Feedback Must Cause Thinking
Feedback must be more work for the recipient than the donor. Pose questions rather than writing corrections. If feedback requires no response from the learner, it is not feedback; it is merely information.
The strategy, as published
Exactly as it appears on the card
Part of Feedback That Moves Learning Forward in 02 Formative Assessment, where it sits alongside its neighbouring strategies, the infographic and the thinking for the whole area.
Why you might use it
The problem it may help with
The card sets a simple test: feedback must be more work for the recipient than the donor. Most written marking fails it. A corrected error requires nothing of the pupil except to read it, or not; a question about the error requires an answer.
The card's other line is worth keeping whole: if feedback requires no response from the learner, it is not feedback; it is merely information.
What it might look like
One version of it, in a classroom
Instead of correcting a misused apostrophe, a teacher writes: there are two apostrophe errors in this paragraph; find and fix both. The pupil does the locating and the correcting, which is where the thinking sits.
Try it
A way to begin
In your next round of marking, convert your five most common corrections into five reusable questions. The stock builds quickly and cuts the writing time.
What to notice
Reading what happens
- Whether pupils actually respond, and in what depth. A question ignored has caused no more thinking than a correction.
- The ratio of your effort to theirs, page by page. The card's test is blunt, which makes it easy to apply.
Things to think about
Before and while you use it
- Time for the response has to exist somewhere in a lesson. A question with no time set aside to answer it is a correction with extra steps.
Technology second
Where technology fits
An approved annotation tool with a reply function in your setting makes the response visible: every question you leave either has an answer against it or does not, for every pupil, and that record can shape what the next lesson revisits. The questions still have to be worth answering; the tool only shows you whether they were.
The wider thinking
Where the evidence sits
This is Wiliam's framing of feedback inside formative assessment: the purpose is to cause thinking that closes the gap, not to document errors. The card’s attribution stands as published: Wiliam.
The fuller picture, sources included, is in further reading and evidence for Formative Assessment.
Keep exploring
Where next?
Back to this strategy in 02 Formative Assessment, across to what you're trying to improve, or into all 144 at once.
Want to take this further?
Support is available
Pedagogy First gives you a starting point. If you want support exploring how approaches like this can work across your school, trust or professional learning programme, that work is available.