1
The potential of Information School to use new features of
Blackboard and Turnitin to support Audio Feedback
A study submitted in partial fulfillment
of the requirements for the degree of
Your Degree Title
at
THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD
by
Anisha Asokan
130139470
September 2014
2
ABSTARCT
Background:
Many Universities have started utilising more technology based learning
tools. One of the learning tools which is widely being used by
Universities around UK, is Audio Feedback tool. This makes their
students to improve their learning skills and very flexible for lecturers
who uses it. However, there is a mixed opinion of this feedback method
among both lecturers and students, so a study has been conducted to
analyse their perception about current feedback and audio feedback
method.
Aim:
The aim of this research is to make use of new features in Blackboard
and Turnitin to support audio feedback. This research aims to analyse
about the current feedback practices of the lecturers and experience of
the students.
Methodology:
This research has been carried out using mixed method approach. Both
qualitative and quantitative are being used. Qualitative method is applied
to lecturers and semi- structured interview is being conducted.
Quantitative method applies to students of The University of Sheffield,
by taking part in the online survey.
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Result:
Based on the findings and discussions, results have been shown. The
overall satisfaction rate of the student on the current feedback is not high
as expected. The lecturers must be explored by using new tools such as
audio feedback to provide feedback to the students. Because, students
prefer audio feedback as such. The University must train lecturers to
utilise it completely to enhance students’ learning skills.
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ACKNOWLEGMENT
My deepest thanks to Mr. Peter Holdridge, for his useful
supervision. During the research, he has given a lot of guidance
and informative support and helped me in understanding the
subject completely.
I would like to thank all the respondents and participants who
helped me in completing the online survey and interview.
Without their participation, I could not have completed my
dissertation.
Lastly, I would like to thank my parents for their love and
support.
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Pages
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Pages
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“I believe that concentrating on giving students detailed and
development, formative feedback is the single most useful things we
can do for our students”
-Brown, 2007
CHAPTER 1- INTRODUCTION
Over the many years the technology enhanced learning (TEL) strategies
that have been motivating the ways of teaching and learning within
Higher Education (Conole, 2007; Oliver, 2007). Nowadays, Internet
access makes work done quick and there are lots of education related
technologies worldwide. The Higher Education has developed many
teaching and learning formats such as, summarising teaching sessions;
recording lectures and audio feedback to benefit students’ learning. As
technology plays vital role in all fields, why not in developing in learning
process. There are lot of educational tools which is not been utilised
completely and moreover, lot of people are unaware of such existence.
One of those unaware existence is a audio feedback tool. As feedback is
the most needed support for a student to learn and develop his/ her
skills, many Universities have facing issues in providing a formative
feedback.
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Feedback and assessment is one of the main components of students’
learning. Every year, the number of International students are being
increasing, so in order to make them completely satisfied, by providing
a proper; accurate feedback makes students improve their learning
skills. As not all are from English speaking country, every student must
be provided with a face –to –face meeting at their first piece of work.
Thus, this will let them know about the criteria of marking and the
current performance level of each student.
Feedback is the most important tool for students’ learning. Whoever
the students are, wherever they come from or whatever they learn
does not matter. Also, regardless, what form of feedback does the
instructors provide on students’ work could be either written or online
format. The quality of feedback and the comments they provide must
be accurate enough and reliable, so that studnets will be able to
understand the lecturers comments (Chang, 2011).
Dissatisfaction among students about the quality of the feedback they
receive is noted by The Higher Education Academy Generic Center and
National student Survey in 2014. The overall satisfaction percentage of
2013 and 2014 is 72 which includes all the universities in the UK (Times
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of Higher Education). There were a lot of questions being asked in the
survey, but the least rated is the assessment and feedback.
In order to know about the satisfaction rate of the feedback of the
University of Sheffield, this research is conducted. This research not
only discusses about the satisfaction rate, but also the current feedback
practices and experiences of both lecturers and students and bringing
the ideology of audio feedback into existence.
There are many new features in the Blackborad supported by MUSE of
The University of Sheffield, but few features still remain unused such as
audio feedback. So this research will carry out the benefits for
Information School for providing audio feedback for students.
According to (Gibbs, 2004, Simpson, 2004), the feedback must not only
identify mistakes and misunderstanding, but also it must indicate the
supporting improvements, future developments and also by providing
with timely feedback students could improve in their future assessment
where this is the most significant part of their learning.
Audio feedback is also known as positive feedback. It is used by a digital
voice recorder to record spoken feedback. It is then saved as an audio
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file, then sending the file to the corresponding student by attaching the
audio file via email. It is considered to be more time-efficient. The
equipment needed for this system is just the mp3 recorder and
headset. It is a straight forward process. It provides constructive
suggestions for students’ improvement. Most of the students would
prefer to listen audio rather than reading the whole piece of written
comments.
Many other feedback format being used currently, but students feel
that it does not aid them while preparing for the future assessment. By
comparing the existing feedback system like written feedback,
Grademark feedback with audio feedback, there are quite a lot of
advantages such as, it will be more personal to the students; they may
find it easier to understand; more likely to listen to the whole piece
rather than reading the selected highlighted text; there would not be
any problem with the legibility.
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CHAPTER 2- LITERATURE REVIEW
The main aim of this research is to investigate about the current
feedback practices and the satisfaction rate of the students on
assessment feedback. The technology can make assessments and
feedback more agile and efficient to promote high quality learning (JISC
Report). There are lots of opportunities for self- evaluation, self-
regulation for the learners to assess their own work and creates a
criteria against them. There is a substantial value for various
multimedia technologies which can make the feedback more rich, good
quality, more personal.
The technology could offer the benefits such as, coherent and reliable
feedback; immediate feedback (timely); online peer and self-
assessment. Nicol (2010) argues, any assessment must be designed in
an effective manner since it’s a long term process of learning and one
should be able to gain confidence and self- judgements about their own
work.
The main aim of this research is to help students to improve in their
assessment by the feedback provided by the lecturers. There are many
other tools helps in providing feedback on Blackboard such as; Voice
Board, GradeMark (by using QuickMark option), Audio Feedback etc..,
By using audio feedback can engross students and enhance the
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teaching presentation. Voice Board, Voice Presentation and Voice Email
could be used to produce audio feedback.
