ‘closing the gap’. Feedback has long been recognised as a mechanism through which teaching and learning may be influenced. The current wave of support in the United Kingdom for assessment for learning echoes these sentiments. This paper examines the feedback strategies employed by two experienced literacy practitioners in England. Using data gathered from field observations, interviews and documentary sources, the paper presents evidence of espoused practice associated with feedback, demonstrating that whilst teachers may claim that they make effective use of some feedback strategies to support pupils’ learning and motivation, that this is not supported by empirical data. The paper also identifies that whilst some teachers aim to mark every piece of pupils’ written work for perceived motivational benefits; such a strategy can undermine pupils’ intrinsic motivation and lead to a culture of over-dependency, whereby the locus of control with regard to feedback lies solely with the teacher. The paper concludes by exploring some possible implications for practice with regard to the provision of written feedback in particular.
Feedback is one of the most powerful influences on learning and achievement, but this impact can be either positive or negative. Its power is frequently mentioned in articles about learning and teaching, but surprisingly few recent studies have systematically investigated its meaning. This article provides a conceptual analysis of feedback and reviews the evidence related to its impact on learning and achievement. This evidence shows that although feedback is among the major influences, the type of feedback and the way it is given can be differentially effective. A model of feedback is then proposed that identifies the particular properties and circumstances that make it effective, and some typically thorny issues are discussed, including the timing of feedback and the effects of positive and negative feedback. Finally, this analysis is used to suggest ways in which feedback can be used to enhance its effectiveness in classrooms.
Much of L2 teacher feedback research is conducted with advanced students in process-oriented classrooms in the United States. There is less published research about how school teachers in EFL contexts respond to student writing. Specifically little is known about why teachers respond to writing in the ways they do, and if discrepancies exist between teachers’ feedback practices and recommended principles, the reasons that may account for the disjuncture. The present study serves to fill these gaps by examining the written feedback provided by 26 Hong Kong secondary English teachers to 174 student texts, followed up by interviews with 6 of the teachers to find out the factors that have influenced their responding practices. The findings indicate that teachers’ written feedback occurred in single-draft classrooms and was primarily error-focused, contravening the principles recommended in local curriculum documents. The interview data highlight four important issues that shed light on teachers’ feedback practices: accountability, teachers’ beliefs and values, exam culture, and (lack of) teacher training. It is concluded that teachers’ feedback practices are influenced by a myriad of contextual factors including teachers’ beliefs, values, understandings, and knowledge, which are mediated by the cultural and institutional contexts, such as philosophies about feedback and attitude to exams, and socio-political issues pertaining to power and teacher autonomy.
The Art of Giving Online Feed-back Concept of Feedback Purpose of Feed-back
- N Leibold
- L M Schwarz
Leibold, N., & Schwarz, L. M. (2015). The Art of Giving Online Feed-back Concept of Feedback Purpose of Feed-back. 15(1), 34-46.