Know Your Why!: gotFeedback - AI Generated Feedback for Student Writing

Spring is a great time to learn & explore something new! April 13th, 2023

If you’ve followed my blog over the last several years, you might remember that I occasionally create challenges for myself to explore, learn, and share what I discover. Last December, I challenged myself to explore 24 Days of Teaching and Learning Resources.

My challenge for April is to explore something new each day and share what I discover. Hopefully, I won't let you or myself down! (April Challenge Update Doc)

Today am exploring some of the recent posts by @rmbyrne. Richard Byrne is one of the OG's in the world of EdTech. He was one of the first educators I followed when I joined Twitter. His blog "Free Technology for Teachers" was one of the first blogs I followed regularly. Richard still produces amazing resources and collections today.

Today I was drawn into a post about another new AI tool, gotFeedback. gotFeedback's goal is to help teachers provide more individualized feedback to students.

Feedback matters for both teachers and students. When I create and share feedback with my students, it forces me to think about the lessons and activities that led up to the student's responses. It also helps students reflect on the same lessons and activities and sets the stage for what is next.

Making time for authentic feedback can be a challenge. I use quite a few formative assessment tools to help, but sometimes I need to provide prompt and effective feedback to short answer responses in a document or form response. I've been teaching long enough and I have some "canned responses" to save me some time, but these often are not enough to provide complete feedback. I sometimes struggle to find the time and the right words to personalize all feedback for students.

Thanks to Richard Byrne and gotLearning, I have a new tool to help me create and share personalized feedback.

gotFeedback is modeled on the research that feedback needs to be:

Goal-referenced
Tangible and Transparent
Actionable
User-Friendly
Timely
Ongoing
Consistent

I believe gotFeedback will be added to the full gotLearning platform in the future, but right now teachers can use the resource as a stand-alone product after creating a login.

Here is a brief summary of how to get started exploring the platform.

Create a free account.
Once you are signed in, choose the type of feedback you would like to have the AI generate. Right now the options include, “Narrative Structure”, “Details in This Writing”, “Claims in This Writing”, and “Evidence in This Writing”. Teachers can also write a custom prompt. gotFeedback has even created a “Prompt Guide” to help.
Next, a student's work can be uploaded (pdf or Word) or pasted directly on the site.
Click “Evaluated” and the AI will create a customized evaluation of the writing that can be copied, modified if necessary, and shared directly with the student.

I am looking forward to spending some more time to continue exploring both gotFeedback and gotLearning as I prepare to use these resources with my students.

Additional AI Generators to Support Teachers and Learners