John Hattie on feedback

In this session for FIFA’s Science Explained series, Professor John Hattie of the University of Melbourne draws on research encompassing some 300 million students to consider how coaches can tailor their feedback to maximise the impact of their training sessions. His presentation is followed by a Q&A, hosted by FIFA’s Dr Paul Bradley.

Explain what feedback actually means in practice and emphasise that teachers and learners often see it differently. Highlight that different types of feedback have different effects. Describe the three levels of feedback and how they can be used. Discuss different strategies coaches might use to tailor the feedback to the situation at hand.

Coaches and teachers often focus on observation of current skill levels when giving feedback, but learners focus on improvement and want to know what they can do better in the future. Moreover, various forms of feedback have diverse effects, and feedback can be focused at different levels of learning. Finally, research suggests that coaches tend to give huge amounts of feedback, very little of which is retained.

Coaches should look to ensure their feedback is improvement-focused wherever possible. This means listening to your players to find out whether your feedback messages have been fully understood and are actionable. There are a wide range of different feedback strategies available; try to use the right technique (or combination of techniques) for the specific situation at hand. Finally, keep general praise of players’ attitude separate from feedback about their performance, as praise can dilute the feedback messages and impact.

Welcome from Dr Paul Bradley

Part 1: What do we mean by “feedback?”

Part 2: What makes feedback effective?

Part 3: The levels of feedback

Part 4: How to give and receive feedback

Part 5: Feedback strategies

Part 6: Q&A

Part 1: What do we mean by “feedback?”
Any coach or teacher will tell you that feedback is important to learning, but some types of feedback have a bigger impact than others. As Professor Hattie explains, teachers and coaches tend to focus on what they observe and how learners are doing things. However, research shows that learners want to know what they need to do to improve. If they don’t get this “where to next?” element, they often feel they have had no useful feedback at all.

Part 2: What makes feedback effective?
So, what does useful feedback look like? As becomes clear in this part of the presentation, this is a complicated question. There are many types of feedback, and research shows they each have different effects on learners. Moreover, for players to be able to put feedback into practice, it needs to be not just heard, but thoroughly understood, and it is down to the coach to listen to their players to ensure their message has got through. Only then can players take action to implement the coach’s suggested improvements.

Part 3: The levels of feedback
Another way of approaching the science of feedback is to look at it in terms of levels. In this model, the three levels (known as Task, Process and Self-Regulation) focus on technical skill, the learner’s approach to the task being taught and, finally, the big-picture understanding that will allow them to apply the skill independently. Coaches can move between these levels to a limited extent, but should be wary of diluting them by mixing them with general praise of their players.

Part 4: How to give and receive feedback
Research suggests teachers and coaches spend up to 89% of their sessions talking. How can you hear the impact of all that talking unless you create opportunities to listen to how players are understanding the feedback and how they plan to act upon it? For coaches, one way of getting players more engaged is to show you are listening to their opinions; giving feedback on the coach’s techniques can often help players deepen their understanding of what they are being taught, by encouraging them to talk about it.

Part 5: Feedback strategies
To conclude the session, Professor Hattie discusses the wide range of recognised feedback strategies available to coaches and how to choose the right one for the situation at hand. For instance, peer coaching, in which senior players mentor their team-mates, can be especially useful in a sporting context, because it helps players coach each other through matches. However you deliver your feedback, it should be tailored to the players’ needs and give them the information they need to improve. Readers should also be mindful that this session summarises the fundamentals of feedback, but applying them effectively in a football context will mean tailoring them to the context of individual clubs and organisations.

01:20
How can we measure whether players are receiving and acting on feedback?

03:40
Which strategies have proven most effective in switching players’ mindset from superficial forms of feedback to deeper levels of feedback?

07:13
The high-performance environment is unique. How can coaches create environments in which players feel safe receiving and seeking feedback?

10:48
What role does a coach’s self-awareness play in improving feedback practices? Can we develop self-awareness in coaches?

13:47
Can you provide some examples of how productive failure has been used successfully, especially in high-performance environments?

16:56
I wanted to touch on feedback costs. How can coaches guard against cognitive traps, in themselves and in their players?

19:07
I wanted to turn our attention to players and ask how we train them to generate their own feedback and become more autonomous learners?

21:29
I wanted to ask about tools and methods to gain feedback. What tools and methods exist to gather feedback on the quality and impact of the feedback they receive, particularly in high-performance environments?

24:18
How can we make sure feedback is actionable and goal-orientated, and doesn’t get too vague?

26:23
What are the take-home messages you would give to practitioners in football regarding feedback?

John Hattie is Emeritus Laureate Professor at the Melbourne Graduate School of Education at the University of Melbourne, Chief Academic Advisor for Corwin, i-Ready Technical Advisor and co-director of the Hattie Family Foundation. His Visible Learning research is based on insights from a quarter of a billion students, and he continues to update this research (including with the 2023 book “Visible Learning: The Sequel”). He has published and presented over 1000 papers, supervised 220 thesis students and written 70 books, including 40 on the topic of visible learning.