Technology-enabled higher education academic writing feedback: Practices, needs and preferences

Abstract

Student and teacher perceptions of feedback practices, preferences and awareness of feedback needs may differ and detract from learning. This article explores alignment or misalignment in higher education to argue alignment suggests needs are being met on these issues via technology-enabled feedback on writing. Within the context of academic training, we take a broad view of writing supervision along a continuum that comprises digital feedback on writing assessments at an Australian university. We used a survey comparison of teachers’ and students’ self-reported data to answer the following questions: (1) What digital feedback and assessment practices are reported by teachers and students in Australian higher education? (2) What e-feedback needs are self-declared through teachers’ and students’ self-awareness of assessment practices in that context? (3) What e-feedback preferences are reported by teachers and students? Students and teachers from different academic programmes and levels from social science self-reported their experiences of digital feedback on writing assessments. The quantitative and open-ended responses covered technology-enabled feedback experiences up to PhD supervision. The results on alignment and misalignment of participants’ needs and preferences suggest a need to increase dialogue and incorporate student agency into feedback processes. We discuss further implications for feedback experiences in this context. Implications for practice or policy Programme assessment designers might reconsider policies requiring online collaborative work since teachers and students prefer individual assignments. Assessors might improve digital assessment tools, to increase teacher and student interaction and expediency, without losing individual feedback, in line with unanimous claims that such tools support feedback processes on writing. Course leaders could implement practices buffering the effect of negative feedback because teachers perceive few complaints, but students react badly to negative comments through digital channels.