Promoting students’ reflection through process-oriented feedback: Teachers’ conceptions, practices and learning needs

This study explores teachers’ conceptions, experiences, and learning needs regarding the important 21st-century teaching skill of promoting student reflection through process-oriented feedback. Interviewing 23 secondary school teachers about their perceived practices and challenges identified four groups: Basic, Intermediate, Advanced, and Constrained. The Basic group teachers struggled with concepts of process-oriented feedback and reflection, hindering the provision of effective reflection tasks and feedback. The Intermediate group teachers faced difficulties with increasing reflection task frequency and providing weekly feedback. The Advanced group teachers, with extensive experience, still struggled with implementing cyclical reflection on school level. The Constrained group teachers encountered external limitations like limited lesson hours and lack of support. Learning needs varied among the teachers’ groups, emphasizing the importance of tailored professional development programs to enhance teachers' process-oriented feedback literacy. Findings contribute to understanding stages of effective teaching and their implications for teacher evaluation towards stage-geared professional development of teaching skills. • Teachers' conceptions and experiences on process-oriented feedback are assessed. • This study explores teachers’ challenges in stimulating students’ reflection. • Three stages of teachers’ development in discussing feedback were identified. • Teacher learning needs call for tailored professional development programs.