HIGH-LEVERAGE PRACTICES IN General Education and Resource CLASSROOMS

Reaching Beyond:
Providing Meaningful Feedback

Episode Description

In this episode, Heather talks with Alex—a new teacher and former writing center tutor—about how feedback becomes one of the most powerful tools in the classroom. They explore what makes feedback truly effective: it’s not just about praise or correction, but about giving students clear, specific information they can use to grow.

Alex shares how meaningful feedback supports independence, builds confidence, and helps students learn to reflect on their own progress. From real-time conversations to video recordings and verbal walkthroughs, they highlight small shifts that make a big difference in how students hear, understand, and act on feedback. Whether you're teaching writing, behavior, or life skills, this episode reminds us that good feedback isn’t just about what we say—it’s about how it helps students take the next step.

Key Points and Takeaways

  • Constructive feedback is crucial in guiding student learning and boosting motivation, as underscored by the High Leverage Practice (HLP) 22.
  • Effective feedback should be timely, specific, and tailored to the student's developmental stage and learning objectives.
  • Encouraging self-evaluation in students helps them become independent learners capable of analyzing and improving their own progress and performance.
  • Digital feedback tools, such as video and audio recordings, can enhance the effectiveness and personal touch of feedback.
  • Teachers and school leaders must provide ongoing feedback to both students and educators to foster growth and address gaps in understanding.
Podcast Guest

Alexander Vrbanoff, BA

Alexander Vrbanoff is a nonprofit grant writer and aspiring general education English teacher specializing in inclusive writing practices. He has been a social media marketer, writing center tutor, and substitute teacher in the public and higher education sectors. Outside of his professional work, he enjoys gold, horology, reading, writing, and comedy. Alexander is a Nonprofit Grant Writer with his Bachelor of Arts in English Education.

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High-Leverage Practice #22:
Provide positive and constructive feedback to guide students’ learning and behavior.

The purpose of feedback is to guide student learning and behavior and increase student motivation, engagement, and independence, leading to improved student learning and behavior. Effective feedback must be strategically delivered and goal-directed; feedback is most effective when the learner has a goal, and the feedback informs the learner regarding areas needing improvement and ways to improve performance. Feedback may be verbal, nonverbal, or written and should be timely, contingent, genuine, meaningful, age-appropriate, and at rates commensurate with task and phase of learning (i.e., acquisition, fluency, maintenance). Teachers should provide ongoing feedback until learners reach their established learning goals.

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‘Good job,’ ‘100%,’ ‘smiley face’ —that doesn’t really help anybody...

Alexander Vrbanoff

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Host: Heather Volchko

Guest: Alexander Vrbanoff

So for this high-leverage practice, we're talking about “Provide Positive and Constructive Feedback that Guides Students' Learning and Behavior.” And I've got Alex with me, a new teacher but also a longtime tutor in the English Writing center as well. So I'm super excited to see where you take this conversation because I think you have a neat perspective that bridges both higher ed in academia but also into your classroom and in your K-12 schools.

So for this high-leverage practice, what actually is it?

Yeah, so it's talking about providing constructive feedback, positive and constructive feedback that guides learning and behavior. Basically, it's everything, right?

So the feedback that we give to the students at the end of our instruction or at the end of our assessments is how the student knows how to improve, where they're at in the goal, where they're missing out on objectives, where they're hitting objectives, where they need to focus. It's basically the way that you motivate and engage students to become independent learners.The feedback is everything.

And it shows up in so many different ways.

Yeah, definitely. Yeah. It shows up everywhere. You could do verbal feedback, written feedback, whatever it is, but it’s what's going to guide the student in their learning.

I love that you keep focusing on, like, it's guiding the student, right? It is for their learning. So if we're just giving feedback and it's not resulting in them learning, them progressing, we're not actually moving them along that journey, then maybe it isn't actually. It could be positive, it could be constructive, but if it's not resulting in their change of learning, maybe that doesn't actually count. So are there any other things that are coming to mind for you for what would this not be?

