Maximizing the Transformative Power of Feedback for Teacher Candidates

Hillary Gamblin:

My name’s Hillary Gamblin. I am a GoReact employee and the host of the Teacher Education Podcast. And today I’ll be talking with Dr. Marti Elford. Marti, do you want to introduce yourself?

Dr. Marti Elford:

Sure. My name’s Marti Elford and I’ve recently retired from the University of Kansas, Department of Special Education. I’m currently working at Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville. I’m the co-founder of Vector Virtual Coaching, an organization that provides coaching to teachers, coaches, and school administrators. And I’ve recently published a book with my friends and colleagues, Heather Smith, and Susanne James, and the book is called, GET Feedback: Giving, Exhibiting, and Teaching Feedback in Special Education Teacher Preparation. And Dr. John Hattie, as you know, is the foremost researcher in what is effective in education and his meta-analysis has changed how educators think about where to focus our attention. Specifically, his research on feedback has established a framework for how we understand the levels of feedback and the questions that feedback answers. And so we are quite humbled to have him write the forward for our book.

Hillary Gamblin:

And you have a little quote there from him. That’s fantastic. We are actually putting a link in the chat box too. So if you guys are interested in the book, I was able to read the first few chapters and it was fantastic, so check it out. Thank you for joining us. I’m a bit of a feedback enthusiast. That’s why I was so excited to read those chapters. So I’m really just excited to discuss this topic with you, but before we dig in, let’s discuss how we structure this virtual event. So for the first 30 minutes or so, I’m going to discuss with Marti how to bring about behavior changing feedback for teacher candidates. And then after interviewing her, we’ll do a 15 minute live Q&A session.

So if you’d like to submit a question for the Q&A there is a tab just below the video feed. And if you see a question someone else asked and you think it’s a great question and want to be asked as well, there is a handy up vote feature, so you can vote for questions. And then don’t forget the chat feature which is on the right hand side of the video feed. This is where the party happens. This is where everybody exchanges information, shares resources, a lot happens there so don’t miss out.

And then actually right below that, ask a question, is a polling feature. So we’d like to start off today is workshop with a quick poll and to get to know everybody a little bit better. The question is, on average, how many of your teacher candidates listen to your feedback and make appropriate changes? So we have a couple of different percentages there. If you could just make a guesstimate and we will see what our audience says. I’ll give you a minute to do that.

Okay. It sounds like the results are about 50% or higher which is fantastic. That means that’s a really great place to start. The hope is that by the end of this workshop, that we’ll provide you with tools, models, and tips for feedback that can ultimately help increase that percentage even higher than you just answered. So that’s a lot to take on in less than an hour so let’s jump right in. Marti, you just talked about how you co-authored a book on feedback and actually when I read it, inspired today’s polling question because in the first chapter you describe this very real frustration of professors reading their course evaluations and their teacher candidates are asking for more feedback. And of course, the professors are thinking to themselves of all the hours and hours and hours they spent giving that feedback.

So obviously there is a disconnect sometimes. Students don’t always feel like they’re getting adequate feedback and professors feel like they’re getting plenty of feedback. So on the book, you and your colleagues look at how there’s this disconnect and why. And you start to think that maybe what is the cause of this is that you’re failing to tailor feedback enough to the recipient. For example, you propose that maybe teacher prep professionals are used to working with K through 12 students, and they’re using that same method and techniques for feedback with their student teachers, but that doesn’t really fit because student teachers are adult learners. Can you explain how adult and K through 12 learners differ and how the difference is substantial enough that teacher prep professionals need to change their approach to feedback?

Dr. Marti Elford:

Well, there are a lot of differences between K-12 and adult learners, but probably the most significant is in the motivation to learn. K-12 learners are designed to learn because their brains are still developing and neural pathways are being constructed. They’re more motivated to learn because of the interest and the curiosity about what’s going on around them. There’s also external motivation that comes from the adults that are important to them, teachers, parents. When an adult shows genuine care for a K-12 learner, that learner will be more motivated to learn whatever topic or skill the adult presents or proposes.

