The Effects of Feedback on Student Learning in a Kindergarten Classroom
Year: 2014

This action research study was conducted in a kindergarten classroom at a public elementary school, and it included 18 students, 10 boys and eight girls. My study examined the effect of feedback on learning by utilizing rubrics and target statements to increase student self motivation and engagement. Data was collected from a preand poststudent feedback form, a rubric, a student observation form, a student discussion form and a teacher reflection journal. The student observation forms and student discussion forms indicated that students displayed a higher level of selfmotivation, engagement in the learning environment and acquisition of the skills necessary to demonstrate proficiency in reading. By using the feedback from rubrics and target statements students were able to do self evaluations and peer assessments that promoted engagement and self motivation. Implications are that providing feedback helps students to become more engaged and self motivated in their learning which in turn improves their ability to acquire the necessary skills.  What ignites a student's self motivation and engagement to drive their own learning? As I observed my students working I noticed they lacked the self motivation and engagement that is necessary to facilitate their own learning. As a kindergarten teacher, I am always looking for ways to help my students understand what my expectations are and how they can be successful and confident learners. I questioned whether incorporating rubrics and target statements would help students gather feedback about their skill acquisition, that in turn would lead them to become self motivated and engaged in their learning. The next question was how to implement them effectively. My project question: What effects will feedback, using the rubric and target statements in the classroom, have on student motivation and engagement, and thus student learning and skill acquisition? "A rubric is a scoring tool used to evaluate the quality of students' constructed responses, such as, written compositions, oral presentations, or science projects" (Popham, 1997 p. 1) Popham goes on to state, "rubrics have three essential features, evaluative criteria, quality definitions, and a scoring strategy"(1997, p.1) The role of rubrics within the classroom according to Goodrich (as cited in Goodrich, 2005) "is an assessment tool that lists the criteria for a piece of work and articulates gradations of quality for each criterion, from excellent to poor" (1997, p. 1) Birky found "with the focus placed on accountability, as a result of No Child Left Behind (2001) assessment has come to the forefront of education" (Birky, 2012, p.19) Brookhart found that "Good assessment yields good information about the results of instruction"(1999, para. 1) She clarifies that if a student is going to participate fully in managing their own learning they must understand what is expected of them and how to demonstrate their mastery of the FEEDBACK ON STUDENT LEARNING 5 skills. She goes further by stating, "Sound assessment and grading practices help teachers improve their own instruction, improve students' motivation, focus students' effort, and increase students' achievement" (1999, ) Brookhart (2013) describes four types of rubrics: analytical, holistic, general and task specific. Analytical rubrics are more effective in a classroom because they evaluate several criterion and indicate the skills demonstrated. The analytical rubric provides relevant information to the teacher of student learning, provides the student with actionable feedback, offers formative assessment and can be adapted for summative assessment. Holistic rubrics are constructed to evaluate all criteria together. These rubrics take less time to create and score but do not provide feedback for students. The holistic rubric is best used for a final grade. General rubrics use criteria and descriptions of performance over a variety of tasks. The general rubric helps to connect assessment with instruction, can be reused, provide the student with a general understanding of how they are doing, and they are easier for students to co create. Task specific rubrics are scored for a specific task and are easy to score. These are single use rubrics and are not designed to be shared with students and are considered highly reliable. Andrade "warns against approaches that limit the effectiveness of rubrics and encourages teachers to take the simple steps toward ensuring the development and use of rubrics that are valid, reliable and fair" (2005 p. 28) Rubrics are a means to communicate expectations, so students do not need to ask, "Why are we doing this?" or "I do not get what to do!" When used, rubrics clearly explain the expectations and skills to be demonstrated. The rubric does not replace quality instruction in the classroom. Teachers need to FEEDBACK ON STUDENT LEARNING 6 develop thoughtful lessons in which they model the skills and allow time for questions. When first introducing rubrics, teachers need to explain the expectations, criteria and the skills their students will need to demonstrate at each level. As students revise their work they need teachers to give feedback and guidance. Students get a clear understanding of the learning objectives when teachers use a rubric and display related samples of student work as examples. Students gain a feeling of confidence that the work is "do able!" Andrade (2005) found "rubrics orient teachers towards their goals. Rubrics help teachers clarify learning goals, design instruction that address those goals, communicate the goals to students, give feedback to students on their progress towards the goals, and judge final products in terms of the degree to which the goals are met" (2005, p. 28) Rubrics provide focused feedback from teachers, students (self evaluation) and peer assessment. "Permanent change in behavior or skill (i.e. learning) can happen much quicker with peer assessment and evaluation by using a rubric" (Birky, 2012 p. 20) There are several articles and websites that can help a teacher begin the process of developing rubrics for their classroom. One method is to co create a rubric with your students. To co create a rubric students need to have prior knowledge about what makes a rubric a useful tool by first experiencing rubrics designed by the teacher. As students begin to understand the purpose of a rubrics' criterion and skill levels, they are able to help create rubrics with their teachers. Reddy and Watanabe Hall Kenyon's (2011) found that students as young as kindergarten benefit by assisting in the development of rubrics. They discovered that students have a better sense of what the essential learning is and how to demonstrate their skill level when they participate in the creation of rubrics. Students are empowered to be FEEDBACK ON STUDENT LEARNING 7 active participants in their learning by using higher levels of questioning, self evaluation, and peer assessment. Andrade notes "that instructional rubrics help give more informative feedback to students and that this feedback is profoundly educative" (2005, p. 20) Formative feedback is an active and intentional feedback process in which the student and the teacher gather evidence with the intention to promote student development (Brookings, 2012) In a study by Watanabe and Hall Kenyon (2011) it was evident that students use feedback to engage in their learning during a writing lesson. "They emphasize that the guided writing context is an appropriate and important venue to encourage, practice and teach writing to young children. More specifically the study suggests that kindergarteners' writing increases in complexity as they participate in guided writing lessons focused on story elements" (2011 p. 78) These findings show, as students are given the opportunity and guidance to write, they begin to write more by connecting their thinking to the text written. Watanabe Hall Kenyon acknowledged, "the use of oral, written and graphic types of text in each writing sample provide a more accurate representation of the student authors' thinking"(2011, p. 278) Revision is an expectation of all writers beginning in kindergarten. Chase Fink (2012) note that one teacher's desire to help her kindergarten students with the revision process led her to incorporate their inherent artistic ability to draw for understanding, making this integral to her lesson. She also noted, "how important the development of a few essential practices was for determining what "best work" means and how it might be achieved with children so young." The teacher in the study noted, "the students who were FEEDBACK ON STUDENT LEARNING 8 dependent on adults took fewer risks, but students that took risks and experimented with new ideas made more progress"(2012, p. 166) The writings of Gullatt, Stevenson and Deasy (as cited in Chase Fink, 2012) noted that by integrating the arts students are more confident to take risks. They stated that incorporating the arts promotes creative thinking, problem solving, focus and persistence, which foster participation and engagement in learning. According to the study by Chase and Fink (2012 p. 167 170) there were five essential instructional practices that contributed to the success and growth of each child and laid the foundation for their later comfort and facility with revision in their work, particularly writing. These practices include: 1. Co developing rubrics 2. Collaborating and sharing what they know 3. Conducting collaborative critiques 4. Looking, noticing, and describing 5. Tools of the trade: providing models, technical assistance and tools My project was conducted in my kindergarten classroom made up of 18 students, 10 boys and eight girls. The project took place during our 90 minute literacy block each morning. My students are strong high average to low average students, but they seemed to be missin