Students’ participation and engagement in feedback
Purpose/research question
The purpose of the project is to gain insight into factors limiting students’ engagement in feedback as well as factors making their engagement possible. The hypothesis is that engagement is determined by both the feedback practice and its context. The results of the project will support quality development of feedback practices at Aarhus BSS and contribute to the existing knowledge on feedback.eveloping the quality of feedback practices at BSS and contribute to existing knowledge of feedback.
Background
Feedback research focuses on how feedback should be organised in order for students to benefit from it. It has an individualistic psychological basis and states universally applicable principles and methods. Recent literature, however, points out that feedback has in fact only taken place if students take part in and receive it; at the same time, the context is crucial for feedback to happen.
The research project is based on these positions and investigates feedback and the students’ engagement in feedback as collective social practices. The results of the project can reinforce feedback practices at Aarhus BSS.
Data and analyses
The study has an ethnographic approach and builds on data collected at a BA programme at Aarhus BSS. The data set consists of 10 interviews with students (approx. 15 hours), 5 interviews with lecturers (approx. 6 hours), observations of teaching (approx. 50 hours) and artefacts of teaching and feedback within two courses, including group-based peer-feedback from 100-117 students. The data set is thematically coded and analysed by means of Stephen Kemmis’ theory of practice architecture.
