A few years ago, I often accompanied my son Dillon to his baseball pitching lessons. As an educator, I am always intrigued as to the strategies used by sports coaches, as they have similar goals to teachers in the classroom. Ultimately, we are looking for growth and improvement from those with whom we work. When the pitching lessons began, Dillon’s coach would model the form that would result in a successful pitch, and then invite him to try it. As the lessons continued, the coaching became less directive and Dillon’s coach asked more questions. I recall a statement he said that has always stuck with me. “Dillon, what went wrong? What do you need to fix?” He continued, “I won’t be on the mound with you at your games. You have to learn how to self-correct.”

Our goal as educators should be the same, to use feedback with the intent that students themselves will learn to access strategies for self-improvement. This concept is backed by the neuroscience of Universal Design for Learning (UDL). In accordance with UDL, we activate the affective network of the brain when we develop self-assessment and reflection in our students. The goal is that learners are purposeful and motivated. As an educator, I love to hear my students use the same verbiage with each other as they heard me use. When I taught first and second grade, it was always affirming to hear one of my young students chant, “A proper noun needs a capital!”, complete with the hand motions I used to accompany the phrase. As students begin to independently verbalize our feedback, it is clear that they have internalized the message.

I took piano lessons from the age of 4. As an adult, I returned to the music school at which I had been taught and became a teacher myself. As an adult, I realized that as I listened to students perform at school-wide recitals, I could quickly determine the teacher with whom they studied. The nature of the dynamics, the techniques used in musical phrasing, the interpretations of tempos and articulation marks, all of these revealed the specific feedback of each piano teacher. As educators, our feedback drives student performance. It is our specific, actionable, timely, and consistent guidance that shapes the metacognitive minds of our learners. While I myself play the piano much like the pianist from whom I learned, it took me years to hear and recognize the difference. As I sat listening to others as an adult, with an objective view, it was much more clear. I reflected upon ways that we can spark metacognition in our students earlier than was the case for me in my experience as a pianist.

Being the supportive parents that they are, my mom and dad often videotaped my musical performances. Once I entered middle school jazz band as a bassist, an instrument that was new to me, my motivation to improve was much more than it ever had been as a pianist. I recall watching the videos my parents had recorded multiple times in order to determine ways in which I might improve. Video playback is a powerful method of sparking metacognition and promoting self-assessment. It is even more impactful when this is done in the presence of an educator who asks meaningful questions that prompt reflection. Feedback via video is not restricted merely to musicians. Athletes, dancers, and professional speakers seek to improve by watching video as well.

I witnessed a lesson designed and implemented by a fantastic physical education teacher a few years ago. This teacher implemented video for peer and self feedback. Students worked with a partner. One student swung a golf club while their partner pressed record on an iPad. Then, the students viewed the video to analyze the form and technique of the golf swing. This concept can be applied to many content areas. Students can use screencasting software to record their voice over a digital presentation. Young students can use the app Seesaw to view letter formation habits. World language students can practice self-assessment while listening to their pronunciations from a video of a recorded conversation with a peer. Regardless of the platform used, the goal of feedback is that students own the learning, that they become reflective individuals who engage in purposeful self-assessment.