Feedback seeking and student reflective feedback literacy: a sociocultural discourse analysis

Abstract

<p>A significant and somewhat under-exploited aspect of feedback literacy research lies in students’ feedback-seeking behaviors. This research charts progress in oral feedback seeking by means of a three-year longitudinal inquiry focused on the feedback literacy development of an undergraduate co-author. The study is framed through sociocultural learning theories and the notion of feedback encounters to illustrate how social and relational feedback interactions encourage meaning-making and feedback uptake. Data comprise the student’s reflective journal of feedback experiences; regular documented interactions between the two co-researchers; digitally recorded and transcribed feedback encounters over four consecutive semesters; and teacher feedback on completed assignments. Sociocultural discourse analysis is deployed to uncover how the student and her teachers used talk to co-construct shared thinking about assignment work-in-progress. Features of the selected feedback encounters include interthinking and the interweaving of cumulative and exploratory talk. Reflecting on feedback-seeking experiences over time stimulated student feedback literacy development through progress in preparing for, participating in, following up, and working with emotions in feedback encounters. Originality and significance lie in drawing conceptual linkages between feedback seeking, reflection, and the development of student feedback literacy and in exemplifying innovative ways of conducting feedback research on the student experience of feedback. We introduce the concept of student reflective feedback literacy to represent considered analysis of feedback evidence and experiences informing ongoing efforts to seek, make sense of, and use feedback. Incorporating within the curriculum sustained opportunities for student reflections about feedback carries the potential to develop student feedback literacy and merits further investigation.<br></p>