Audio feedback makes students feel optimistic, because it’s more
comprehensive and personal, greater clarity and it is vital for
anticipated results. Students can also review the feedback by replying
back to the faculty. Rotherham (2009) suggested that Audio feedback
may be time consuming for the faculty who uses for the first time, but
by the practice they will be able to finish their marking so quick when
compared to other mmarking methods. But once they are familiar with,
it would save time. Also Rotherham (2008) indicated that audio
feedback are more liable to include examples to elucidate points made
and recommendation of improvements can also be made.
Furthermore, (Merry 2008; Orsmond 2008) noted that audio feedback
can be reused for related assignments in the future, this makes
students improve in the upcoming assignments by analysing the
mistakes they have done in the previous assignment.
The issues for academic staffs thinking about using audio feedback
should be considered, and the Institution must give proper training to
acquire the usage of audio feedback. The common issue among staffs is
the lack of confidence and understanding of the technology where
these issues can be easily erounce with practice. Initially, the students
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might feel alienated when a new method of recording is introduced.
But with practice, perseverance and exposure, they would become
much more comfortable with the equipment. It has an advantage of
rectifying any mistake that has been committed in a span of a few
minutes. (Ekinsmyth, 2009) indicates the staff perspective that
changing from the current method of feedback to a new method they
face problem of time period to learn the new skill and hence they
unwillingly accept the significance of the feedback process. This can be
overcome with proper training by the study organisers to aid the staff
working with the audio feedback with ease and also by providing
training on re-recording to rectify the mistakes they make.
Furthermore, there are a lot of drawbacks of using current feedback
such as written feedback, GradeMark feedback provide very straight-
forward feedback and also highlights more on the weaknesses.
Researchers found that very few students take up advice seriously
given by the tutors in the written feedback and rectify their errors.
Unlike other types of feedback, written feedback can take a substantial
amount of time to produce. Written feedback cannot be prepared right
away as feedback is a very vital thing for every student, they cannot
wait for a long time. (Dowden, 2011; Pittaway, 2011; Yost, 2011;
McCarthy, 2011) indicated that the students had emotionally
responded to the written feedback saying that the written feedback
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contains more of the negative comments given by the tutor and
therefore it is less effective.
Another criticism of the current feedback is that providing GradeMark
feedback students feel that it looks like a ready-made feedback, where
a default marking terms being saved and academic staffs can easily
drag and paste onto the submission. This makes students read only the
highlighted points rather than reading it completely and hence
improvements in the upcoming assessment is low.
By comparing the current feedback with audio feedback, there are
many advantages of using audio feedback. Many researchers like
(Roberts, 2008; Rotherham, 2008) are much more enthusiastic about
the students’ perspective, students indicated that comparing to written
feedback, audio feedback was more clear and also by providing audio
feedback they say that the lecturer had genuinely considered their
work. According to (Ribchester, 2008; France, 2008; Wakefield, 2008)
the positive response should not only point at tone of voice, quality,
but also highlighting the important parts of the feedback where
students will be able to concentrate more on it. However, in my view,
this method should be taken into consideration for the students
betterment of the future assignments because expressing feedback by
speech is a better medium than written in words. Another advantage
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is that, the students can access the feedback within or away from the
university (Hill, 2008) and (Merry, Orsmond 2008) indicated that audio
feedback can used while travelling as well. Also (Merry, Orsmond,
2007) noted that audio commentary will be more understandable to
this generation of students because of the mobile technology, they can
access information through sound by multimedia technology.
Advancement in the technology provides all possible ways to the tutors
to record and send the spoken feedback to students via email as audio
files. Furthermore, the recognition has become high for the portable
audio players and multimedia also opens all new possibilities for
students to interact with such feedback.
National Student Survey (2009) indicated that the assessment feedback
is not upto mark of student satisfaction. Weaver (2006) suggested that
students prefer the feedback for improving their learning in the future,
but they feel it's not effective as it could be. (Glover, 2006; Brown,
2006) also argues that the feedback lacks the future linkage or
assessment task. So to overcome these issues, it's important to explore
an alternative approach such as audio feedback which may increase the
impact on student studying. (Pryor, 2008; Crossouard, 2008) argues
that the role of feedback not only cogitate matter of learning, but also
let think about critical consideration of learning. (Gibbs and Simpson,
2004; Nicol and Macfarlane-Dick, 2006) stated that feedback should be
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effective which means it must be detailed, understandable and
students use it to self-assess their learning.
National Student Survey 2009 also discussed about the drawbacks of
using written feedback, they are lack of depth, simply stating the
problem, over emphasing on area of weakness and inability to prioritize
(BBC, 2007, UNISTATS, 2009).
Students' perspective about audio feedback are, audio feedback is
easier to understand because it clearly indicates the error and ways to
improve in the future assessments. It is more depth than any other
feedback such as GradeMark feedback, written feedback. Also, it is
richer feedback when compared to others. The academic staff
perspective about using audio feedback is, they are able to give
feedback in more depth and higher quality work and its more flexible,
also saves time by giving in an audio format.
Furthermore, Some researchers claim that, providing feedback to
students is very time consuming and despite the time taken, many
students may not read or uses it for their future assessment (Higgins et
al, 2002).
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Sadler (1989) argues that, students must learn the following from the
given feedback “a) to have a concept of the reference level they are
aiming for, b) an ability to compare their current standard of work with
that reference level and c) to be able to engage in appropriate behavior
that enables closure of the gap between the reference level and their
current level”. According to Kirshner et al, 1991, found that the
amount of time tutors spends on written feedback is less when
compared to the amount of time they spend on audio feedback. Sipple
(2007) noted that the audio comments made for problematic papers
made students feel more confident in their writing because they had
provided more genuine and praises.
To use audio feedback there are many practical issues to overcome, but
it could replace to other feedback method which is beneficial to both
students and academic staffs.
Merry and Orsmond (2008), improved student learning and also
explains staffs about the value of audio feedback for the students to
improve their assessment standard. Students listened to the audio
feedback more than once and while listening, they can also view their
work. Gibbs and Simpson (2004), suggests that, the students must
receive an effective feedback, which needs to be detailed, clear and
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should be understood and used by them to self- evaluate their learning.
There are many learning styles which are preferred by students such as,
verbal,aural, written etc.. Advancement in the technology has made a
platform for the tutors to send feedback through the audio file and
multimedia program such as plethora has all possible ways for students
to interact with such feedback. Lunt and Curran (2009) discusses that
students are more likely to listen to an audio file, even for 10 times
when compared to written feedback. Hefce (2011) says that students
are less satisfied with the feedback given. Priority of audio feedback is
becoming higher, as it highly engaging for students (Ice et al, 2007).
