A systematic review of technologies for providing feedback and grades to students

It can be a daunting task to identify, compare, and select a tool to assist with the task of providing feedback and grades to students. There are multiple tools available that have varying capabilities and cost. Some feedback tools are provided within learning management systems (LMS) (e.g. Blackboard, Moodle) while others are standalone implementations, such as feedback software (e.g. GradeScope, Crowdmark), third-party plagiarism checkers (e.g. TurnItIn, Viper), and highly specialized tools such as those for automatically grading coding assignments. While each of these tools has the potential to reduce the time spent by instructors, providing effective, timely feedback to students should still be the focus.

This paper reviews commercially available products that can assist or automatically grade assignments and provide feedback to students. First, each tool is categorized based on features. The categories include plagiarism checking, assignment feedback and rubrics, and annotating writing assignments. These categories are selected based on their broad applicability to higher education STEM instructors. Then the tools in each category are summarized based on publicly available data and free trials. The goal of this study is not to necessarily recommend one tool, but to bring important information into one place to make it easier for instructors to compare and select the tool that will work for them, their students, and their course.