Coming off the back of January exams and Michaelmas term summatives, we have all either received or are about to receive feedback for our submissions. Now, it feels like a good time to talk about how to approach the feedback we receive and how to implement it in order to make it worthwhile going forward. Though it is tempting and to a certain extent, inevitable, to focus on the grade, your attitude to the feedback is where a real difference can be made.
1) Annotate the positives and improvements that need to be made
I always start by highlighting in green the positives outlined by the marker as things I’ve done well. It is important to remember to continue to include these in future essays rather than just focusing on the things you can do better. I also highlight the core parts of the content I included in the essay, which the marker also mentions in the feedback, in a neutral colour such as yellow. This is so I know, if I was to write a future essay on the same topic, what content is essential to include. Additionally, I highlight in red, the things the marker has outlined as either critiques or aspects that could have been done better. This is crucial for improvement. Recognising where you went wrong is the first step to understanding how to get better.
2) Book in an office hour
Having highlighted what I need to do better, I will then look to book in an office hour with either my class teacher or lecturer for the module. This is because I sometimes find that even when I understand the feedback, I don’t quite know how to implement or execute the suggestions for improvements into the essay. Here is where booking an office hour comes in handy. It is the ideal opportunity to ask your teacher to give examples of what implementing the feedback given would look like on top of clarifying the feedback given. By implementing feedback, I am referring to, taking one of my feedbacks from last year as an example, situations where the marker has told me to think about a more “critical engagement with the statement” to improve my mark further. Unsure of how that would look like in that essay, I asked my course teacher who gave me two ways I could have done that in the essay. That was crucial for me as even though that module was over, I could use the examples they gave as inspiration for other modules where a question was framed similarly.
Ultimately, receiving feedback is the most direct way to keep improving as a student. So don’t be afraid of what it may say, and rather, take it in your stride. With formative season in full swing again, it is the ideal time to write some essays for the purpose of gaining feedback.
