Research-based feedback for students and insights for teachers, within minutes

As an innovative Instructional Specialist in Digital Learning for Kleb Intermediate School, Kim Sharp wanted to find new ways to gain insights into her students’ learning and growth. She decided to explore tech solutions that qualified for Title 1 funding. Her research led to Swivl’s new interactive reflection station, M2 embedded with MirrorTalk software.

Kim had her humanities co-teaching partner, Christy Stewart, create custom reflections in MirrorTalk for each of her students to reflect on their writing processes. Their goal was to determine whether offering an option for students to record verbal reflections would help the students improve their written outcomes.

When setting up custom reflections for students to complete with MirrorTalk, teachers have the choice to type out the “goal” of a reflection or to record themselves as they say the goal out loud. Kim and Christy decided to record the goal so the students would hear their teacher’s voice.

Students were initially hesitant about recording verbal reflections with MirrorTalk, but after demoing how to use it, and hearing their teachers’ voices stating the goal, they quickly warmed up. The students even named their M2 “Siggy” after Sigmund Freud.

Improving students’ reflective skills

The more Kim and Christy used MirrorTalk with their students the more they realized that their students don’t know how to reflect on their own. This made them realize that MirrorTalk needed a dedicated place in their classroom. This newly minted reflection station helps students easily build their reflective skills.

After a student records a reflection with MirrorTalk, AI generates immediate feedback based on the student’s response. Each piece of feedback includes something a student did well, and offers an unbiased insight into how students can improve.

Data grounded in education research and theory

As part of the feedback MirrorTalk offers, teachers can access a dashboard containing individualized reflection cards for each student reflection. To generate the data on each card, AI measures the student’s reflection against education research and theories from Piaget, Kegan, Erikson, Vygotsky, CASEL, and more.

Minutes after a student completes a reflection, teachers are able to dive into the data. MirrorTalk presents an overall reflection score comprising sentiment, tone, and mindset scoring. It clearly lays out how a student understood the objective of the reflection, to name a few of the data points.

“I found the teacher dashboard extremely helpful! The color coding on each student’s reflection that assessed their tone meant I could easily see the students that were having a really good day. On the students where the analysis was red, I immediately knew where I needed to focus more one-on-one time.”

Helping students demonstrate how they are thinking

MirrorTalk is enabling Kim and Christy to see a better representation of their students’ thinking processes – in their words, “We’re able to see the students who always think outside of the box, and the students who need more support to think outside of the box.” For Kleb Intermediate School they have found a solution that provides better opportunities for students to process concepts and themes while expressing the depth of their thinking.

Read more about how Klein ISD educators are using MirrorTalk

• Klein ISD –  Monica Shallenberger, the Director of Professional Learning for the Klein Independent School District, uses MirrorTalk to support her teachers amidst stringent state budgets. 
• Hildebrandt Intermediate School – Sarah Marin uses MirrorTalk in her 7th-grade English classroom for project-based learning assessments.

Learn more!

Ready to transform your reflective practice? Schedule a live demo with the Swivl team to learn more.