Why do not many tutors use audio feedback? Though the audio file
preparation time is quick, the handwritten feedback takes more time,
the ratio is (1:6 ie audio feedback: written feedback in minutes) (lunt &
curran, 2009). Dissatisfaction has been wisely a major issue with
feedback. Both lecturers and students must know what to be expected
in terms of feedback.
Turnitin GradeMark (turnitin.com): it is the online marking system
which is supported by VLE’s such as Blackboard and Moodle.
GradeMark is one of the vital players in the online marking field. And
very recently it has been upgraded to the audio recording for staffs to
provide feedback to students. The cost is very huge that every
institution is investing to use this system. They pay around tens of
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thousands of pounds every year as license fees. There are also many
alternative tools to provide audio feedback such as SoundCloud
(soundcloud.com) or DropBox (dropbox.com). These tools are available
at zero or low cost. Both the methods have advantages and
disadvantages. Rotherham (2009), research notified that audio
feedback is becoming more popular with the students and also usage of
the audio can be provided at least potential time for staffs. Many
researchers say if students receive their mark before they receive
feedback, if they are satisfied with the mark, they won’t be looking at
the feedback. The GradeMark has certain disadvantages over
SoundCloud and DropBox. Firstly the cost; the feedback can be
delivered as the tutor wishes, whereas GradeMark is a default set of
comments. National Student Survey (NSS) claimed that students are not
satisfied with the feedback they receive as discussed above. On the
other hand, many students do not collect their feedback (Jollands et al,
2009), if they collect it, fail to read it completely (Buswell & Mathews
2004). There are numerous number of questions arise regarding audio
feedback. Firstly, by considering the staff time, it is not clear enough
whether to use audio feedback. Some studies have proven that,
providing audio feedback decreases the staffs’ time when compared to
written feedback (Lunt & Curran, 2010), whereas others feel the
opposite (McFarlane & Wakeman 2011, Rodway Dyar et al, 2011).
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Some studies noted that audio feedback had proven positive effect of
students learning (Merry and Orsmond, 2008). Orsmond and Merry
(2011) reported that, no lectures provide suggestions for the future
assignment. Merry and Orsmond (2005) indicated that many students
preferred verbal feedback from tutor as it can be questioned and
discussed. France and Wheeler (2007) and Merry and Orsmond (2007,
2008) noted that audio feedback can be more personalised,the voice
tone which provides a clear comments and students may hear the
whole part of the feedback. Thus, this would make students read the
feedback completely.
National Student Survey 2014, have a released a new result. This year
students satisfaction rate remains the same as previous year (2013).
Students rated 72% overall for the assessment and feedback they
receive. Moreover, other questions that have been asked was rated
higher. Questions such as teaching process; academic support;
organisation and management; learning resources; personal
development were rated higher by the students of all Universities
around the UK. The reasons of rating assessment and feedback low for
two consecutive years proved that students are not satisfied with the
feedback they receive. The examination management of each
University must solve this issue by brining an alternative method to
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provide feedback. The table of the survey is mentioned in the Appendix
section.
Furthermore, National Union of Students (NUS) conducted a research
on feedback and assessment. The NUS recommended some strategies
for lecturers and students. The first strategy is, the assessment and
feedback should be provided throughout the year and formative
feedback must be provided before the assessment deadline. This can
be applied to Undergraduates and Postgraduates taught students. The
next strategy is, students must have a face –to –face feedback at least
for the first assessment. This makes students know about their
performance level indepth and tutor will be guiding them according.
Thus, this will enable students to achieve the goal in the future
assessment. The strategy is feedback should be provided on time.
Finally, an induction program must be conducted in order to know
about the assessment and feedback method, and making students to
understand the criteria of marking of the concerned University.
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CHAPTER 3- METHODOLOGY
The methodology is used to collect data to complete a research. There
are many techniques and methods to collect useful data. This research
is carried out using both qualitative and quantitative approach called a
mixed method. Qualitative method means collecting data by
conducting a semi- structured interviews and qualitative method mean
collecting data by online questionnaires.
3.1 Mixed Method:
Mixed method is defined as the research which adopts more than one
type of research method is called mixed method (Bryman 2001: 20). To
utilise this method effectively, one must understand both qualitative
and quantitative approaches (Creswell , J. (2012). Once the method is
confirmed, the data collection strategy and type of design will be
identified. This provides a better understanding of the research. King et
al (1994) claims that both qualitative and quantitative methods has
fused logic and share the same rules. Although they are combined, it
does not mean to use it every time (Sale et al, 2002).
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Furthermore, by combining qualitative and quantitative methods in one
particular study, it is highly practical and accepted. But on the other
hand, one must analyse and evaluate about mixed method before
carrying out for the research. Jick (1979) mentions that, quantitative
results in enriching to get the qualitative data.
The Acquaring of mixed approach in this research is because, there are
two end-users of audio feedback. Data are collected from both
lecturers and students of The University of Sheffield. Qualitative
method is applied to lecturers by conducting a semi- structured
interview. Quantitative method applies to students by sending an
online questionnaire via University mail.
3.2 Quantitative Method:
Quantitative methodology encompasses collecting numerical data that
is drawn for statistical analysis. Social survey is used in collecting data
through online (Bryman, 1988). Questions can be represented either by
open- ended or close- ended and both at times. The open- ended
question are left with black space, so that respondents can type their
own opinion. Closed- ended questions are given with options, the
respondents must choose whichever one is appropriate (Sofaer, 1999).
The questionnaire can be created at low or free of cost and very
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effective method to collect data from a large pool of people who can
still remain anonymous
One of the main advantages is that, the data can be collected in a very
short period from a large number of people and thus a large amount of
data could be derived (Ackroyd. S, 1981).
3.3 The Questionnaire Design:
This research consists of total 16 questions in the questionnaire. These
questions are of type closed- ended. In the first section the general
information such as, age; gender; degree level has been collected. In
the second section, the experience of current feedback method related
information is collected. And the last section consists of question on
audio feedback. None of the questions are open- ended, only multi-
choice questions have been created by providing options such as Yes or
No and choices of answer.
The questionnaire is sent to the whole Univerisity, which covered all
the departments. It was created using Google Docs and sent via
University mail.
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3.4 Limitation with questionnaire:
The questionnaire sometimes fails to offer a chance to receive high
quality data. Therefore a prior testing must be done. According to
Bryman (2004), any form questions should be rectified before
distributing it online, failing to do such testing, will result in invalid and
unreliable data. The researcher must inform in prior about the research
and should ask the participants to answer honestly even it is a negative
answer. But whatever the answers might the students will still remain
anonymous.
