Over the course of my tenure as a writing instructor, one of the most challenging aspects of my job has primarily been the delivery of feedback. It has been my experience that the most powerful feedback always occurs in a conferencing situation in which I engage in dialogue with students about their work. However, conferencing can be extremely time-consuming, and my class sizes are simply too big for each student to get adequate conferencing time. I have attempted to schedule conferences outside of class hours, but since I am working with high school students whose schedules directly before and after school are normally booked solid with school-related activities, trying to do such conferencing has proved a daunting task.
I suppose that's why I've primarily stuck with the standard means of feedback, written comments. Still, the fact that I've stuck with written commentary and feedback seems strange to me at this point. Why have I not ventured far beyond standard written commentary even though I know it has clear limitations and does not always yielded the results I desire for my student writers? As I reflect on this question, here are some of the reasons my own reluctance to change strikes me as odd.
1. It is no secret that my handwriting, when hurried, looks much like that of a disoriented toddler. In a traditional writing classroom where physical copies of writing are submitted and returned, students sometimes likely feel as though they should receive bonus points for deciphering my comments scrawled into the margins. This fact translates into feedback that is illegible, confusing, and often ignored. John Killoran, in "Reel-to-Reel Tapes, Cassettes, and Digital Audio Media: Reverberations from a Half-Century of Recorded-Audio Response to Student Writing," expresses a similar sentiment. In the article, referencing his research on teacher use of audio rather than written feedback, Killoran notes, "Several [instructors] reported that students found written comments to be illegible, incomprehensible, insensitive, or too terse to be helpful. Some reported that students often did not even read their written comments. Indeed, it was frustration with written response that prompted some, including me, to experiment with recorded-audio response." Additionally, while echoing my own feelings about the illegibility and confusing nature of my written commentary, Killoran's statement also hints at another obvious problem I should have recognized with written feedback.
2. I'm quite aware that written feedback is grossly limited in its ability to convey nuance and tone. It is impossible, in written form, to instill feeling into commentary; as a result, I've often had students give too much or too little weight to a comment, feel insulted by a comment that was intended as encouragement, or perceive my feedback as directive when it was intended to probe and question. In "When I Stopped Writing on Their Papers: Accomodating the Needs of Student Writers With Audio Comments," Sara Bauer brings up this very point. Bauer quotes audio-feedback advocate Adam Cavanaugh who says, "Text- based comments often ‘sound’ terse when read by students; with audio comments, the instructor can qualify his/her language, adjust volume, use pregnant pauses, etc. in offering the student feedback on concerns in a paper. These dynamics help to communicate the problems in a student’s writing with care and empathy." As a person who works hard to establish a culture of trust and solid working relationships with all students, it is troubling when my own commentary, because of its imprecise conveyance of tone and feeling, undermines the very culture I want to create. Audio feedback seems, as Bauer and Cavanaugh suggest, to offer a much more quality platform for creating this culture of care and empathy in the feedback I offer students.
3. I know written feedback tends to keep my commentary at a level that mainly addresses only the specific issues of editing (grammar, spelling, punctuation, etc.). While those are certainly issues that need to be addressed, the exclusive use of only written feedback seems somewhat ill-suited for addressing more advanced aspects of writing. In relation to this, Killoran, speaking of teachers who had adopted audio feedback as practice, says that "Some characterized audio recording as less conducive than writing to comments on small-scale issues such as grammar and spelling, but more conducive to comments on large-scale issues such as development and organization." Additionally, he goes on to say that they generally "perceived recorded-audio response, in comparison with written response, to exemplify principles of good communication and good composition pedagogy: to be clearer, better developed, more specific, more detailed, more explanatory, and less directive." Killoran's findings line up with my own practical experience as I just last week walked with a student through a question of organization in an essay. This particular student needed some pretty significant organizational direction and instruction, which demanded a detailed discussion related to purpose, audience, and medium of transfer, among other details. Looking back on the oral guidance I provided the student, I cannot fathom how I might have even approached packing all that I said into the margins of an essay. Audio feedback seems a much better way to approach issues that one would classify as true issues of revision rather than simple matters of editing.
When I consider the objectives and aims I have as a writing teacher, audio feedback seems to make so much sense. As I said earlier, having read up more on this approach, one that Killoran makes clear is not some new idea, it seems odd that I've "arrived to the party" so late. I am excited to take this approach and build it into my courses for next fall.
Works Cited
Bauer, Sara. "When I Stopped Writing on Their Papers: Accommodating the Needs of Student Writers With Audio Comments." English Journal 101.2 (2011): 64-67. Web. 10 April 2013.
Killoran, John B. "Reel-to-Reel Tapes, Cassettes, and Digital Audio Media: Reverberations from a Half-Century of Recorded-Audio Response to Student Writing." Computers and Composition 30 (2013): 37-49. Web. 10 April 2013.
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