First-grade teachers benefit from digital assessment feedback on the two-year pre-primary education pilot

In the two-year pre-primary education pilot (2021-2024), children born in 2016 and 2017 attended pre-primary education for two years, while children in the control group participated in pre-primary education for the customary one year. One of the goals of the pilot was to determine the effects of two-year pre-primary education on children's opportunities for development and learning.

The impacts of the pilot were assessed after the children had moved on to the first grade of primary school. The assessment consisted of exercises the pupils completed digitally on the ViLLE learning platform and pupil-specific assessments by teachers. Teachers and principals then received digital feedback, including data on, for example, pupils' literacy and numeracy skills at the student and class level and in relation to the whole age cohort. The assessment also included pupils' self-evaluation tasks on the domains of self-esteem as well as teachers' evaluations of pupils' socioemotional skills.

Over 60,000 instances of pupil-specific feedback

Typically, teachers or principals do not get feedback on the studies they participate in. The assessment feedback was unique also in terms of its scope - the research project provided more than 60,000 instances of pupil-specific feedback. This could be done efficiently through the ViLLE system developed at Turku Research Institute for Learning Analytics.

"Feedback was given in quick cycles on both pupils and classes in relation to the entire collected data" says Professor Mikko-Jussi Laakso from the Turku Research Institute for Learning Analytics. "The information was up to date and could be put to immediate use in the development of teaching. It would be important for this approach to be adopted more systematically in other research projects in the future as well."

Feedback reinforces existing views on pupils' competencies and needs for support

In this study, data was collected from teachers and principals about the usability of the digital pupil feedback received. A total of 617 teachers and 329 principals responded to the survey. In addition, twelve teachers and nine principals were interviewed.

According to the teachers, the feedback reinforced their views about their pupils' performance extensively or very extensively. The fewer years of experience a teacher had as a first-grade teacher, the more the feedback changed their view of pupils' overall performance.

In the interviews, the teachers reported how they had used information received from the feedback to fine-tune their teaching, and in some cases, this information had led to concrete changes in teaching arrangements with respect to multisectoral cooperation. Some of the interviewed teachers said that the feedback had provided additional insights into, for example, pupils' needs for support.

Project Researcher Kaisa Harju from the Turku Research Institute for Learning Analytics and the University of Jyväskylä believes that digital assessment feedback would be a welcome addition to the palette of teachers' assessment methods, as it offers detailed reflective support for their own observations and evaluations.

"Digital assessment feedback could already be used during teacher education to support the development of teacher students' assessment skills," Harju states.

Knowledge management as a development target

Principals also considered that the feedback had reinforced their views to some or even a large extent when it comes to estimating learning challenges, monitoring the development of skills as well as evaluating support measures and the distribution of internal school resources. The less experienced the principals were, the more they also felt that the feedback had influenced their assessment of pupils' learning challenges.

The principals' survey also explored, more generally, the usage of aggregate data in knowledge-based management of schools. The use of this approach practice turned out to be varied, even when relevant data were available.

"There may be a need for in-service training on this topic," the report states, "as it seems that using aggregate data in the knowledge-based management of schools remains rudimentary to some extent, and principals' understanding of the approach appears somewhat narrow."

The report, published by the University of Jyväskylä, is entitled in Finnish Oppilasarvioinnin palaute ja sen hyödyntäminen: Kaksivuotisen esiopetuksen kokeilun ensimmäisen luokan oppilasarviointien palaute opettajille ja rehtoreille [Pupil assessment feedback and its utilisation: Feedback for teachers and principals from first-grade pupil assessments regarding the two-year pre-primary education pilot]. The study is part of a larger research programme concerning the pilot. The study is also part of the EDUCA Flagship, Education for the Future, funded by the Research Council of Finland and coordinated by the University of Jyväskylä.

The Ministry of Education and Culture will publish a final report on the two-year pre-primary education pilot, including action recommendations, at the beginning of 2026.