Thursday, November 13, 2014

Reflection on peers and tutor feedback

The role of peer and tutor feedback

Prior to taking this module I haven't had a module that required me to feedback on my peers' work though tutors gave their feedback occasionally on exams scripts and term papers. After taking this module , my perception towards feedback and role it plays changed quite dramatically. Throughout this course we had many chances to give our feedback to our peers on their reader response , essay and their blogposts.

We started out by giving our comments peers 's blogposts which tended be more informal  and personalized. When I had to give my comments it made me pause , think and reflect on what they wrote as I can't comment on something I myself isn't clear about or have doubts. When my peers gave me their comments it was helpful to me in the sense that it gave me different perspectives to certain issues that I have raised in my essays. Sometimes my peers were even kind enough to give me specific comments on  grammar issues which proved to be of great help for me. Throughout  the course  the tutor gave his comments on my blogpost which motivated me to write better the next time I post or submit something. The comments from my peers and the tutor also  helped to improve my writing skills as i started to be more aware of my common mistakes I made such as fragments and subject verb agreement.

Moving on during the course we embarked on reader response and essay which formed the bulk of the course. For the reader response we had to do multiple drafts. Initially I thought having multiple drafts of the same essay was going to be of very little use however i was wrong. By the time I wrote my second draft for reader response I realized the importance of having multiple drafts as I realized that each draft was a much improvised version of the previous ones especially for the first two drafts. Also by the 2nd and the 3rd draft , my tutor emailed us with specific comments on how to improve for the final draft which came in very useful and handy.

Moving on to the essay process , before we started our essay proper we had class time to brainstorm for our essay ideas and come up with thesis ideas.  For the essay we had the privilege of meeting our tutor personally to get comments on how to improve the essay for the third draft. Again tutor feedback proved to be very useful to me as by then I was more interested to know where I went wrong and was eager to improvise it. Many a times , in university we don't not get the luxury of getting individual feedback from the professors or even the teacher assistants simple due to lack of manpower and time. However  for this course , the tutor feedback and my peers feedback proved to be useful for several reasons such as identifying the common errors made and providing an opportunity to rectify them in the future drafts. More that I also felt the feedbacks from my peers added value to my essay or blogposts.  Adding on , apart from the feedback I got for my blogpost , reader response and essays , I also got feedback for essay presentation. Though it was intimidating to present infront of my peers it was a great experience. I also learnt more about presentation from hearing the feedbacks given to me and also to those to who presented . Thus the feedback provided to me by my peers also aided the future presenters on areas to improve and areas to take note.

In the future, I believe that feedbacks I received throughout the course will be of great help for my modules I take in the future for example in terms of the correct way cite in a formal essay. All in all it was a module that  allowed me to improve both my soft and hard skills.





4 comments:

daine said...

Hi Pavi!

I think what you said is quite true and it does indeed improve our writing! I tend to look forward to receiving feedback too cos at least it lets me know where I have gone wrong or right, which is very useful! It's really interesting cos this is the only course that lets us experience such stuff. but yuppp so true! Anyway, I hope this finds you well and good luck for finals!!! :)

purplecarrot said...

Hi Pavi!

I do agree with you that we have to understand what others have written in order to provide constructive feedback.:)

Having to do multiple drafts is also a good practice as we are able to see how our essays have improved. It gives us a sense of satisfaction right?

Lastly, I also agree with you that tutor feedback is very useful. We are able to receive detailed feedback and explanations on how to further improve our essays!

Thank you Pavi :)

Diyanah

Anonymous said...

Hi Pavi!

Indeed, receiving feedback from both our peers and tutor is very useful as we are able to improve on our essays and identify errors which we often overlook. This practice of peer and tutor feedback has also highlighted the benefits of writing drafts in striving towards better quality essays. I hope that we will continue this practice for our future essay assignments.

Thanks for sharing your reflection and all the best for your upcoming examinations!

Adila :)

Brad Blackstone said...

Thanks for this good effort, Pavi. I appreciate your giving a general overview of the various course components, how we did peer feedback on those, and what you benefited from. Your post includes a healthy discussion dedicated to the specified topic, peer feedback.

You have written quite a bit here. The 'test' on whether our course was effective or not might be how well you can transfer the skills learned to other modules. I hope you can do that.

All the best as you continue your learning journey.