An Embedded Intervention To Support The Development Of Student Feedback Literacy

Feedback literacy is an emerging concept. It is seen as an individual competency that facilitates taking an active role in contemporary feedback processes. As such, it is a valuable skill not only in the classroom, but also in students' future professional lives. This paper reports on a qualitative study of a learning intervention embedded in a lab series, aimed at developing first-year engineering students’ feedback literacy. The intervention consists of a short e-learning module, a one-hour workshop, and two peer feedback assignments. The design of this interventional study is based on the comparison of an experimental group with a control group. Both groups participated in focus group discussions after the intervention (n=55). Findings were complemented by data from reflection logs collected at the end of the semester describing students’ most important feedback experience (n=42). The results suggest that the learning intervention contributed to the understanding of the key concepts and principles of feedback literacy. Moreover, students in the intervention group appear to value their peers better and recognise their valuable contribution in the feedback process. Although students realise that easily applicable feedback, such as minor corrections, make a limited contribution to their learning, they still often prefer it because of the minimal time effort required. Based on the findings, the paper concludes with recommendations for both individual courses and entire programmes, such as encouraging reflection, and supporting students in storing and revisiting feedback.