Feedback loop influence on teaching and motivation

Abstract

One of the most important tools for teaching and learning in higher education is feedback. Engineering studies at LTH (Faculty of Engineering at Lund University) include the elaboration of reports on laboratory experiments and other tasks on a variety of courses. These serve as assessment for students and the feedback provided by the teachers is supposed to encourage the learning process. To give an opportunity to the students to improve on their work, there might be several iterations on the assessment of a report, and this will lead to what the authors call a ‘feedback loop’. A survey was conducted to inquire 10 teachers and teaching assistants working at LTH on their strategies for handling report feedback, assessment and their opinion on the perspective of students on this subject. In this paper, the possible cause and consequences of the feedback loop on motivation throughout the teaching and learning process were evaluated. The analysis shows that although teachers encourage active learning behaviors, the current feedback loop system might be a hindrance to achieve these.