3.5 Questionnaire Ethics:
This research has been approved by Information School Research
Ethics. Information concent sheet is attached to the online survey.
Participants enrolled are not asked to give any personal (general)
information, as they are anonymous. Participants can be withdrawn
from survey anytime.
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3.6 Qualitative Method:
Many researchers has recognised that, qualitative research tries to
bring a vast potential for collecting data (Black, 1994). Qualitative
method is a type of educational research which completely
concentrates on the participants view; general data; maximum data are
collected by words (in detail) from the participants.
Qualitative method also analyses the words and conducts to find a
common theme. It is conducted among a small group of participants. It
has no hard rules, because the data collected can be either included or
removed by the researcher (Greenhaigh. T, 1997).
This research needs to obtain a deeper understanding about the
current experience of students about their assessment feedback and
thus qualitative method is used. Qualitative method is used to gather
information that one cannot do with quantitative method and also
analyses the human behavior change. Such complex behavior is not
recognised by qualitative method. Therefore, it is both inductive and
interactive.
In qualitative research, the most commonly used method is interview. It
allows people to speak in their own voice. The interview retains quality;
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investigation of information and also, only specified persons are been
interviewed (Morgan, 1988).
This research is carried out by conducting semi- structured interview.
Semi- structured interview is a non- standardised and very often used
in qualitative research. The research must have key themes, the issues
to be covered and questions can be amended according to the situation
of the interview.
3.7 Interview Design:
The interviewee are the lecturers of Information School. For this
research three of them were selected . There were 6 questions in total
and the duration of the interview 15-20 minutes. The questions might
be included or deleted during the interview because it depends on the
way of participant answering the questions. The interview participants
are anonymous.
3.8 Interview Ethics:
An email was sent to the interviewee to confirm whether they are
willing to participate or not. Once they confirm, the interviewee will be
asked to have a clear idea of the topic. There were totally seven
questions, but during the time of interview, few questions will be
added or deleted according to the situation of the interview.
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3.9 Conclusion:
Thus, mixed method was used to collect data. Online questionnaire
which was distributed to the entire University of Sheffield, helped in
receiving a large number of responses and semi- structured interview,
which was conducted at the Information School, helped in gaining lots
of information about this research. These data will be used in analysing
and discussing in the following chapter.
CHAPTER 4- FINDING
This chapter represents the research finding of data from the online
survey and semi- structured interview. The data that has been collected
from lecturers and students will explore the current feedback practices
and experiences and the attitudes towards audio feedback of both
lecturers and students. Data from both questionnaire and interview will
be discussed to make the analysis clear.
4.1 Questionnaire results:
The finding is represented in the form of graphs and tables with a short
explanation about each and every finding will be discussed.
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4.2 Sampling:
The questionnaire has been sent to The University of Sheffield via
announce mail from 1st to 8th of August 2014. The number of valid
responses was approximately 100. The following section describes the
details of the finding in depth.
4.3 Findings Description:
The online survey is conducted only for students. The students’
perception on the feedback and their idea and usage rate of the audio
feedback will be discussed.
Gender Number of Responses
Male 44
Female 55
Prefer not to disclose 1
Total number of
responses
100
Table 4.1 Number of Responses according to Gender
Table 4.1 shows the number of responses according to the gender. The
total number of males is 44 and female count is 55 and one of them did
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not prefer to close. However, this is a required question to be
answered.
AGE
Figure 4.2
Figure 4.2 shows the respondents’ age. There are 64 students between
the age of 18-25; 28 students in between the age of 26-35; 5 of them
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
18- 25 26- 35 36- 45 46- 60
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are between 36-45 and 3 of them are between 46-60. Thus, in total
100 respondents have declared their ages in the questionnaire.
EDUACATIONAL LEVEL
Figure 4.3
0 20 40 60 80
Undergraduates
Postgraduate- Taught
Postgraduate- Research
PhD
Other
Educational level
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Figure 4.3 shows the different educational level respondents. There are
18 Undergraduate (UG) students; 67 students were Postgraduate-
Taught(PGT) have been the maximum number of respondents; 8 of
them were Postgraduate- Research (PGR); 6 of them were PhD students
and 1 students from other educational level.
Questionnaire on Current Feedback Experience:
This section tries to find out about the current feedback experience of
students of different departments. The following are the data collected
from the finding.
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Rate the accuracy of the feedback
Figure 4.4
Figure 4.5 tries to find out the accuracy of the feedback received by the
students. All the degree level has rated the accuracy, 10% of the
student respondents say that the accuracy is less than 50%. The
maximum number (61%) of student respondents says the accuracy is
between 50- 70% and the rest 29% respondents rated the accuracy as
more than 75%. Students who rated the accuracy as less than 50%,
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70
Less than 50%
50-70%
More than 75%
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might have received a poor feedback which would not had consistent
comments or inaccurate.
Do you get your feedback regularly?
Figure 4.5
In order to know about the regularity of the feedback, 65% of the
students opted “Yes”, which means that they receive their feedback on
time. Remaining 35% of the students opted “No”, which means they
have not received their feedback on time. The ratio of this finding is 1:2
(ie) for every two students, one of them have received their feedback
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70
Responses Percentage
No
Yes
36
late. Therefore the management has to solve this issue by providing
timely feedback to all the students with any delay. As there are large
number of students submit their assignment altogether, the lecturers
does not find enough time to prepare as they were given very limited
time and even if they finish marking on time, the management makes
some delay in forwarding the feedback to the students.
Do you read your feedback completely?
Figure 4.6
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
Responses Percentage
No
Yes
37
This question tests the whether students read the feedback completely
or not. 80% of the students say that they read the feedback completely,
on the other hand 20% of them says ‘No’. The students who opted
“No”, must be taken into account, the reasons for not reading the
feedback completely. The reasons will be discussed in the next chapter.
What percentage of the feedback do you read?
Figure 4.7
This question tries to find out the percentage of the feedback read by
the students. 5% of the students reads less than 25%, 16% of the
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70
Less than 25%
Less than 50%
Less than 75%
100%
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students read 50%, again 16% of the students read more than 75%, and
the rest 63% of the students read it completely ie 100%.
The feedback helps to improve future assessment?
Figure 4.8
In order to know about the improvement of the students in the future
assessment, this question investigates the percentage of the students.
