The feedback triangle and the enhancement of dialogic feedback processes

Abstract

This article explores some of the main barriers to the enhancement of feedback processes and proposes a framework for using dialogic feedback to foster productive student learning in the discipline. The framework suggests a feedback triangle focused on the content of feedback (cognitive dimension), the interpersonal negotiation of feedback (social-affective dimension) and the organisation of feedback provision (structural dimension). The interplay between these three elements is central to prospects for the enhancement of feedback processes. Derived from the framework is a set of six key features of optimal feedback practice which we represent as building blocks of an architecture of dialogic feedback. The paper concludes with a research agenda which suggests issues to be further explored in the cognitive, social-affective and structural dimensions.