Adult learners have already have a wealth of prior knowledge and prior experience that they bring into learning situations. And they’re more motivated by whether there’s a personal payoff for what they’re learning and what kind of intrinsic value that learning has. So I would say that motivation is probably the biggest difference, but as you see what Brookhart says, the effect of feedback depends, whether it’s K-12 or adult learners, it depends on the nature of that feedback. And William states that, “Feedback is only successful if students use it to improve their performance.” So feedback only works if the person getting the feedback does something with it.

Hillary Gamblin:

So in your book you wanted to provide a framework for teacher prep professionals that connects feedback, the latest and greatest scholarship with giving feedback with adult learning theory. What parts of the adult learning theory did you decide to focus on and why?

Dr. Marti Elford:

Well, most higher ed faculty have a working knowledge of Knowles’ principles of andragogy. And these principles are listed on the slide, learners need to know, the self concept of the learner, prior experience of the learner, learner’s readiness to know or readiness to learn, the orientation to learning, and the motivation to learn. And when we were digging deeply into adult learning theory and how it might play a role in the way our feedback was received, we discovered that each one of these principles influenced whether the feedback we were giving was falling on deaf ears or whether it was constructed, our feedback was constructed in a way that could actually benefit and be used by our adult students. And so I can’t say that there’s any one element or principle of adult learning theory that we could fair it out to be the most important. They’re all important.

Hillary Gamblin:

I was actually going to ask you. I’m like, I should have asked you, what was the most important one, but you answered that. Sounds like they’re all important, equally important. To help contextualize this point in the book you shared this personal experience that opened your eyes to the difference of giving feedback to teacher candidates versus K through 12 students. Can you share that all aha moments?

Dr. Marti Elford:

Well, a story I always tell about this awakening it’s described in chapter one of GET Feedback. It was my first semester teaching online in the master’s program at KU. And I had designed this course purposefully with scaffolded assignments of, I wanted the students to do a little bit, hear from me, do a little bit more. The students who were all teachers working on their master’s degree would get feedback each week and they were expected to revise and resubmit the assignment with the incorporated feedback in the next section. So in my mind, these adult learners would take this brilliant feedback that I was giving, they’d learn from it, and then each segment of the assignment would just get better and better.

Well, I had one student who was not making any changes at all or any improvement based on my feedback. Her grades on the assignments kept dropping and my frustration kept building. Why was the student ignoring my feedback? I just didn’t get it. So in the final week of class, I received a frantic phone call from the student about her grade, could we meet? What can she do? And I said, I agreed to meet with her to go over the feedback and what she might be able to do at this late date to actually pass the class. So this is before Zoom, before document sharing. So we were meeting on Skype. I could see her face, she could see mine, I told her to print out every segment of the document from the first week all the way to the last one and set them in order and I had my copies. And so I asked her to open the first submission and read the feedback to me from the very first page of the assignment.

So her face squinted at the screen and she said, “Well, I see some words highlighted and these little dots that go out past the margin.” And I asked her to read me what was in the box beyond the margin. So her face squinted at this computer screen, and she was really trying to do what I asked. According to Knowles, she was clearly ready to learn and she needed know this, and she was motivated to learn, but the student had no prior experience. So when I explained to her how to turn on the review feature in Microsoft Word, and she saw the list of comments in the margin, there was this look of shock on her face that she couldn’t hide.

Obviously, I had not taken into consideration that important principle of adult learning theory, prior experience of the learner, because this student’s lack of experience with technology was preventing her from actually receiving the feedback that I was giving. I had laboriously and systematically delivered all this feedback and she didn’t get any of it. Now, this happened years before we conceptualized the intersection of adult learning and feedback that we address in the book. But it’s an experience that is fundamental to the premise of the book. Feedback is ineffective, if it does not fit the recipient.