28% of the students strongly agree that the feedback they receive from
the lecturers helps them to improve their future assessment. 43% of
the students agrees, 27% of the students feels neutral about the
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45
Strongly Agree
Agree
Neutral
Never
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improvement and 2% of the students says that the feedback never
helps in improving the assessment.
Which of the forms of feedback have you received?
Figure 4.9
This question analyses the type of feedback students receive. 55% of
the students have chosen written comments, 27% of them chose
GradeMark, 13% of them chose comments through email and 5% of
them chose other form of feedback. There are different forms of
feedback method exists in the turnitin, but very few methods are only
0 10 20 30 40 50 60
Written Comments
GradeMark
Comments through mail
Other
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used. Not all departments use the same feedback methods, it differns
from each other. Many students did not know about GradeMark, this
shows they receive their feedback in an informal manner.
Does the current feedback method give you a personalised touch?
Figure 4.10
This question tries to analyse whether the feedback received by
students gets them personalised touch. 63% of the students say that
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70
Responses Percentage
No
Yes
41
the feedback gives them personalised touch, whereas 37% of the
students says “No”.
Does the feedback contain more negative comments than positive
ones?
Figure 4.11
In order to analyse the feedback method in depth, this question tries to
find out the measure of negative comments versus positive comments.
9% of the students strongly agree, 19% of the students agree, 62% of
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70
Strongly Agree
Agree
Neutral
Never
42
the students feel neutral and remaining 10% of the students completely
disagree. During the interview, this finding results have shocked one of
the lecturers. Because each students must be given importance and the
number of students who opted “strongly agree and agree” must be
considered and certain steps has to be taken to solve this issue.
Are you satisfied with the current feedback methods?
Figure 4.12
0 10 20 30 40 50 60
Responses Percentage
No
Yes
43
This question analyses the satisfaction rate of the current feedback
methods. 56% of the students are satisfied with the current feedback
method, whereas 44% of the students are not satisfied. This is one of
the questions being asked in National Student Survey, United Kingdom.
The overall satisfaction rate of assessment and feedback was 72 for the
two consecutive years (2013, 2014).
Have you ever got assessment feedback via audio file?
Figure 4.13
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90
Responses Percentage
No
Yes
44
This question measures the number of students who had experienced
audio feedback. 11% of the students have experienced audio feedback,
whereas remaining 89% of the students have not experienced. Only
some departments have tried using it. Since, it is one of the features in
Turnitin, why have not all the departments utilise it? The analysis will
be discussed in the next chapter.
Would you prefer audio feedback?
Figure 4.14
0 10 20 30 40 50 60
Responses Percentage
No
Yes
45
This is the major question of this research. Since Turnitin supports
audio feedback method, not all departments in the university use it. So
here is the responses of the students. 55% of the students prefer audio
feedback and 45% of the students wouldn’t prefer audio feedback. The
students who have opted “No”, must not be aware of the audio
feedback. Because only 11% of the students in the University have
received the feedback in an audio file.
Do you prefer feedback in your native language?
Figure 4.15
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40
Strongly Agree
Agree
Neutral
Never
46
In order to know more about International students’ preferences, this
question has been asked. 26% of the students strongly agree, 12% of
the students agree, 37% of the students selected neutral and 25% of
the students does not prefer their feedback in native language. Many
students’ native language is not English, so to make them understand
about feedback completely, there are lots of software which converts
English to any preferred language. It has being widely used for many
purposes. The number of responses who opted “never” might be purely
English speaking students or their comfortable rate may be higher in
understanding.
Interview:
4.4 Interview Sampling:
The interview was conducted in the Information School, three of them
were selected and an email had been sent to them for confirmation.
Once they confirmed, the research objectives were discussed. Each
participant spent 15-20 minutes of their time to answer my questions.
There were totally 7 questions, but during the time of the interview
some questions may be added or removed according to the situation.
47
4.5 Findings:
Question 1:
Experience of using the Current feedback methods such as, GradeMark
and written comments.
The participants who were interviewed have at least 10-15 of
experience in providing feedback. Each participate had their own
experiences, which were not too similar among them.
Respondent A shared his experience:
“It has been rated very highly by Undergraduate students in the
National Student Survey and indeed every year Information School has
been rated high and some departments as well”.
National Students Survey rated overall of 72%, and only this component
is being rated low.
Respondent B shared his experience:
“ Students get two parts of feedback, the first part would be textual
statement and the next part is the marking grade. It contains a series of
very standard statements and it is basically a pre- coded responses.
48
How I use it, read the essay and make some scribble comments and look
write up those textual comments and looking at the grade and mark
whichever grade is appropriate”.
Based on the respondent B, it is clear that, he uses GradeMark method
to mark the assignment.
Respondent C shared his experience:
“ I have not used GradeMark as such at all. I wanted to experience. I use
turnitin to provide feedback. Trademark has lots of tools, such as adding
a textual comment or dragging appropriate comments from the set of
standard comments. It also says that the trademark would be time
consuming, but in the students’ perception, it might help them see their
mark and comment in single sheet”.
Respondent C was totally in contrast of A and B. As Information School
lecturers uses grademark method for assessment, he said, he never
used because it is does not provide consistent comment according to
him. He concluded by suggesting, it would be better if some
amendments are made in the criteria sheet.
49
Question 2:
Do the current feedback methods help students to improve their future
assessment?
This is one of the important questions that have been asked to both
students and lecturers. As three respondents uses three different
marking method, the experiences were totally different from each
other.
Respondent A discussed:
“ On the National Students Survey, it has been rated 72%, which
students are not satisfied with the feedback method and we lecturers
give only formative feedback. We focus only on the strengths and
weakness rather than providing comments for the improvement. Some
modules share a series of components, they have the potential of one
assessment informing the next assessment and being a formative
learning process. Ad some module assessment is at the end of the
module and thus the impact of feedback is less. This must be changed
as soon as possible”.
Based on respondent A opinion, not all modules share the same
method of assessment. Some module may have an essay writing, some
may have a group work and some module would share both group
50
work and individual one. This leads the marker to discuss very little
advice on the work students have perceived.
Respondent B was totally in contrast of respondent A:
“ I hope it is, because by giving two forms of feedback it would help
them to improve. For instance, if a student had scored 45% and he looks
for the comments to rectify his mistake and do well the next time. Thus,
my feedback helps students to improve their future work”.
