Acknowledgments
The idea to write a book that presents a comprehensive overview of research into instructional feedback, and offers a mixture of theory and practical recommendations, has been evolving for several years. We would like to thank our editor, David Repetto, for seeing the value in such a volume and for inviting us to join the effort and prepare the Handbook. We would like to also thank Professor Valerie Shute, a recognized authority in the field of assessment and feedback (and far beyond), who graciously agreed to write the Foreword to this edited volume, and did it in record time.
Edited volumes can be very difficult to produce, as anyone who has set out on this onerous task will testify. We are indebted to Fiona Stuart for her work pulling together the important pre-production pieces, including formatting all the chapters, tracking references, and editing the volume. Fiona was the first person to read through the entire Handbook and to provide her ever-positive feedback. Thank you for that!
Anastasiya would also like to thank her incredible husband Sergey Lipnevich for all of his love, support, and constant encouragement throughout this endeavor. I get so touched when you casually discuss new research on feedback with our houseguests (despite being immersed in a field that is far removed from psychology and education). You do listen to my exhilarating accounts of current research findings! Anastasiya also thanks her children, Emilian and Evan Lipnevich, for being the amazing people that they are. I marvel at you each and every day and I look forward to watching your superhuman powers further unfold. And to the three of you – I value your feedback, realizing that it may be positively biased. Despite all that we know about optimal feedback practices, “You are the best” does mean a lot when it comes from the three of you. Words cannot describe how much I love you and hope that my work on this Handbook will help you in various domains of your lives. Many thanks to my parents, Larisa and Andrey Tsobkalo; grandparents, Elena and Stepan Khinevich; my sister Viktoria; my uncle Vladimir; and all extended family. Your unending support helped me to take this project to fruition. And to the Krivtsova-Ricchiuti family – this book will always be associated with the marvelous time that we spent with you, in beautiful Abruzzo, Italy. To all of my friends and family – many thanks for your advice, for listening to me as I vented my frustrations, and for just plain being there.
Jeff would like to thank his wonderful wife and partner in crime, Lisa Smith, who was gracious enough not to remind him how many times he said, “This is the last book I’ll ever edit,” through the past three edited volumes he has worked on. And he thanks his children, Benjamin and Leah Smith, and his stepdaughter, Kaitlin Bishop, for their willingness to provide him with unflinchingly honest feedback on his tastes in clothing, music, jokes, and many other aspects of life. I hope your wonderful partners Andrea Livi Smith and Ben Bishop always do the same for you. To Jeff’s beautiful and brilliant granddaughters, Daria Smith, Olenna Smith, and Gwendolyn Bishop, may you one day read this paragraph and say, “Hey, I’m in a book!” And may the feedback you receive always be honest, kind, timely, and help you grow.
Ana would also like to thank her PhD students with whom we spent the entire semester discussing the mechanics of feedback. Dana, Elise, Francesca, Kalina, Maggie, Maria, Tai, and Zebing – it was a great privilege to have a group of enthusiastic and interested students by whom I could run my feedback-related ideas. Your feedback is incorporated throughout this volume – and I thank you for it. And both Ana and Jeff thank David Berg for being David Berg throughout the whole process.
Finally, an edited book would be nothing without contributions from the acclaimed scholars whom we asked to give of their time, expertise, and knowledge to prepare chapters on topics that we felt needed special attention. We are indebted to each and every one of you for the various chapters appearing in this volume. We appreciate your critical contributions and willingness to cope with a challenging task and time constraints and to respond to our suggestions with grace and efficiency. We learned a lot from you and are very grateful for your work. Because of your joint efforts, we believe the volume is coherent and informative. It has been a tremendous privilege to work with you, and we look forward to future projects and opportunities to collaborate.
Our work on this volume coincided with quite a bit of traveling. Between the two of us, this volume developed and evolved as we traveled through seventeen countries. The time that we spent working side by side in Dunedin, New Zealand, was the most memorable, but our calls at odd hours from various corners of the world were no less enjoyable. We hope this book will give readers a deeper understanding and appreciation of the current state-of-the-art in the field of instructional feedback and give a flavor of different cultures and countries from which our multinational crew comes. Please enjoy this volume and do not hesitate to drop us a line should the book raise any questions. As you may have guessed, we love feedback!