Hillary Gamblin:

Perfect. And we’ve talked about these six principles a little bit of adult learning theory. And in the book, you combine them into a model with the most, like I said, cutting edge scholarship about giving students feedback. We actually have a slide with that. It’s like a little medallion, but it’s a model there. And the model has intricacies that we don’t have enough time to discuss today because there’s a whole book on it, right? So it is pretty intricate, but our audience can start generally using this as a reference. And so you can see at the center of the model that you’ve put the six principles for adult learning around it if

you concluded the best scholarship on feedback. After reviewing all the scholarship on feedback, can you share with us probably the most important tips for teacher prep professional to keep in mind when they’re giving feedback to their teacher candidates?

Dr. Marti Elford:

Well, as we were doing all of our research, one thing that we noticed is that although feedback is highly regarded and it’s expected in all of the requirements for teacher preparation, there was really no agreed upon definition of feedback. And so I’d like to start by stating how we define feedback. Feedback is any information the recipient receives that informs or restructures their thinking or beliefs related it to their performance, knowledge or skill. And so succinctly put, feedback should produce a change or transform the learner. We can only expect our feedback to produce change if it’s tailored to meet the needs of the recipient. So as teacher preparation faculty, we will be more effective when we place the adult learner at the center of the feedback just like in the diagram, in order to support their continuous development as teacher candidates.

And as you can see from that framework, the adults at the center, and it’s surrounded by the characteristics questions and the levels of feedback that are widely accepted in the literature. And then beyond that, we’ve constructed four domains, the outer circle, which is the framework for intersecting adult learning theory and feedback in a way that teacher prep professionals can use when they’re giving exhibiting and teaching feedback to teacher candidates. Probably the most important thing that teacher prep faculty can do is to remember that feedback in teacher preparation should be explicitly taught, consistently modeled, and frequently reinforced.

Hillary Gamblin:

Fantastic. And I actually didn’t think about this, but what I love about your definition is, with feedback we usually think of it as an action that we do on our part, we never think of it having to be connected to the action to the student, right? In order for feedback to actually take place, it’s more than just our effort. It has to be the changing of the behavior of the student as well. That’s fantastic. I love that definition. Now for your research model, you put together a lesson plan that sets up teacher prep professionals for success when you’re giving feedback for internships or field experiences. Can you share that with us? I know quite a few of our audience members would probably love to see what you’ve come up with.

Dr. Marti Elford:

So this is a lesson plan flow chart that we use in our video assessment which is GoReact, of course. And so this assignment was created with multiple feedback opportunities. The teacher candidate get every place you see a star there, that’s where we provide feedback. So the teacher candidate gets feedback on their written lesson plan before they teach it. And at Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville, we currently teach and where I currently teach, we have a Virtual Professional Practice Lab, a simulation situation where teacher candidates can use that simulation software to teach avatar students as a way of practicing their teaching. So in the VPP Lab, we can give immediate feedback to the teacher candidates during their session.

However, what we found is that when they watch their own teaching in GoReact, it doubles the power of the feedback we give. And then in the journal assignment, the student has the opportunity to

reflect on the whole process so far and construct meaning from all the feedback that they’ve experienced. And so we use this feedback from the lesson plan and their teaching and their journal assignment to actually have a Zoom conversation with them about the goal that they want to set to change either the focus that they want to work on in the rest of the course or what they want to work on professionally as a teacher and what they need to do to improve their own teaching. And so clearly through this process, it’s a co-construction between teacher prep faculty and the teacher candidates. And that’s part of what’s so powerful about feedback.

Hillary Gamblin:

In the lesson flow plan you actually specifically look, and you can see the GoReact logo and you mentioned that as using that for your video assessment software, why did you choose to use GoReact?

Dr. Marti Elford:

I’m so happy you asked me that question. We started out with a different software platform and we were happy with it for a period of time. And then I had a chance to go to Finland on a Fulbright and part of my work over there was to work with their teacher prep faculty to figure out how to do remote supervision. And so I had time to investigate a variety of video software for teacher preparation. And when I put them all to the test, GoReact exceeded my expectations. One of the things that I like the most about GoReact is I can have a conversation with the student. The student can make a comment and then I can piggyback or make a comment based on that comment. And so it’s little like a chat thread. So that’s one of the things I really like.

