HCD.9:4.4 - Give Feedback the Learner Can Use

A feedback contribution names:

• the exact requirement or criterion and the observed part of the attempt;
• what remains useful and should be preserved;
• the error, uncertainty, missing check, or unsupported relation that needs attention;
• the smallest cue, question, example, explanation, or correction information suitable for the learner and task;
• the action the learner performs next and the opportunity and deadline for using the information; and
• the provider, channel, timing, support boundary, and any consequence or escalation.

Choose timing from the purpose, risk, and error. Intervene immediately for an unsafe, irreversible, privacy-breaking, or repeatedly rehearsed critical action. When conditions are safe and the first response is informative, allow enough of the attempt to preserve the learner’s reasoning before feedback. There is no universal immediate or delayed timing rule.

A score can locate a threshold and praise can acknowledge effort, but neither substitutes for information about the action when a correction is required. A full solution may be appropriate as a worked example in another episode; if it supplies the current answer, record that the learner’s independent action was not observed.