Teacher Comments and Feedback

Teacher Comments and Feedback

by Al Metcalfe -
Number of replies: 4

Hi

I teach over 500 students and each time they do a Lesson, Task or Test I have to look at the grade moodle gives them and then write a comment in the feedback section of the gradebook.

In some of the tests, there is an OVERALL FEEDBACK section where you can set a different comment depending on the grade, this is automatic.  I have set this up but it does not put the comment in the gradebook, it puts it somewhere else.  

How can I get the grade book to accept the automatic comment as this will save me having to write over 500 comments every 3 weeks. I assume that one this is done if I wanted to manually change a comment in the gradebook ie override the comment inserted automatically, I could, if not it is not a problem.

I hope someone can help me, going crazy with all this marking.

I have attached 3 screenshots.

Feeback-info - Is a sentence on what moodle says should be happening.

Grade-feedback is what I have set up as comments and grade boundaries, just as an example.

manual-grading is what I have done manually, the orange sections show a comment has been put in, the white ones do not yet have a comment.


Also, I have found a bug.  When I do put in feedback comments manually via the gradebook (so it turns the item orange), it often takes out the spaces and adds HTML codes so when the student and parents read it back it has spaces between some of the words missing, example:-  

"Well done you have20%, I am verypleasedwith you progress so far thisterm,  Please trytoget 100%nexttime in your test."

Thank you.

Attachment feedback-info.png
Attachment grade-feedback.png
Attachment manual-grade.png
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In reply to Al Metcalfe

Re: Teacher Comments and Feedback

by Colin Fraser -
Picture of Documentation writers Picture of Testers

The only thing I can think of is that the gradebook is a gradebook, it's not a report card. What you might be looking at is, I suspect, outside Moodle's remit, tending more towards the Student Management System tools rather than the Learning Management System tools. I don't disagree this might be a valuable addition to the tool set, I can't help but notice there are two tools that provide system wide grading reports. Both of them have not been upgraded since about v2.7, so are not current, and likely not workable in recent releases. I'm not sure either of them allow Teacher's general comments on the Student's term/semester progress though.   

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In reply to Al Metcalfe

Re: Teacher Comments and Feedback

by Rick Jerz -
Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Testers

I know that this might seem a little odd, but it appears to me that you have some criteria and "canned" comments ("Well done you have20%, I am very pleased with your progress so far this term,  Please try to get 100% next time in your test.").

Since your comments are "canned," why not just post these feedback comments in one post at the start of your course.  Or better yet, next to the grade categories on a course syllabus (or similar document.) You can say something like "Students, if you get a score of 80% on any assignment, I hope that you can do better."  Or "Students, if you get a score of 50%, you have not met the standards and I am disappointed in you."  This way, you don't have to repeat your comments.

Do you see what I mean?  Do you really need these canned comments always appearing on every grade item?

I think that it was in D2L where the teacher could use "colored" grades.  A score of about 90% would be green, 70 to 90 percent, yellow, below 50% red.  Moodle doesn't do this, but this might be something that would satisfy you, I guess.


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In reply to Rick Jerz

Re: Teacher Comments and Feedback

by Colin Fraser -
Picture of Documentation writers Picture of Testers

Oh please, never ever, not red! I have avoided using red on anything I am marking, or as a colour relating to achievement, or non-achievement. In Western European, red is considered a danger colour, warning of high risk and so on. Students need warnings, sure but the overuse of red has a strongly negative impact. Over the years, I've had a number of Asian students from cultures where red is considered a good luck, good will, joyous colour, and using red to signify non-achievement is somewhat of a mixed message. 

Blues are very positive in most cultures, greens too, except in Indonesia apparently. Green hats are avoided in China for some reason, which I found out on St Patrick's Day once while wearing a green hat amongst a number of Chinese students, they seemed uncomfortable but didn't explain why. Yellows can indicate caution, but also laziness brought on by contentment, whereas orange is widely accepted as a generally positive, peaceful colour. Pastel reds can be used as cautionary markings, but I would prefer a brown or tan colour here. In recent years, as more varied coloured pens have become available, it's easier to pick colours, but when there was only blue, black, green and red biros, I always found an excess of reds and a shortage of other colours. With the digital age, I have generally been more discerning, avoiding reds without an issue. 

Colour schemes too, inside Moodles are important, text requiring emphasis can be brick, the closest I get to reds, but more often brown or green, bold or one size larger, and for some reason, I've never used italics all that often. Even the most dire warnings are not in red.  

mmm Right off topic now.. sorry. 

  

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In reply to Colin Fraser

Re: Teacher Comments and Feedback

by Rick Jerz -
Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Testers

Maybe off topic, but maybe not.

It appears that Al wants to use a method of communicating what a numeric grade means, and he wants to do this in a very standard way.  First, at my school, the letter grade says a lot, and Moodle can be configured so that a numeric score gets converted to a letter grade automatically.  But some schools apparently need more.  At my old school, in the University Catalog, there was a section that verbalized what the letters A, B, C, D, and F meant.  So I have never had a need to say this for every assignment.

I just look and found the language that was used (as an example), see below.

So if a student gets a "B" on an assignment, I don't need to say "You have had superior achievement to the basic level."

So all that I am suggesting is a cross-reference from either the numeric score, to a letter grade, to some words that explain what the letter grade means.


Attachment grade_comments.jpg
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