Feedback-induced Improvement in the Learning of Anatomy and Physiology-specific Terminology among Tenth Grade High School Students

Abstract

Feedback is perceived as single most influential educational factor and driver of students learning. Hence, the present study examined the effect of administering feedback on improving the acquisition of anatomy and physiology-specific terminologies among tenth grade high school students. Participants were randomly divided into three groups: a control group (N = 29), instructive feedback (IF) group (N = 29) and written feedback (WF) group (N = 29). A post-test was administered to determine if feedback had significant effect on the two treatment groups. A Kruskal-Wallis test showed significant difference among all the groups. Therefore, to compare the mean difference between the groups, a post hoc analysis, Dunn’s test, was performed. The result indicated significant difference between control versus (vs) IF, control vs WF and IF vs WF, respectively. Similarly, the results of feedback administration on specific anatomy and physiology-specific chapters showed that groups subjected to feedback intervention was statistically significant compared to control group. While there was no significant effect of feedback on gender in IF, we found that written feedback had significant effect on gender in WF group. Taken together, the present results suggest that administering feedback significantly enhanced learning of anatomy and physiology-specific terminologies. Accordingly, we recommend teachers to provide written feedback as it allows learners ample time for review and maximize its impact.