Respondent C emphasized:
“ I think when people doing marking they should see it is formative even
it is in the module. And also we are in a position to think how can we
help students to improve. In some ways I don’t think we do our job as
best we could do. I always think someone could do the marking better
with the appropriate comments”.
Based on respondent C opinion, it is clear that, the marking sheet must
be changed completely or at least little amendments could take place.
51
Question 3:
Is current feedback method time consuming?
Respondent A:
“It depends on what method is being followed. If it is a written
feedback, “Yes” I find it extremely time consuming and other lecturers
feel the same”.
Respondent B:
“Any form of feedback, if it is used properly, it is time consuming. Thus,
clear and fair feedback would be provided”.
Respondent C:
“ If it is a big class and if I have to mark 40 essays with the word count
of 3000, it could very complicated by writing and sometimes not written
very well and finally marking the 40th essay…., it’s a vast network but
people perceived it to be. Of course it is very important to do well, but I
think it is repetition as well. People try to do varience such as group
work, presentation, structured assignment, etc,.. so each one is
different. Thus, marking is time consuming”.
Based on the answers, each one of them uses different feedback
method. Respondent A uses written feedback; respondent B uses
52
grademark and respondent C uses a mixed method (both grademark
and written comments). Thus, all the current feedback methods are
time consuming.
Question 4:
Do students go through the whole feedback?
Respondent A:
“I suspect, they just look at the grade, if they are not happy with the
grade, they might go through the feedback. If they are happy with the
grade, they might just scan it or ignores it”.
Respondent B:
“I have no clue whether they read or not”
Question 5:
Why have not Information school use audio feedback?
Respondent A:
“I think for me personally, if you want to give a feedback, it must be
accurate and fair, I don’t think you can do it via sound track. The only
53
way to work is by writing it first and then making an audio file. This
might be accurate”.
Respondent B:
“I wouldn’t use it because, when I look into written feedback and think
very carefully what exactly do I want to say. But if it’s an audio, you can
actually talk to the students directly and discuss about the
performance”. I prefer face -to -face feedback than written feedback,
because I spent a lot of time thinking how to write it so that students
does not misunderstands the comments”.
Respondent C:
“I suspect they would think it will be time consuming, but I heard other
department lecturers saying it is not time consuming when compared to
other methods. I would really like o know about the mechanism of audio
feedback”.
At the end of the interview, after knowing about the benefits of audio
feedback over other methods, the participants agreed to use audio
feedback, if there were allowed. One of the participants still refuses to
use.
54
4.6 Conclusion:
Based on the finding, it is clear that both students and lecturers have
positive attitude towards audio feedback. Thus, the University must try
bringing such a method into existence.
CHAPTER 5- DISCUSSION OF FINDING
In this chapter, based on the findings from the previous chapter will be
discussed. Both qualitative and quantitative finding are combined
together to have a better discussion, which means a comparative study
will take place that includes lecturers and students.
The aim of this research is to explore new feature of Blackboard and
Turnitin to support e-assessment such as audio feedback for
Information School. This research is based on providing audio feedback
for e-assessment to students via an audio file. And also issues faced
both by lecturers and students regarding current feedback methods are
discussed. It mainly focuses on analysing the existing system;
comparing audio feedback system with the current feedback system;
and also to propose such feature in Information School. Since it is
already exists in turnitin, why have not the department implemented
55
it? And lastly lecturers and students perception on audio feedback is
discussed.
An online survey has been distributed to the students via University
mail to the university which covered almost all the departments. The
online survey lasted for 10 days online and received approximately 100
responses from students of various departments especially from
Information School. The total number of responses has been deeply
analysed and results that audio feedback is not completely utilised by
the University. As already mentioned above 100 students took part in
the survey and only 11 of them have experienced audio feedback and
the remaining 89 of them have not experienced till date. This is the
highest rate of not using such feature.
Furthermore, a deep investigation has been carried out to benefit both
students and lecturers. So management must support lecturers to use
audio method to benefit students to improve their future assessment
and providing timely feedback with any delay. Management must also
train lecturers to use such new feature. One of the participants who
took part in the interview claimed that “ one of the main problems of
using audio feedback is the lecture who’s assessing the students' work
must be formative, but when he tries through the audio file, it becomes
56
informative in certain places”. According to the online survey, 44%of
the students are not satisfied with the current feedback practices such
as GradeMark; written comments; comments through mail etc,,.
Feedback can either be formal or informal, because the only is to help
students to evaluate their ability to understand (Nicol et al, 2006 ). The
feedback methods that are mentioned in the above section can be
constructed in a formative way, but in the students' perspective, they
feel feedback could also be in an informative way, so that it helps them
to understand the feedback completely and could correct themselves in
the future assessment.
The rating for the accuracy of feedback from students was, 10% of
them rated the feedback as less than 50%, which has to be noted.
Because less than 50% accuracy does not help students to cope up in
the assessment. Feedback is the only tool, where students could
improve and understands their current level of performance. There
were 61% of students rated 50-70% as accuracy. This is comparatively
better than the previous rating. Noting this ‘The Higher Education
Academy Genernic Center’ has carried out a research to increase the
quality of feedback. They also have suggested a few strategies. The first
57
one would be providing a clear definition criteria sheet and focusing on
the performance level of students. The second strategy would be
provided with an example assignment which is attached to the
feedback. Finally feedback should deliver high quality information to
every student which would help in improving their learning skills.
Flanndly (2001) notified that students who are unable to measure their
performance by the feedback given, then they are not likely to focus on
the subject which has to be completely mastered. Hence, feedback
must be accurate enough provided by the lecturers.
In order to know whether students receive their feedback regularly or
not, a question is has been asked related to it. There were 35% of the
students have not received their feedback on time. The same question
was also asked to the interviewee, he answered “ the time given to us is
not sufficient to evaluate more than 100 essay with the word count of
3000 in three weeks. For an accurate and timely feedback, we must be
given fair enough time to evaluate”. One of the researchers discusses
that, formative feedback must be provided on early exams or
assessment, so that it helps students to improve their performance in
the upcoming assessment.
58
One of the important questions asked to both students and lecturers is
“Do students read the feedback completely?”. According to the survey
result, 20% of the students opted “No”. The reason might be, if a
students’ score is good, he/she will not be going through the feedback
completely. If the students fail or just pass in the border, will have a
glance, again not reading the feedback completely. Therefore, whether
they score good or bad, they are not prioritizing the feedback given by
their lecturers. One of the interview participants said “usually students
won’t go through the feedback, they check for the mark which is
mentioned at the top and ignores the comments”. By understanding
the issues of both lecturers and students, ‘The Higher Education
Academy Genernic Center’ have suggested that, only if the students’
response to the comments given by the lecturers will be given the mark
failing which the students will never get to know their marks. Thus, this
would make students to read the feedback completely.