Yeah, “good job”, “100%”, “smiley face.” That doesn't really help anybody in that sense. I think that that might be some of the worst feedback that you could get, even if it's positive feedback. “Great job”. “Good job”. You're still not learning what you did, right? You're still not learning where you could go from here, how to improve. You don't want to see “good job" on the top of a paper. I think back to when I was a student, and I put in three hours into an essay or whatever it is. You're working for a week on end on a paper, and then you get back, “Good job, 100%.” That's nice to see, right? You like to see good grades, but you want to also see that your hard work is being acknowledged. The effort is being acknowledged as well. And you want to know where you can grow as well. So constructive feedback, making sure that it's constructive.

The other thing that you don't want to see is, “Oh, you missed the mark. No good. Try again.” Right? That's not really feedback, either. It's got to be specific. It has to be right on the mark, right? It has to be right on time, right after the action happens. And it really needs to, again, it has to guide the learning. It needs to tell what you're doing is you're telling your student what to do next. “What do I do next?” “Okay, so I understand that I didn't do that great on this. How do I do it better?”

Well, and that's what I was just thinking was kind of like, well, why do we do this? Right? We know what it is, we know what it's not. But why do we actually even utilize these things? I mean, we're talking about guiding the learning and giving them that immediate feedback. But for you and your practice, why have you seen this really an effective tool? If that's with your work at the tutoring center or the work in your classroom, what do you see this showing up as?

Good feedback allows a student to give good feedback to themselves as well, right? To provide themselves with self-assessment. If you have an instructor that's really providing you with good, detailed, specific, timely feedback, like what HLP and CEEDAR kind of suggest, the student is going to go back, and they're going to be able to try to look for those specifics. They're going to be able to get into the nitty-gritty.

Maybe they're going to be able to reflect on what they're learning a little bit more. And that's the goal, right? We want them to be able to do that for themselves. We want them to be able to do that with their peers. And that is going to push the students to becoming an independent learner, right? To that agency that, as an instructor, you really want your students to get behind.

I love that you're talking about, yes, you're teaching them and yes, they're learning, but you're actually teaching them how to then teach themselves in the future. What is it that they did that then they could replicate? Or what is it that they miss that they can specifically work on, as opposed to just the whole thing being a failure? But you're not just teaching them those skills, you're not telling them how they did or didn't perform, but you're giving them that feedback so they can internalize it in their own way, and then they can become more independent learners in their own right. I love that framing.

Yeah. I think that that's a personal thing for me in my classroom. And when I'm working with students, I want them to be able to become independent. I want them to be able to advocate for themselves and then to identify their mistakes before I'm able to identify them, right? So if a student comes up to me with an assignment or a worksheet or a paper, I'm always going to ask first, “Oh, well, what did you think you could work on more?” “What do you think?” “Where do you think maybe you missed the mark here?” Right? “What do you think you did really well?” So you could celebrate those successes and then also allow them to know where they're going to be able to grow, right? Where there's room for growth.

I think that's extremely important. And providing steps, providing resources on the back end is how you do that. That's how you allow your students to become more independent.

So I know before we were recording, you were sharing some examples of how you've supported students at the writing center and how feedback has looked in real time. So what are some of those examples? Can you share that a little bit more here?

Yeah. So there are a lot of tools that you use nowadays, especially online, to make sure that your feedback is coming across as positive that it is strength-based. Because when somebody is writing at any level, for any reason, right? Even if it's a research paper. It's a very vulnerable process. So you want to make sure that your feedback isn't coming across as sarcastic or demeaning in some way. So what I like to do, and there are many different tools that allow you to do this, is I like to give verbal feedback.

So, recorded feedback, even if you can't do it in person, websites like turnitin.com allow you to access this. You could even record a little video of yourself on your cell phone and send it to them via email in a digital file where you're just basically going through their paper with them as if you were in front of them, having a conversation with them. You show your face, you show yourself smiling, you have a positive demeanor and it allows the student to maybe not feel so dejected or feel bad about the work that they did. If you are calling them out on mistakes, things that they need to improve on, that can be really difficult.

