Bluepulse: The DOs and DON’Ts of Soliciting Student Feedback

Getting the most out of direct instant feedback can be a fun and engaging way to connect with your audience, but it’s important to have an idea about how and when it can be used best.

With a tool like Bluepulse, receiving candid feedback can be an exercise in humility. Because of the social nature of human beings, the precariousness of anonymity, and the possibility of being inundated with suggestions, a little will go a long way in terms of educating students on how to use the tool to their advantage. For instructors, deepening the understanding on how to effectively engage students in this sort of exercise can be invaluable.

DOs

• Encourage open dialogue:

  Over and above tracking the ratings for improvement opportunities, instructors should use this tool to establish an open dialogue with their class if a particular topic resonates with more than a few students. In the beginning, some of the shyer students may be wary about its use, limiting their participation. This is also an opportunity to clarify the gist of certain suggestions surrounding similar topics.

• Focus on things that can change:

  Especially true for students, focusing on areas that are open to change will yield the best results. Things like curriculum, exam dates, and class times are determined by outsides parties; things like the pace of a lecture, access to remedial tools, grading schemes or classroom activities are usually determined by the instructor.

• Test the waters:

  Some methods have stood the test of time; other teaching strategies might be too new or may not even exist yet. Bluepulse is an excellent tool to help instructors discover new approaches to teaching or reinforce best practices. In a nutshell, instructors can decide what to start doing, what to stop doing, and what to continue doing to improve the teaching and learning experience in the classroom.

• Provide context:

  As young inquiring minds would like to know, reasons for doing things may escape students. This is not to say you need to justify every decision, but providing a backdrop to the legitimacy of classroom learning strategies help put things into the big picture. In this day and age, how students are learning is as important as what they are learning.

• Be specific:

  When looking to improve an existing skill set, chances are you’re past the congratulatory feedback stage and would like to get down to brass tacks. Instead of focusing on high level aspects of teaching that are usually covered in structured feedback forms, Bluepulse offers an opportunity for instructors to investigate their approach on a granular level. Ex: “Was my PowerPoint informative?” Instead: “Am I taking sufficient time after delivering an important concept to allow class discussion and digestion of this topic in between my PowerPoint slides?”

DONT‘s

• Give into every suggestion:

  The purpose of Bluepulse is not to provide a soapbox for every student issue. Certainly not every suggestion submitted by students is going to contain a golden nugget of insight or artful praise. A few might and this will increase with time, however, it is important to address these suggestions so students know the system is working. Teaching without any structure by conforming to the whims of students can be hazardous. Conversely, being too rigid and inflexible will decrease engagement. Like many things in life, a comfortable balance is required to guide student learning experience in an optimal way.

• Limit interaction to just the classroom:

  With an accessible and familiar social platform, Bluepulse is also mobile. All users should feel free to submit suggestions and comments when and where it suits them. Restricting the ways that users interact diminishes the collaborative aspect of the tool and inserts unproductive barriers to getting buy-in from students.

• Identify anonymous users:

  Being an instructor gives you plenty of time to get to know your students. The fact that users are anonymous is an important aspect of Bluepulse; outing students publicly will undermine the very premise of the tool’s use. Even if you are able to identify a student by how they write, managing student suggestions can be done privately without the need to specifically identify a user.

• Conform:

  This tool is made so instructors can use it as they see fit. There is no regiment or set pathway. The idea is to give users a way to make improvement a personal journey, one that adapts to the needs of their teaching style or class structure.

• Force the process:

  Improvement is a gradual process that can be viewed over time. It is important to take stock of the changes that can be made incrementally so impacts in the classroom happen organically and from collaborative participation. The social aspect of Bluepulse feeds this culture of participation by encouraging others to chime in with suggestions or ratings, especially if certain topics are particularly important.

Happy improving!