SEQTA functionality

What is continuous reporting?

Continuous reporting or progressive/ongoing feedback refers to the process of teachers providing timely and targeted feedback to students about their learning progress in a subject. This is done through an online system and the feedback and assessment information is then made visible to students to parents.

Schools that move to this type of reporting will usually stop providing individual student subject comments on semester reports.

Why move to a continuous reporting model?

The main benefit of this model is that students and parents receive feedback in a ‘timely’ manner about how the child is progressing. End of semester reports are often seen as too little, too late, with not enough targeted feedback and time for the student to improve their learning.

Many schools are now trading off the traditional teacher report comments and instead providing timely and targeted task/assessment feedback throughout the year through SEQTA, thereby reporting student achievement. This enables teachers to provide limitless feedback either written, audio or video, along with the assessment rubric with the option to upload annotated student work directly to students and parents.

Another attraction for many schools is the traditional teacher rush to get reports written and proofed at the end of a semester is removed. However, many schools are keeping their pastoral form which provides information on the child’s engagement within a class and school community.

The move to a continuous online feedback model also enables a school to examine the quality of the feedback that teachers are providing to students. John Hattie’s (2012) research on feedback highlights the significant variability in teacher feedback.

Feedback Tools in SEQTA

There are a range of feedback tools available within the system that support the feedback process. These include:

  • Student expectations: students can assess the quality of their own work and predict their performance. “Educating students to have high challenging appropriate expectations is among the most powerful influence in enhancing student achievement.” (Hattie, 2012)
  • Rubrics: provide clarity and shows students what success looks like.
  • Feedback: “Collectively the research defines feedback as information for the learner and teacher about the learner’s performance, about their performance relative to learning goals, based on evidence of learning, from the teacher, the student or peers, leading to changes in teacher and student behaviour (AITSL 2017, pg 5)
  • Separating teacher feedback from the mark or grade: Ruth Butler (1988) found that giving grades and comments together didn’t provide the most value to learners. She found that students were intrinsically drawn to their grade, focusing solely on the number/letter while bypassing the more meaningful comments that supported it. Research from Black and Wiliam (1998) supports Butler’s findings, the duo concluding that “the giving of marks, or grades, has a negative effect in that pupils ignore comments when marks are also given.” Click to learn more: Why withholding marks can help your students thrive.
  • Formative Feedback: Teachers can choose to provide formative feedback during lesson/s or a series of lessons using the online submissions area. This area enables students to complete their work within the system and teachers can view and provide formative feedback or feedback for learning.
  • Student Reflections: Hattie and Clarke (2019) noted that “Students taught to receive, interpret and use the feedback provided is probably much more important than focussing on how much feedback is provided by the teacher, as feedback given but not heard is of little use.” The reflection tool enables teachers to set their own student questions, for example, ‘What did you do well?’, What are your next learning steps or goal?’. Students can then plan their next steps and consider how they will act on the feedback that the teacher has provided them.

Benefits of these tools:

  • provides transparency to the assessment and feedback process
  • enables teachers to provide timely and targeted continuous feedback to inform and improve student learning
  • provides opportunities for students to predict and reflect on, the assessment of their work and set learning goals
  • provides seamless continuous flow of task feedback to students and parents
  • facilitates the recording and reporting of student progress aligned with a school’s assessment philosophy

Bibliography:

Reframing feedback to improve teaching and learning. (2017). Melbourne Vic: Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership (AITSL).

Black, P. J., & Wiliam, D. (1998). Inside the black box: Raising standards through classroom assessment. London: NferNelson.

Butler, R. (1988). Enhancing And Undermining Intrinsic Motivation: The Effects Of Task-Involving And Ego-Involving Evaluation On Interest And Performance. British Journal of Educational Psychology, 58(1), 1–14. doi: 10.1111/j.2044-8279.1988.tb00874.x

Hattie, J. (2012). Visible learning for teachers: Maximizing impact on learning. New York: Routledge.