This chapter gives you some ideas about how to get feedback from your students about your teaching style and technique. It also suggests what to do with the feedback and how to introduce changes to your teaching mid-course.

Feedback from Students

Getting feedback from your students is the best way to find out how your teaching is working in your classroom. Asking students to respond to your teaching methods and style at a few different points in the term is terrific opportunity for them: if they have a problem or concern, you can actually make changes to help them before the end of term, when feedback will be too late to make a difference for that group. It is also great for you as a teacher. When students feel that you are listening and responding to their concerns, you will likely have an easier time engaging them in class.

You can respond to feedback by adjusting your teaching methods, if possible, or by explaining to students why you will not be making any changes (perhaps your students suggested “no more take-home assignments,” and so you need to explain why take-home assignments are necessary). 

There are many ways that you can solicit feedback, using less than five minutes of class time to solicit the feedback and then one or two minutes to explain your response to the feedback in the next week. Click through the accordion below for different ways to collect feedback from your students.

teaching observation

Teaching Observations  are an opportunity to receive feedback from a member of the MacPherson Institute on your teaching. This process can be implemented for in person and virtual (synchronous) or online (asynchronous) courses.  More information about the teaching observation process is available on our website. You can request a teaching observation via the MacPherson Institute Request Form. 

peer observation

Engaging with colleagues and hearing their perspectives allows you to check, reframe, and broaden theories of practice, and to consider new ideas and approaches. Conventional peer observation teaching development programs emphasize the giving and receiving of critical, evaluative feedback among colleagues, while a Teaching Squares approach involve reflecting on what can be learned about one’s own teaching by observing colleagues. Rather than evaluating others, the Teaching Squares emphasis is on self-evaluation and reflection. The University of Calgary’s Teaching Squares Guide has more information about this practice.

Self-Evaluation

You know yourself best. Take a few minutes after each tutorial to ask yourself what you think the best part of the tutorial or lab was, and what part you felt least comfortable with. Spend some time brainstorming ways to improve or alter the parts of your class that did not go as well as you would like. Making critical reflection a regular part of your teaching practice can significantly improve your practice as a teacher by helping you understand your strengths and identify areas to focus your development efforts.

Changing Techniques Mid-Course

If you notice that a particular teaching technique is not working, or you receive feedback from students that indicates this, you can change what you do and how you do it. Let your students know you will be making a change and why you are making it.

Changes to course structure (e.g., assignments) or content should be made in conversation with the course instructor. You may have to continue with the course assignment if the instructor is not willing or able to adjust the assignments. If this is the case, let your students know why you are continuing with an unpopular assignment, and then, as a class, brainstorm ways to make the assignment more meaningful.