The markers, the tags, are brilliant because we as teacher prep faculty can set up what it is we want the student to look for. Based on their lesson plan, we’re really heavy into explicit instruction right now at SIUE. And so most of our markers are related to the things we expect to see in explicit teaching. And so the students can watch their video and go, “Oh, yeah, that’s where I explained it explicitly. That’s where I gave my advance organizer.” And then they can comment about that or they can say, “Oops, I missed that.”

And then we had a chance to make our own comments about what we see, and we can also respond to their comments. And it’s affordable, it’s easy to use it, and the other thing that really tipped the scales for me when I was trying to sell it to the KU School of Ed, is that the help features and the videos and how explicitly it’s explained, I don’t have to troubleshoot for the students. The students can just go to the help desk and if they can read, they can figure out how to solve the problem on their own. And if they can’t, all they have to do is type in the chat and somebody will get back to them.

We would be here all day if you asked me to sing the praises of GoReact because GoReact allows both the instructor and the teacher candidate to look at the same teaching video. Peter Parker calls that… No, Palmer Parker calls that the third thing, you’re both looking at the same thing. And so it’s not me sitting at the back of the classroom writing copious notes, it’s both of us looking at that teaching and having a conversation about what we see, what went well, what matches, what they said they were going to do in the lesson plan and where there are discrepancies and then the things that they need to work on to improve. So GoReact is absolutely perfect for providing the feedback that we describe in our book and that I believe works.

Hillary Gamblin:

Well. Yeah. Your definition of feedback like we were pointing out it takes to, right? And if you are having a conversation, you’re that much closer to changing behavior, right? You’re at least there at least engaging with you and realizing and seeing the points that you’re making and you can work together on that. That makes a lot of sense.

Dr. Marti Elford:

Well, and it gives the teacher candidate an opportunity to… After they get over all the negative that they might say about their teaching, we really try and drive them toward what worked. And don’t get rid of that because you want to keep doing what’s working. Pick one or two things that didn’t work and let’s talk about what you can do differently next time based on the research, the evidence based practices, that we know work in education. And then at SIUE they can actually go back into the VPP Lab and practice and then they just upload it to GoReact and say, look, look, I did better this time.

Hillary Gamblin:

I love that. Now I know when we do Q&A we’re probably going to get a lot of questions that are going to dig into this a little bit more, but our audience may not be able to implement everything that you shared today. But if there’s one thing that you would encourage those listening to start doing with their feedback, what would it be?

Dr. Marti Elford:

Well, I think just like with good unit planning or course planning, you begin with the end in mind. Even for feedback, we should know the purpose of the feedback and who’s going to hear it. And so there are some questions that can aid all of us in starting to deliver feedback that’s learner centered. What do I hope this feedback will achieve? Do I have enough information to provide feedback? Clearly with the story I told you, I didn’t have enough, right? And do I know the recipient well enough to tailor the feedback?

And so that’s where I would start. And that’s where I start when I’m thinking about how am I going to structure this course or this lesson with feedback in mind. And when universities were established, the intent was for scholars to impart their knowledge to novices. In this model, the feedback was all instructor driven like you said earlier, but in Scott’s recent study instructors across a variety of disciplines report the feedback that they deliver is not read or acted upon. And it’s frustrating for instructors to spend all that time giving feedback when it produces no change. And so we’re hoping that by putting the recipient at the center of feedback, that feedback will be transformative.

Hillary Gamblin:

Fantastic. Thank you for answering all of my questions. And like I said, I’m sure all these resources and ideas have sparked ideas among those that are watching live right now for today’s workshop. So we’re going to take the next 10 or 15 minutes to do a live Q&A. If you’d like to submit a question for the Q&A, it’s not too late, there’s a tab just below the video feed. So you can do that. My colleague has been monitoring your questions and has selected a few that we can ask Marti. Okay. The first one is, is there research that supports verbal reinforcement of the written feedback?

