Engaging, motivating, and supporting students through feedback

Progress guides encourage students to persist in learning by connecting where they are now with what’s next.

Learning takes time and effort, and real progress requires us to engage, motivate, and support learners as they improve. Much of our students’ work represents a first attempt at describing, explaining, and applying ideas about a topic. For some, the process of making a first attempt and then trying and trying again is seemingly effortless. It is easy to wish that all students would effortlessly engage and require less hand-holding and coaching. But in fairness, few of us teachers were the imaginary “self-motivated” students we wish we had. With a little introspection, we too can remember times we felt disengaged, unmotivated, and unable to make progress at school.

The way we assess learning likely contributes to this disengagement. The plethora of tests, quizzes, and homework that dominates education can feel separate and disconnected from actual learning. Too often, these assessment tools and procedures are not accompanied by any positive, useful, just-in-time feedback that allows the learner to improve before it’s too late. Why would anyone try revising a response when the grade is in the grade book and everyone else is moving on?