Challenging Students with Feedback

If you’re a student in any undergraduate or graduate academic program instructor feedback is instrumental for academic growth and ongoing learning throughout the program. This is often a key component of that motivation that comes from being in that program and that overall scholastic vigor, which is very necessary for understanding what our students require in their enrolled programs in order to improve upon writing skills and research skills.
Being able to provide our students that individual, qualitative, and concrete feedback is truly what often drives those students that come back to thanking me as their instructor for first, taking the time to thoroughly read and conceptualize their work, but also, most importantly, providing those encouraging comments for helping them to really want to succeed in their assignments. This communicates that feedback came across as helpful, meaningful, and rather useful because they will use the information for subsequent courses. This is very satisfying for all involved.
When you think about the approach, students appreciate that instructors take the time to learn their academic style, needs, get to understand their work, provide supportive direction, which means instructive examples as to expectations, how to support information with use of academic research, being a role model to demonstrate that for the student, and outlining that with solutions through validation and affirming their core strengths on paper. This allows for the instructor to take a student centered approach to learning, which is only beneficial in that if there are students that are bordering on staying in the course, or at the threshold of passing, and insecure about how they are conceptualizing complex materials, instructors can incorporate motivational and empowering techniques that help students explore areas of ambivalence in order to progress successfully. It really is about how we approach and engage our students in their ability to have confidence in their work, their capacity to embrace and compartmentalize not seeing mistakes, but opportunities for enhancement, and embarking on their success.
We are in this together, which allows for collaboration, or to work as a team. As an instructor, I believe that the purpose is to support the various types of learning styles that allows for learning to be promoted at peak levels in any program.

Dr. Sencil-White earned her PsyD in clinical psychology at California Southern University School for Behavioral Sciences. Dr. Sencil White also has a PhD in Counseling Education, a Master's in Clinical Social work from Florida State University, a Bachelor's in Social Work from the University of South Florida, and received her AA degree from Central Florida Community College.

Professor White has been teaching for GCU online Graduate and Undergraduate courses as an Adjunct Professor since 2008. She has also been licensed as a clinical social worker for almost 13 years. She is licensed in many jurisdictions as a LCSW and is the author of over 19 articles that have been published online relating to mental health and the virtual environment.

Dr. Sencil-White works as a psychopathologist, clinical researcher, and academician