But if you're saying it to them in person, if you show your faith, if you show that you still have faith in them and that you still are willing to work with them, right. That could really go a long way.

I love that example. There's actually someone on our team that uses a video recording platform, and they'll share their screen, and they'll walk me through what they're describing. Either if they're trying to figure something out and they need help or if they're giving me some feedback on some work that I did. And I didn't fully understand the value of…- I mean, it's still asynchronous feedback. I mean, we're not in a meeting. We're not having a conversation.

But there is just something about the tonality and kind of that more humanized walkthrough that does communicate so much more than just chats or comments, just text on a page. I always try to throw in a ton of emojis. And I know on our team, we communicate with a lot of GIFs, right? To communicate the emotion around just the feedback that is being provided. But yeah, I did not…- That's something I've learned in the past few months or this year.

I did not fully understand. I used to think, “Oh, that's kind of silly.” “They can read the comments,” or they can, you know, “they'll pick it up along the way.” But yeah, now on the receiving end, I'm like, oh, man. That helps me so much to be able to receive feedback that way. And we've been able to collaborate faster. I've been able to learn faster. I've been able to really meet the mark of what's being asked of me in such a better way that I totally did not see coming.

Yeah, I feel the same way about that a lot. I thought it would take a lot more time in order to set up a camera or to set up this feedback process, but it really doesn't take much more time than writing it down. I've got bad handwriting anyway, so if a student has to come back up and ask me what my feedback was, it's a waste of time. So it's really helpful in order to just speak it out loud. You already have these thoughts as you're reading through a paper or an assignment or whatever it is, in order just to say it right in that moment as you're reading it in front of them, right? 

It also, in my mind, allows things to be a little bit more open ended and a little bit more of a conversation because it kind of is. As an instructor, it can be hard to remember that you're having a conversation with the person. Even if it's one-sided feedback, even if it seems like one-sided feedback, they still have a chance to respond, and it feels more like that's more the case, especially if you're speaking to them in person or asynchronous.

Well, thank you so much. I'm so thankful that you could jump on and share some of your experiences with how you've used feedback with your students and in your spaces. And hopefully this was helpful to everyone else as well.

Thank you.

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Good feedback allows a student to give good feedback to themselves as well, right? To provide themselves with self-assessment.

Alexander Vrbanoff

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Instructional feedback plays a crucial role in guiding student learning while boosting motivation, engagement, and independence, ultimately leading to better academic performance. Its primary purpose is to help students recognize what they already know and pinpoint areas for improvement. Effective feedback should be timely, meaningful, and specific, aligning closely with the student's developmental stage. It can take various forms, whether through questioning, written comments, scaffolding instruction, or even digital feedback.


The effectiveness of feedback isn’t driven by extrinsic rewards or programmed instruction, as these methods don’t significantly impact academic achievement. Instead, feedback is most impactful when it’s goal-directed, providing students with a clear understanding of where they stand in relation to their objectives and how they can make progress. This goal-driven feedback gives students actionable steps, helping them to actively move toward mastering the content. By connecting feedback to prior learning, teachers reinforce what students already know, using language that is appropriate and constructive.


Feedback can serve multiple purposes, such as correcting errors, suggesting more efficient strategies, or helping students regulate their own learning process. However, it’s important to tailor the feedback based on where the student is in the learning process. For example, error correction feedback is most effective during initial learning, but as students move toward fluency, over-correcting can hinder progress. The focus should shift to addressing faulty interpretations and providing cues that help students find more efficient paths toward understanding.


A powerful aspect of feedback is encouraging self-evaluation, allowing students to recognize and correct their own mistakes. This helps foster independence, self-regulation, and confidence in their ability to learn and master academic content. Through this kind of structured feedback, students not only learn how to improve academically but also develop critical skills in evaluating their own progress and applying strategies effectively.


