Attending to Student Voice: The Impact of Descriptive Feedback on Learning and Teaching

This article explores the central role that description of experience, on the part of both teacher and students, plays in reflective practice. In particular, it highlights the power of students' description of their own learning as revealed to teachers in dialogue, a process I call descriptive feedback. Descriptive feedback is neither in-the-moment constructivist information gathering nor is it a formalized data gathering process. It is, rather, a reflective conversation between teacher and students wherein students describe their experiences as learners, with the goals of improving learning, deepening trust between teacher and student, and establishing a vibrant, creative community on a daily basis. It is also distinct from student self-assessment because it is, by nature, descriptive rather than evaluative. Authorization of students' voices currently is acknowledged at two ends of a continuum. At one end, constructivist practices foreground students' learning, attending to the sense that learners are making of subject matter as they make it, in the moment. At the other end, formalized research gathers students' perspectives on their experiences in schools as well as engaging students in the process of research itself. The space between these two ends is, I propose, filled by descriptive feedback. This article situates dialogue with students about their experiences as learners within the larger frame of reflective practice. In addition, drawing directly on teachers' accounts, it provides a framework for that dialogue and examines the impact of descriptive feedback on teaching and learning as well as what it demands of teachers and students.