Offering Feedback to Students from a Strengths Perspective
Posted March 2, 2015
By Dr. Michelle Louis
The word educate is derived from a Latin word meaning “to draw out or to bring forth.” This understanding of education conceives of students as a well from which to draw instead of as a bucket to be filled. Specifically it casts educators in the role of calling out and nurturing students’ untapped potential. This understanding of education’s fundamental purpose is resonant with what is called the “strengths perspective.” A strengths-based approach to education rests squarely on the assumption that each student has a unique configuration of capabilities that are worthy of being cultivated.
Although there are many effective tools in education, one of the most powerful we wield to draw forth the best from our students is to offer meaningful feedback on their work. The strengths perspective suggests a method of offering students feedback that is different from many traditional approaches. In educational and work settings, a common template for offering feedback is to organize it into two broad categories: strengths and growth opportunities. For many people, as cheerful as the term “growth opportunities” may sound, this phrase evokes anything but glee because it is frequently understood to be a euphemistic catch-all used to refer to anything that is being done poorly and that requires improvement. The practice of using a category called “growth opportunities” as a repository for describing performance deficits may prompt students to think of growth opportunities and weaknesses synonymously.
THE PROBLEM WITH “GROWTH OPPORTUNITIES”
From a strengths perspective, it is problematic for students to think about their areas of deficiency as the most fertile ground in their lives from which substantive growth is likely to spring forth. Why?
The simple answer is that a student’s greatest potential growth opportunities often exist precisely within their areas of strength—not apart from them. Referring to “strengths” and “growth opportunities” as two distinctly separate entities disregards the possibility that these categories overlap. Strengths are growth opportunities in that strengths need to be continually developed and refined in order to support optimal functioning, and doing so often generates significant growth and elevated performance.
Strengths-oriented feedback can help students understand their personal strengths and resources. However, if part of our goal in offering strengths-focused feedback is to prompt students to embrace their capacity for growth and change then we must be thoughtful about how we describe and characterize their strengths.
Specifically, some of my research on strengths-based educational strategies suggests that it is critical to:
◘ Frame strengths as personal tendencies that are malleable as opposed to describing strengths as static characteristics that are either present or absent. Students who are inclined to see strengths as immutable tend not to consider the role of their own effort in producing positive outcomes.
◘ Emphasize that strengths require ongoing development. As empowering as it might seem to give students language to identify their strengths, we actually do them a disservice if we do not also help them think about ways to develop those strengths.
GIVING STRENGTHS-ORIENTED FEEDBACK
Therefore, when giving feedback it is important to attribute students’ success to strategies that student used in applying a strength to meet the requirements of the assignment. For example, this shift in emphasis can simply mean that we might help a student consider how her strong organizational skills can be further developed to enhance her writing skills or other elements of her academic work.
Students can also generate personal, self-reflective feedback that helps them contemplate how they might use their strengths more effectively. An example of how I have implemented this concept in my own teaching is that I have asked students to submit paper topic proposals that also include a brief paragraph about how the students intend to approach the research process in a way that reflects and augments their strengths.
On occasion, following the completion of an assignment I have asked students to write a brief reflective essay that addresses questions such as:
◘ "How did you leverage your strengths in the process of completing this assignment and what did you discover about yourself as you did?"
◘ or, "What did you learn about how to modulate your strengths as you worked on this project?"
◘ or even, "How did your strengths play out in the context of working with your study group?"
Students have reported to me that these brief reflections have helped them gain insight about how to use their strengths with increased understanding and proficiency.
WHAT ABOUT WEAKNESSES?
Educators who are learning about a strengths approach often wonder whether this framework requires a permanent “glass half-full” mentality that crowds out a consideration of students’ struggles and deficiencies. Although commonly misunderstood, a strengths approach does not involve ignoring problems, nor does it consist of putting a positive spin on poor performance and undesirable outcomes so as to consider them irrelevant. The contrary is true: Pioneering social work educator Dennis Saleebey once noted that “in the lexicon of strengths, it is as wrong to deny the possible as it is to deny the problem.”
What differentiates a strength approach from other feedback processes is not whether problems are addressed; what is distinctive about a strengths-based approach is how these issues are handled. Strengths-oriented feedback places a student’s capabilities, talents, values, and resources at the center of a consideration of how to address a concern or deficiency and invites the student to view these positive qualities as resources that can be used to address a challenge in novel ways. The goal is to help students understand that when trying to overcome difficulties, their strengths are their best resource.
If education truly is the process of drawing out and bringing forth the best in our students, then it only makes sense to offer them feedback that recognizes and cultivates these inherent qualities. Adopting a strengths perspective enables students to consider their problems and their possibilities in light of their strengths, ascribes dignity and value to who they are, and empowers them to take tangible action steps toward their goals.
[Dr. Michelle Louis is an Associate Editor at the Journal of Positive Psychology and an adjunct Assistant Professor at Bethel University in Saint Paul, Minnesota. Her scholarly interests integrate psychology and higher education.]