Dr. Marti Elford:

Verbal reinforcement of the written feedback. Michael Kennedy has done some work around verbal reinforcement or verbal feedback over written feedback. He published an article, I think in 2020 about using interviews with students where he would sit within them and go through his written feedback, let them ask questions and give follow-up. So that’s the only research that I can think of right off the top of my head.

Hillary Gamblin:

That’s amazing that you can think of that right off the top of your head. I’m really impressed. You even knew the date of when it was published or roundabout. That’s fantastic. Our second question is, do you ask students to demonstrate a specific practice or skill in the lesson that they plan and upload to receive feedback or can they choose anything?

Dr. Marti Elford:

We do construct the assignment in such a way that we have expectations for the student. And this is the beauty of that lesson plan flow chart for one thing and the way you can do things in GoReact for another. What we do is we say, we want you to teach a 10 minute lesson and we might give them a topic, math or reading, some kind of strategy. And then we want them to do it explicitly. We ask them to start with an advanced organizer and then describe the strategy and then model it and then give the students a chance to apply the strategy. So it’s the typical I do, We do, You do model of explicit instruction. However, I’ve done a little bit of research where I’ve asked teachers to come into the simulation lab and practice their feedback. And so we would tally the types and frequency of feedback. So you can design it either way. That’s the elegance of beginning with the end in mind.

Hillary Gamblin:

Well, and it sounds like in the plan that you showed, it sounds like the student does choose at some point when they review that, they choose like I can see that I’m not doing very well at this, I’ll focus on this. Is that normally how it goes? It’s not you telling them what to focus on?

Dr. Marti Elford:

Yeah. I might guide them. I might use guiding questions to get them to think about what I’m seeing, but generally we let them choose on their own. Now, obviously, if we’ve asked them to be very explicit in their lesson planning and delivery, and they say, “That just wasn’t comfortable for me. I’m more of a spontaneous person. I think I’ll just wing it next time.” We’re going to guide them away from that kind of a goal and try and help them realize that good planning will help make them a better teacher, but they do. They do get to set the goal because as we said, motivation is a big part of it and prior experience of the learner. Nobody is motivated by somebody else’s goal. That’s just not how it works. And so if they’re invested in their own learning, then it’s going to produce better results. It’s going to be more transformative.

Hillary Gamblin:

That makes complete sense. Our next question says, does Dr. Elford provide professional development on feedback for teacher practicum programs?

Dr. Marti Elford:

Yes, I do. And you may contact me. I would love to work with any program that’s really interested in digging deep into this. We learned so much, and we’re excited to be able to share that.

Hillary Gamblin:

Did you share your email information in the slides or anything like that? Do you want to say it right now so they can contact you.

Dr. Marti Elford:

I’ll stick it in a chat if that’s-

Hillary Gamblin:

Okay. We will take that and then put it in your guys’ chat so you can contact her directly. Our next question says, hi, Marti, do you ever get pushback from teacher candidates who get defensive from feedback? What are some of the suggestions to approach this?

Dr. Marti Elford:

Yes. I do. I mentioned that I’m a co-founder of Vector Virtual Coaching and my work as a coach over a number of years taught me that being a good listener and coming from a stance of partnership, if someone is defensive, then the first thing that I do is check my own stance. Was I too directive? Was I too… Did I not know my recipient well enough. Where is this coming from? That’s where I go first in my thinking, and then I’ll try something like, clearly you see this differently, can you tell me a little bit more about what you’d like to hear from me so that it forces or encourages the recipient to really think about what’s going on? Why is this feedback hard to hear? Is it really not the right feedback? And do I need to learn? Am I willing to accept feedback myself? So Edgar Schein has written a book called, Humble Inquiry, and it really influenced my thinking related those kinds of pushback situations, always asking gentle questions to find out more because usually it’s just a misunderstanding.

