5 ways technology has improved our ability to give feedback

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As a composition and rhetoric teacher and child of the digital age, I rely on software programs to help me evaluate student writing better. Here are five ways electronic feedback trumps my traditional pen n’ paper feedback:

1.      Digital feedback is tidier

My handwriting is very messy (“chicken scratch” as we say in my country). MS-Word eliminates this problem instantly. Perfect, clean, digital typing appears on student papers. This means I can worry less about students understanding my handwriting, (or about the awful image my handwriting sends out!) and more about the actual ideas I'm conveying.   

2.      Digital feedback is highly visual

Gone are the days when we had to have a rainbow of pens in our arsenal. Feedback via software helps students “translate” feedback more effectively. It allows consistent interactive comments, the tracking of changes, an array of effects, and many other options that, among other things, are practical and nice.

3.      Digital feedback is more efficient

There are many many ways in which digital feedback aids efficiency, but I’ll stick to two.

Friendly or formal: do I have to pick just one?

"University Life 21" by Francisco Osorio

A recent article in the Guardian entitled "Should Teachers Banter More With Their Students?" discusses how teachers should navigate the wobbly line between being approachable individuals and authority figures.

In the writer’s opinion, the key is for teachers to be professional and accountable towards students while also revealing their human side from time to time. One way the author does the latter is through code-switching, which, for her, involves mixing the complex concepts of her material with more lighthearted, informal discourse:

I might use slang to poke fun at myself. I might even engage in discussions about who should or shouldn’t have made it to the finals of The Voice. Whatever it is, showing myself as a figure in authority who is nevertheless approachable is something students welcome. It can become a teacher’s most useful behaviour management technique.

I'm with her on that. Practices like code-switching and informal discourse are a good tool for us teachers. For example, those moments when I let my guard down with (weak) puns, passionate put-downs of bad writing, Eddie-Izzard-style ramblings etc...often usher in a palpable connection in the classroom. Put simply, my students seem more willing to listen and therefore more open to learning.