Engaging with feedback is essential for your development as a maturing student, but research shows that most students don’t use feedback to improve their learning. Reasons for this include:
- You may feel feedback is pointless because you will never be doing an exercise like this again.
- You may feel angry and upset about not doing as well as you would have liked. Feedback can feel demotivating.
- If you have done well, it may seem like there is no reason to engage with feedback because you’ve ‘got it right’.
One thing is certain: ignoring feedback won’t help you to improve.
As a marker, there are two main aims when writing feedback:
- To give clear indications on how you could do better. Quite a lot of your feedback will be about transferable skills (e.g., aligning your assignment with the brief, improving writing style, enhancing study skills like careful proofreading). They should help you identify weakness that you can improve for all your future assignments.
- To justify the grade. We have a responsibility to explain where marks have been lost and gained. We are assessing the assignment against the brief and Imperial College’s grading criteria to decide whether it is adequate (3rd), good (2.2), very good (2.1) or excellent (1st). If your feedback seems negative it is because markers are explaining why you have lost marks. Comments will usually point out what you could or should have done, so these should be seen as opportunities for how to improve rather than just a list of things you did wrong.
How should you use your feedback?
Approach your feedback unemotionally. If you feel upset at first, put it aside for a few hours or days, and come back to it when you are ready to use it to enhance your learning. Remind yourself that it is your assignment that is being critiqued, not you as a person.
Make a list of those factors that influenced your process of writing the assignment. These are nothing to do with the assignment itself and everything to do with the conditions that may have affected performance. If you did well, these might include that you allowed sufficient time to write the assignment and came back to it to polish it, or you had found a particularly good place to sit and work on your assignment that encouraged you to focus. If you didn’t do so well, write down what stopped you from submitting an assignment that was not to the best of your abilities. Were there other things on your mind? Did you leave it a bit late to get started? Did you get tired of your assignment before you had a chance to go over it properly? Which of these areas can you address to help you do better next time?
Go through your feedback and make a list of those things that went well and areas in which you could improve. Take especial note of those that will be useful for future assignments so that you don’t repeat mistakes. Do you need to pay better attention to referencing? Do you need to articulate arguments more clearly? Is there anything in your feedback you don’t understand? Ask for clarification.
Things it may help you to know
All credit-bearing HSS assignments are double marked. Any discrepancies are discussed, and an agreement arrived at. If markers can’t agree, your assignment will be third marked. The grading is scrutinised by an external examiner who has access to all the assignments submitted on Blackboard. If, after carefully reading the feedback, you still feel your work has been marked unfairly, please speak with your lecturer. Students may appeal their grades but not on grounds of academic judgement. The appeals procedure is outlined on .
As educationalists, we are aware that we can improve the way we give feedback. If you have suggestions on how assignment feedback can be improved, please let your Student Partner know, speak to your lecturer and/or e-mail Michael Weatherburn.