The goal of High-Leverage Practices (HLPs) is to outline a set of essential strategies that are not only effective but absolutely critical to every educator's daily practice. While all 22 HLPs hold significance, some stand out as especially fundamental, consistently appearing as key elements in multiple areas. HLP 22, which focuses on providing positive and constructive feedback, is one such cornerstone. Its importance is highlighted by the fact that it shows up in both the instructional and social-emotional/behavioral domains—HLP 22 in instruction and HLP 8 in the behavioral sphere.


The reason feedback is so critical is simple: none of the practices within these domains can be effectively taught or implemented without it. Feedback is the bridge between student actions—whether academic or behavioral—and the understanding of whether those actions meet expectations. It's the means through which students (and educators) gain insight into their performance, offering them clear direction on how to improve or build upon their skills. This isn't just about correcting mistakes but also fostering growth by providing thoughtful, specific responses that address both strengths and areas for improvement.


To truly excel, one must master the ability to swiftly assess student performance and craft feedback that is caring, precise, and constructive. It's not just about telling students where they went wrong or right; it's about doing so in a way that motivates and guides them, helping them internalize the learning process. This makes the feedback process one of the most crucial skills in the educator’s toolbox, deeply woven into the fabric of effective teaching and student success.


Teachers who are truly effective in promoting active student engagement understand the critical role that feedback plays in guiding students toward their learning goals. To bridge the gap between what students currently know and where they need to go, teachers must ask key questions: Where is the student headed? How is the student progressing? And what are the next steps?


Effective feedback isn't just about correcting mistakes; it’s about scaffolding learning in a way that supports growth at multiple levels. At the task level, feedback helps students understand and complete the work at hand. At the process level, it focuses on the strategies needed to succeed, helping students develop a deeper understanding of how to approach their tasks. Then, at the self-regulation level, feedback encourages students to monitor their own progress, fostering independence and ownership of their learning.


What’s key here is that the feedback remains specific and task-focused. It’s not about the student as an individual but about what they are doing, where they're excelling, and where they need more support. For students who are struggling, timely and immediate feedback can make all the difference, allowing them to course-correct in real-time rather than becoming discouraged.


Feedback is also most effective when it’s goal-directed, giving students a clear sense of how their current work aligns with their overall objectives. Misunderstandings should be addressed, not by simply pointing out what’s missing, but by guiding the student to a clearer understanding of the content or process at hand. 


Lastly, teachers should always consider the unique characteristics of their students—factors like developmental stage, learning history, cultural background, and age all influence how feedback is received and acted upon. Tailoring feedback to these personal factors ensures it is meaningful, motivating, and supportive of each student’s learning journey.


For school leaders, supporting teachers in delivering effective feedback requires more than just encouraging its use—it involves providing clear instruction, professional development, and coaching on how to implement feedback effectively across various settings. The goal is to ensure that educators not only understand the different types of feedback but also apply them consistently and with fidelity, adapting to the needs of different student groups and contexts.


Equally important is the feedback given to educators themselves. School leaders should regularly observe teachers' use of feedback with students, offering constructive insights into the quality and effectiveness of their delivery. If any gaps are identified, coaching or additional support should be provided to ensure teachers can refine their approach.


School leaders can reinforce these practices by modeling effective feedback in a variety of classroom settings. By making this expectation visible and demonstrating it in action, leaders can set a clear example for all professionals in the building, ensuring that feedback becomes a core, effective tool across the entire school.


Feedback is one of the most potent tools at a teacher's disposal when it comes to boosting student achievement. As research has uncovered and highlighted, its influence on learning outcomes is profound. But for feedback to truly make an impact, it has to be delivered with expertise. Teachers need a deep understanding of where each student stands in their knowledge of a skill or content area, and from there, they must craft feedback that not only acknowledges what the student knows but also guides them toward deeper understanding. When feedback is applied consistently and thoughtfully, the results can be transformative, leading to significant improvements in educational achievement. It’s not just about giving feedback—it's about using it in a way that aligns with where students are in their learning journey and helping them grow from that point forward.

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