Hillary Gamblin:

Is that normally what you find as the cause like the root cause is misunderstanding?

Dr. Marti Elford:

Usually, or improper assumptions like in my example, I just assumed the student was ignoring my feedback. And so I waited too long to dig deeper into that. When I didn’t see any response, the first go round, I should have asked for a meeting with a student. That would’ve saved both of us weeks of angst, but generally yes, it’s a misunderstanding. Occasionally, it’s a difference in philosophy. That is a bigger obstacle to overcome. However, when it comes to feedback, if you’re both interested in the same goal, then generally those obstacles can be overcomed.

Hillary Gamblin:

Great. Our next question is, do you provide any in the moment feedback while your candidates are teaching or does the feedback always follow the lesson enactment?

Dr. Marti Elford:

We can. Right now in the structure that we have, we don’t provide in the moment feedback. I have done that. And if you are familiar with Scheeler or Rock’s work on bug-in-ear feedback, that is the picture of successful immediate feedback where the teacher candidate wears a device, a hearing device, and they’re coached in the moment, but in the VPP Lab at SIUE we have the opportunity to just step in and say, okay, not quite. Let’s try that again. And it’s a fresh start. They can start from right where they are or they can back up and start at the beginning. So we have that option depending on the way we’ve designed the experience for the student and the purpose of that experience.

Hillary Gamblin:

Do you use that earlier on when they’re beginning to learn how to teach, is that more effective?

Dr. Marti Elford:

I think that’s a really great question. And so the purpose of the feedback is really important. So when teacher candidates are new at teaching and you’re wanting them to remember all the steps, remember to state your objectives. And if they greet the students and then just hop in with their demonstration, that would be a good time to step in and say, okay, that was great. The way you greeted the students, you affirmed their presence and showed them that glad that they’re here, take a look at your lesson plan and tell me what’s your very next step. And then they could go, oh, man, I forgot to state the objective. Okay. Good. Let’s back up, start again. And you do that once or twice, and they won’t ever forget their objective.

Hillary Gamblin:

That makes sense. I’m even thinking of when I try to practice something if I’m presenting something, I usually interrupt to myself like four or five times at the very beginning, say, okay, need to get those. And then I can go through and actually see the whole thing and start thinking about feedback after the fact.

Dr. Marti Elford:

Well, and that’s really important, Hillary, and that’s one of the beauties of video because everybody needs a coach. If you don’t believe that, listen to Atul Gawande’s TED Talk because we all need an external set of eyes and ears looking in on what we do and giving us suggestions. Well, COVID made that a little hard, but we’ve got GoReact. So I can film myself and watch and ask someone else to watch me and then ask for feedback.

Hillary Gamblin:

I also love the image of students teaching with a little ear piece, reminds me of like that’s a trope in a romantic comedies and never thought of it being used in teacher education. Our next question is, how does a university instructor account for teachers differentiation in the classroom as described in the IEPs of their students, special needs students?

Dr. Marti Elford:

Would you read that question for me one more time, Hillary, please?

Hillary Gamblin:

Yes. How does a university instructor account for a teacher’s differentiation in the classroom as described in the IEPs of their students, say special needs students?

Dr. Marti Elford:

Okay. I think what this is asking is how do we in higher education develop courses and curriculum for our teacher candidates that will allow them to differentiate for students who require IEPs. And thanks for the question because my colleagues and I are strong believers in universal design for learning and learning strategies that support all students. And so with our teacher candidates, we ask them to start with the objectives. What are the… Not the objectives, the standards. What do the standards say? Those students, even students who have IEPs, what should they be able to do? And then we look closely at that IEP and say, what accommodations and modifications are required for this student to be successful.

And the principles of good teaching supersede the differentiation that any student would need, because what works well for students who have IEPs works well for all students. If I understand the question, the idea I’m getting from it is how can we plan instruction in our courses that will manage all these differences. And my resource for that and our resource in our MAT program at SIUE is universal design for learning. And then the well researched evidence based strategies that come out of higher leverage practices and the KUCRL, the Center for Research on Learning.

