Monday 4 November 2013

Audio feedback resource


What is audio feedback?

Audio feedback is using the spoken voice to provide feedback to students on formative or summative assessments. This could be general cohort level feedback or specific feedback to individuals.

Why use audio feedback?

Providing audio feedback to students can have a range of benefits for both the marker and student. One student notes “Audio feedback worked fine. I really liked feedback being presented in this way, and I feel I’ve got a lot more out of it than just reading a feedback sheet”

The main advantages for the student include


  • Allowing for timely feedback
  • Allowing for richer more detailed feedback to be produced, a lot more can be conveyed to a student in 5 minutes of speech than the equivalent written or typed.
  • The feedback is more portable, it can easily be downloaded by the student and reused
  • Evidence suggests that students feel feedback produced in this way is more personable and         understandable as the intonation of voice is clear.


Members of staff that have been using audio feedback noted that it allows them to provide richer more detailed feedback in the same amount of time as ‘normal’ written feedback. The main advantages for staff can include

  • The ability to provide richer more detailed feedback
  • When explaining complex concepts it is often easier and quicker to explain these verbally than to write them.
  • It can take the same amount of time to produce more detailed feedback to students


How do I produce audio feedback?

The main methods of producing audio feedback include

  • Using a digital voice recorder available from Audio Visual Services.
  • Using the recording features built into your laptop, desktop PC or mobile device.


How do I deliver audio feedback?

Audio feedback can be delivered to students through the Institutional VLE for further details on how to do this please refer to http://www.keele.ac.uk/lpdc/learningandteaching/technologysupportingassessmentandfeedback/ and locate the ‘project STAF consultation paper’.

Tips for providing audio feedback


  1. Make sure you are in quiet space
  2. Turn off your phone
  3. Prepare some notes or prompts for yourself before hand
  4. If using a voice recorder make sure to make a note of the file number against the student number. This helps you to identify which file is for which student
  5. For better audio quality use a microphone (available from the LPDC)
  6. If you want to provide textual comments as well or follow a standard proforma, embed the audio file into a word doc (resources http://tinyurl.com/5sx8ual)
  7. Try to keep the recording to about 5mins
  8. Don’t feel your recording has to be perfect stumbles can add a human element.
  9. Tell the students what you are doing and why