82 Does smartphone-assisted student feedback affect the quality of teachers’ teaching? 4.5.2 Discussion Although teachers obtained more insight into where they could improve their lessons as a result of the feedback, and although they reported improvementoriented efforts in response to the student feedback, teachers did not improve the quality of their teaching sustainably. How could that happen? Several explanations for this finding can be considered. First of all, as reflection is an important step on the road towards improvement (Driessen et al., 2008; Fraser, 2007; Hoban, 2004), it may be that, because teachers did not seem to reflect signif icantly more on their lessons, the actions taken were not based on thorough problem analyses and were therefore not effective. It could also be that the aspects of teaching that were in need of improvement required the improvement of complex teaching skills (e.g., related to the effective teaching characteristics of clear instruction, differentiation, and asking questions that cognitively activate students, van de Grift, 2010) which cannot be improved by teachers on their own (Roche & Marsh, 2000). In this study, teachers were provided with feedback without any further improvement support, as we wanted to study the effects of such an intervention. Although there are factors influencing the use and effects of student feedback (mentioned in the theoretical framework of this study), it went beyond the scope of this publication to take them into account. However, these influential factors may have a strong impact on the effects of smartphoneassisted student feedback on teachers. For example, if the school context is not supportive for using the feedback, or if teachers are not willing to change their way of teaching, then the feedback probably will remain unused and be ineffective. Some of the factors associated with teachers’ use of student feedback are outlined in Bijlsma and Röhl (2021) and investigated (see chapter 5 of this dissertation). Moreover, the research on deliberate practice by Ericsson (2006) showed that becoming an expert in a domain (someone consistently outperforming colleagues in a specif ic domain) requires strongmotivation to improve, stepping out of your comfort zone (searching for your weaknesses), clear def initions of ideal (expert) behaviour, the def inition of small and precise improvement goals, and intensive practice until the set of goals has been accomplished. It also requires a coach who knows what ideal behaviour (e.g., high-quality classroom management) looks like, how it can be trained effectively and what practices are effective if problems occur during the improvement process. It is impossible for a teacher to know and do all this on their own. Thus, the use
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