It is important for students to improve themselves in their future
performance level by perceiving a well structured feedback. So in order
to know about it, one of the questions asked to both lecturers and
students was “Does feedback help to improve future assessment?”,
43% of the students agree that, the feedback provided by their lecturer
aids them to understand the mistakes and rectifies it. Whereas on the
other hand 29% of the students have not seen any improvements with
59
the feedback they receive. Lectuerers’ perspective has already been
discussed in the finding section.
National Union of Students suggested a principle, a feedback should be
provided in a timely manner that only helps students in the future
progress (LINK 2). As students prefer their feedback to be personal, one
of the questions in the online survey asked was “Does the current
feedback methods makes students feel personalised?”. Surprisingly
37% of students did not feel personal by the feedback they receive.
Also one of the participants in the interview feels the same. He said “
comment sheet is pre- coded ones, where the lecturers were asked to
select the appropriate comments. Thus, this might not make students
to feel personalised”. Also, he suggested solutions to solve this issue.
1. GradeMark could help to solve this problem by adding written
comments on the marking sheet.
2. If the feedback is provided in audio format, it would be more
personalised for students.
The Higher Education Academy has also suggested that, the lecturers
who is marking an assignment, must write down some ‘action points’
which will be attached to the regular feedback.
60
The comments given by the lecturers matters a lot. Students prefer to
receive more positive comments than negative ones. The errors in the
assignment could be commented in a positive manner. When this
question is being asked in the survey, 28% of them agreed that, the
feedback they receive contains more of negative comments than
positive ones. Lunsford (1997), suggested that students must know how
the reader has experienced their (example –essay), rather than being
judgmental about their work. Certain comments must help students
understand the difference between objective and result. He also
suggests that comments should always overture advice,rather than
finding only the strengths and weakness. Sadler (1983) argues that,
providing feedback by using criteria sheet does not always have a good
impact on students. So lecturers must always think of a tool which
fulfills the students’ need and such tool must deliver feedback with
expected goals and task requirements.
Furthermore, by considering the current feedback methods such as,
written comments, grademark and comments via email have not
satisfied by all the students. The written comment method is being
experienced by 55% of the students and 27% of them experienced
grademark. But as the result, 44% of the students are not satisfied with
the current feedback method. The reasons would be, as already
discussed in the above sections, not receiving timely feedback, does not
61
feel personal and does not help them to improve in the future work
and more negative comments than positive ones. Some lecturers have
also experienced the same as students. Boud (2000) argues, feedback
should not only focus on errors, but also corrective advice must be
provided. This advice should be completely understood by the students
and they must turn it into action.
To overcome all the issues faced by lecturers and students about
assessment feedback, audio feedback would solve these issues. At The
University of Sheffield, some departments have already used this
method. Only 11% of the students have experienced such feedback,
remaining 89% of them would prefer to experience audio feedback. In
the lecturers’ perspective, initially they did not prefer an audio
feedback method as it consumes more time and they think it is a
burden for them as they need to evaluate a lot of students work. After
a deep analysis of students need and satisfaction, they agreed to use, if
they were given a proper training by the management. One of the
participants of the interview said “ there is a wrong perception of audio
feedback. Some lecturer says it is very time consuming, but the staffs
who had already used said that it is not time consuming. And any form
of feedback would be time consuming if they use it properly to provide
a fair feedback”.
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Based on the finding, 55% of the students prefer audio feedback, which
means they wanted to experience such method. As audio feedback
remains to be an unused tool which is supported Turnitin, the
University could start using it effectively. Since it has numerous
advantages which will be discussed in chapter 5, audio feedback could
be bought into existence. Many students were unaware of such
existence, might include a few lecturers as well. Bob Rotherham, who is
a National Teaching fellow at the Leeds Metropolitan University, Leeds,
have conducted a research project “Sounds Good: Quicker, better
assessment using audio feedback”. His research discussed a lot of
benefits that would feed students to improve their future learning from
the feedback they receive. This research has been conducted all
Universities around UK. Both lecturers and students were optimistic
about the audio feedback and pessimistic on current feedback
methods.
National Union of Students has undergone a research on Assessment
and Feedback, which included a chapter called “Students should be
given a choice of formats of feedback”. This particular chapter discusses
about the different format of feedback, such as written, verbal and
electronic. The study results by suggesting the Universities to discuss
63
about the feedback with students and give them a choice, so that
feedback could be provided with their preferences. Thus, this makes
any students to read the feedback completely and also gets
personalised touch.
5.1 Strengths and weakness of the methodology:
Mixed method has been used for collecting data. Qualitative method
was applied to lecturers, conducted a semi- structured interview and
quantitative method was applied to the students by distributing the
online survey. The data collected that has been collected from lecturers
and students was combined to get more reliable and desired objective
result.
Due to the time constraints, not all students took up the online survey,
since it’s been sent to all the department, the responses were less in
number. More number lecturers must be interviewed, but due to less
time, only a few of them were able to participate.
64
CHAPTER 6 – CONCLUSION
In this chapter, the conclusion regarding the research objective will be
summerised. And also recommendation for future study and
suggestions will be discussed.
The research objective:
This research is based on the current practices and experience of
feedback for assessment and also the satisfaction rate of students
about feedback is analysed. Issues by providing timely and useful
feedback method is also being discussed. The following are the
objective of this research,
1. To analyse the existing system.
2. To know whether the current feedback methods help students to
improve their future learning process.
3. To compare audio feedback to the existing system
4. To analyse the students’ and lecturers’ perception regarding
audio feedback.
65
The first objective is to analyse the existing feedback systems such as,
grademark and written comments method. These two methods are
widely being used at The University of Sheffield. But not all students
experience the same method. Some student may receive written
comments whereas some students may receive grademark comments.
As details indicated students receive their feedback by either of the
methods. The lecturers also use either of the methods, since there a lot
of other methods in existence, they do not use it.
The main objective of this research is, whether students are able to
improve their future work by the feedback they receive. As the results
showed students did not completely satisfied with the feedback. Some
lecturers also pointed out that, due to the time constraints , the
feedback is provided only at the end of the module except certain
modules.it depends the form of coursework they work. Some module
assessment will have only one component which will held at the end of
the semester, while some module might have more than two
components, here students might receive their feedback before
completing the second components. Therefore, it depends on the type
of assessment they pursue.
