Poster Presentation 173 UniServe Science Blended Learning Symposium Proceedings

Abstract: For students to progress, feedback is essential. Without feedback it is difficult for students to progress because they have little measure of their cognitive and skill development; in partnership with a facilitator or tutor it is easier. Within this partnership, however, some types of feedback are potentially more powerful than others. We argue that assessment tasks which provide a structure to encourage a feedback loop may provide the students and tutors with more opportunity for progression and performance at a higher level. For students to achieve the necessary cognitive and skill outcomes; they need to understand each of the steps they are taking along the way. If we can give students feedback that helps them reflect on their behaviour, they may progress more rapidly along this pathway and if we take our tutors with us on this journey then the learning outcomes we desire might be achieved. What is student feedback? Feedback by educators to students is a key feature of formative assessment (Black and Wiliam 1998). Such assessment is specifically intended to provide feedback on performance to improve, accelerate and lead to a higher level of achievement in cognitive and skill outcomes (Sadler 1998; Hounsell 2003). Black and Wiliam (1998) suggest the word feedback be used in its least restrictive sense, to refer to any information that is provided to the performer of any action about that performance. The simplest form of feedback on a formative assessment task is often a grade or a mark which do no