Since the participants during e-education do not contact the lecturer/instructor directly face-to-face , and synchronous methods of communication are used rarely, there are significant difficulties in giving and receiving feedback from the participants .
Many participants of online education work on their assignments late at night or on the weekends in order to meet the deadlines. It sometimes happens that after having handed in their essays, case studies or projects, the participants have to wait for several days for their instructor to give them feedback. It is important to point out that untimely response and too slow reactions to problems the participants have are one of the most common reasons for the participants’ discontent and drop out.
Apart from the lecturer/instructor, participants can get feedback from other participants and from the LMS . Participants also give feedback to the instructor/lecturer, first of all about their progress in mastering the educational content, as well as instructor’s/lecturer’s accomplishment in their role.
Feedback given to the participants by the lecturer/instructor is related to the following areas:
- correcting the expectations of inexperienced participants
- solving the problems of participants who do not use the LMS properly
- correcting wrong approaches to certain projects and assignments
- notifying the participants that they are not active enough and that they have not fulfilled their obligations
- informing the students of the test and project results they accomplished
- warning the students that they are not behaving properly in discussion areas or when working in team
There are several principles for giving effective feedback to the participants:
- timeliness (providing the feedback timely and at the most convenient time)
- appropriate communication channel (making the choice of the channel according to private/public, speed etc.)
- functionality (focus on what is important and what the participant can change)
- evaluating the behaviour, not the person (describe what is and is not desirable behaviour)
- bearing attitude in mind (avoid all that could hurt or insult a participant)
- "saving a participant’s face" (being careful of what impressions the others form of a certain participant)
In discussions participants often evaluate ideas, opinions, attitudes, proposals, evaluations and work of the other participants i.e. a lot of the feedback is exchanged between the participants themselves . It is important that the lecturer/instructor monitors this type of feedback, as well as that they react in the case of a participant being exposed to excessive criticism and negative evaluation.
Tips & tricks: Define the rules of behaviour for mutual feedback between the participants in advance. To provide the participants with feedback effectively you have to constantly monitor their activity and progress, as well as participate in discussions. Be very considerate in putting together messages of feedback that the participants will receive automatically from the LMS.