Another important objective would be, the issues facing by students
regarding the feedback. Based on the finding,it is clear that students
66
are not satisfied with the feedback they receive, might be due to
reasons such as, inaccuracy; delay in receiving feedback; more negative
comments; not getting personalised touch; very little advice are given
for the improvement.by considering all these issues, management is in
a position to sort out as quick as possible. Because feedback is the only
tool which plays as a backbone of students’ work.
The next main objective of his research is comparing audio feedback
with the existing one. Based on the finding, maximum responses from
survey showed that students preferred audio feedback than the
existing methods. The participants in the interview also agreed to use
audio feedback, after understanding its advantages over other
feedback methods. The advantages includes, providing feedback on
time, since lecturers themselves agreed that any form would be time
consuming, but once given to training with audio feedback, it might
take less time when compared to other feedback. The next advantage
would be, students will not be able to scan the feedback when sent
through an audio file, whereas, they will be able to scan the feedback
given in written format. Thus, this makes students to know about the
feedback completely. Since many students wanted to get a
personalised touch, audio feedback would solve this issue. Many
researchers have also suggested that audio feedback might get
students more personal by their feedback.
67
Another important objective is that, students’ and lecturers’ perception
on audio feedback. Based on the finding, only 11% of the students have
experienced audio feedback in the University, since there are numerous
number of departments and lecturers only these many students
managed to receive their feedback in an audio format. So if all the
departments make use of such tool to provide accurate and reliable
feedback, students learning skill would be improved. Very limited
awareness of audio feedback makes the low rate of usage. Thus, this
research have provided the facts about the current feedback practice of
lecturers and experience of students. Also a new feature of Blackboard
and Turntin which supports audio feedback method is being proposed.
6.1 A quick research on the UK Universities that prefers to use Audio
Feedback: Source – A Word in Your Ear(2009)
Based on the research on feedback, lot of universities around UK, have
already started using audio feedback. Bob Rotheram, National Teaching
fellow at Leeds MetropolitianUniversity have conducted a research
named “Sounds Good: Quicker, better assessment using audio
feedback”. His research was based on highlighting the benefits of audio
feedback and reasons to adopt this method widely in higher education.
68
The following are the universities and the lecturers who have shared
their experience on using audio feedback and students’ positive
reaction towards audio feedback.
1. Birmingham City University, conducted a case study on students,
whether the audio feedback gives them a personalised touch or
not. The students who participated in the study have felt
optimistic on the feedback they received. Thus, this may be
considered one of the samples, that audio feedback would give
personalised touch.
2. University of Chester, conducted a study on podcasting
technology on audio feedback to students. Both tutors and
students felt so conceiving on such feedback method. And tutors
noted that this method would help all he distance learner and the
accessing of audio feedback is very ease to communicate to the
students directly. Thus, accessing becomes easier when compared
to other methods.
3. University of Reading reports a paper that how tutors and
learners react to audio feedback for written work. This report had
proved that audio feedback would be effective; engaging for
69
learners; more friendly and lecturers could deliver feedback on
time. Thus, audio format will be able to provide a richer layer of
feedback that motivates the learners.
4. Sheffield Hallem Univeristy, conducted a small research on audio
feedback enhances students, whether written feedback is
satisfied or not. The satisfaction rate of the students on audio
feedback was high hen compared to written comments. Thus, this
proves that students are not satisfied with the current feedback
methods. The researchers concluded that, a future research might
be carried out to analyse whether, audio feedback could help
students to improve their performance in the future courseworks.
5. University of Leeds, conducted a research whether audio
feedback helps students to improve their future learning. He
evaluated some students’ work and sent via an audio file. The
students (including hearing disability student) who received
feedback, welcomed this method, genuinely and would prefer this
kind of method for all the modules, since it helps them in
rectifying their errors in the future coursework.
70
Thus, some Universities have already implemented audio feedback
method and proved it has an optimistic feedback from both students
and lecturers. There are also some disadvantages, but the advantages
could solve the current issues.
6.2 Suggestions:
Based on the findings and discussions, some suggestions could be given
to the lecturers and all the departments in the University. The finding of
this research results, many of them were unaware of such feedback
tool, which means some awareness should be given to audio feedback
to both lecturers and students. The University must train lecturers to
use such method and should make sure all students receive their
feedback on time.
Furthermore, based on the finding, one of the online questions,
whether students prefer their feedback in their native language. The
responses received were positive and bringing this into action is not
very complicated as there is lots of software to convert English into the
concerned native language of students.
71
6.3 Future Research:
The online questionnaire was sent to the whole University, but only
very few of them managed to complete the survey due to the time
constraints. Thus, for the future research it would go well when the
questionnaire is sent early summer to receive more number of
responses. Also by adding open- ended questions to the survey to know
about the opinion of students on current feedback and audio feedback.
Meanwhile, in the interview, it would be helpful when more number of
lecturers is being interviewed. Because one of the end-users of
feedback are the lecturers and should be very focused. The interview
must invite lecturers who refuse to use audio feedback tool, this makes
them to know about the benefits of the tool.
Word Count: 10,436
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Appendix -A Online Questionnaire
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APPENDIX B- INTERVIEW QUESTIONS
1. What are the current feedback (GradeMark) practices and experiences?
2. Do current feedback methods aid students to improve in the future
assessments?
3. Is current feedback method time consuming?
4. Do students go through the whole feedback?
5. What are the perceptions of staffs using audio feedback?
6. Why haven’t the Department (ISchool) use audio feedback?
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APPENDIX C- ETHICS FORMS
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APPENDIX –D ACCESS TO DISSERTATION
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Appendix- National Student Survey (2014)
National Student Survey 2014: UK results
National Student SURVEY
2013
National Student SURVEY
2014
Questions Satisfied* Satisfied
1-4 The teaching on my course
86% 87%
5-8 Assessment and feedback
72% 72%
9-12
Academic support
80% 81%
13-15
Organisation and management
78% 78%
16-18
Learning resources
84% 85%
19-21
Personal development
82% 82%
22 Overall satisfaction
85% 86%
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Ranking of the University (2014)- Overall Satisfaction
2013 14
Royal College of Music 89 80
Royal Holloway, University of London 89 89
University of Sheffield 89 90
University of Warwick 89 87
University of Winchester 89 89