Hillary Gamblin:

Fantastic. And then our last question is, how many times should we comment back on the GoReact video and keep the conversation going? So how long does the chat get?

Dr. Marti Elford:

Yeah. There’s a finite amount of time, right? I used to believe I got 36 hours in a day and everybody else got 24, but that’s not really true. I only have 24 hours and I have X number of students. And so that’s why well placed, well constructed recipient focused feedback can really knock it out of the park so you don’t have to have that ongoing conversation. If the student is really focusing on something that’s troubling them, then you have that feedback home so that it really hits the mark. And then you hold onto that nugget so that when you meet with them personally, you can go a little bit deeper and find out what’s going on. But for me, I pick three or four salient comments that the students have made to focus on. And then if they respond back to me, then I’ll try and bring that up in class in a general way. Or if it’s something that’s really troubling them, I might send an email and see if we need to meet.

Hillary Gamblin:

I actually had a last minute question come in. And I’m trying to decide if we have time for it. If you’re in our audience, please bear with us. I think I’m going to ask it. This person said that they’d like to ask about teacher candidates who themselves have special needs, and they’re asking how to apply UDL for those teacher candidates with needs.

Dr. Marti Elford:

Well, I think the first thing is getting back to knowing your recipient. What does that teacher candidate, what do they really need? Do they need more time? Do they need help organizing or structuring? Is it a processing issue where they need things broken down into smaller chunks? Do they need a buddy that will keep them accountable? So knowing your recipient and if they filed with the university that they need accommodations and modifications, obviously you are required to meet those. But when you think about Universal Design for Learning, it’s the different ways that we have opportunity to present the information, the different ways that students can experience it.

And so creating a variety of opportunities in your courses for all students to interact with the information in a variety of ways, and then focusing on what that particular student really needs, I think that’ll get you closer to serving the student who’s a teacher candidate. If they want to be a teacher and understand the struggle that students have, they’re going to be a great teacher. They may need supports all along the way, but it’s as much about the heart as it is about the head when it comes to being an educator.

Hillary Gamblin:

Well, I’m happy to say that we were able to answer everybody’s questions, at least from where I’m sitting. And so we appreciate everybody that took the time to submit your questions. Your questions are what make this workshop an invaluable resource, this real time conversation that we’re having. And now before we end, I always like to ask our guests just three quick takeaways. If you could give our audience three takeaways when it comes to giving behavior changing feedback for teacher candidates, what would it be? What are the three bullet points?

Dr. Marti Elford:

Make sure that both you and your teacher candidate know the purpose of the feedback, and then customize the feedback to the recipient, try and get to know those students really well. And then feedback that allows teacher candidates to construct new meaning about what they’re learning or the skill they’re practicing is feedback that will actually transform their behaviors.

Hillary Gamblin:

Perfect. Marti, thank you so much for sharing your experience and expertise with us today. You did this workshop voluntarily, so we appreciate taking your personal time to be with us. Also, thank you to everybody that joined us live. To show our appreciation, we randomly selected one participant that joined us live today to win a pair of AirPod Pros. I love my AirPod Pros, so I’m so happy for this person. So congratulations to Stacy Price. Stacy Price, you won AirPod Pros. We always do these join us live for our workshops. So if you want a chance to win them next time, join us. We will be reaching out to you Stacy and getting the information so we can get those to you.

We know that this workshop will be particularly valuable to all of our participants who joined us live or maybe ready to be watching this later. So we will be sending an email with a link of today’s recording from the workshop as well as the slide deck that Marti used. So watch for that in your inbox, but that is it for today. So thank you to those who are participating. Thank you to those who are working behind the scenes. And of course, thank you to our guest, Dr. Marti Elford. We will see you next time.

Dr. Marti Elford:

Thank you, Hillary.