Five ways to give your child home learning feedback
As lockdown heads into week 7 of home learning, there are a few things you can do to keep the momentum going and your child’s motivation up. The most important of which is delivering feedback that works.
Feedback is vital for students of any age for progression, motivation, improvement and achievement. Without it, children and teens feel they are doing work for no reason and not finding out whether they are on the right track or not.
Depending on the lessons being set by your child’s school, some feedback will be forthcoming, but you can help your child by adding to it, so they feel they are doing a good job.
Step one: Know the feedback rules
Feedback works best when it is:
Constructive – shows the learner how to move forwards.
Useable – helps the learner to improve.
Positive – doesn’t blame or accuse.
Encouraging – helps keep the learner motivated and confident.
This doesn’t mean you can’t be honest or critical with your child but more that you need to think about how you’re delivering the message and what your purpose is in giving it.
Step two: Be specific
Feedback like “Well done” or “That’s quite good!” doesn’t tell the learner what he did right or give any insight into how to do better the next time around. Being specific with your statements around home learning is much more motivating and directional for a student.
Focus on what you want them to know what you’d like them to feel and what you want them to do next. For instance:
“Well done, I like the way you did X, can you do that with your next piece of work too?”
“That’s quite good, but do you think you could improve question 1 and 2 by trying X and Y”.
Step three: Avoid feedback when you’re frustrated
Lockdown learning is hard for everyone, and it’s easy for emotions to run high and frustration to rise. Keep your feedback for when everyone is calm; otherwise, what’s supposed to be encouraging can soon be taken is a negative way.
If your child doesn’t respond well to what you are saying, ask how you can help them? It could be that feel they don’t know what they are doing or feel frustrated that you don’t appreciate how hard they are working.
Step four: Don’t draw comparisons with others
Saying things like, “You should do your schoolwork right after breakfast like your brother does,” will always lead to a defensive reaction. Likewise telling them stories of what you had to do as a kid or what kind of student you were is also likely to lead to a negative outcome.
With feedback always keep the onus of what’s happening now and address the work, not the person. For example, say “Can you make your work look tidier?” is better than, “You always work in such a messy way.”
Step five: Welcome more outside feedback
Asking teachers and your school for feedback is expected at this time. Don’t be afraid to ask for more detail if what you’re receiving isn’t doing enough or helping. At the same time, consider other ways your child could be supported right now, maybe through working with peers via Zoom or in small online tuition groups with a trained teacher, who also supply feedback.