Giving feedback can feel inherently mean. No matter how gentle or well-meaning you're trying to be, giving someone feedback on their writing is, at its core, about telling someone what's right and (more importantly) what's wrong. It can be very difficult at times to be polite and respectful while still offering that vital advice.
The majority of my experience with giving feedback (outside of tutoring) comes from my creative writing classes. A lot of the things that I learned about giving constructive criticism in these classes can be transferred to any kind of writing. While some of the tips I give here may seem specific to creative writing, you'll find lots of ways to incorporate them into any feedback that you are asked to give.
1. Don't be too polite. We are taught our enire lives to respect the feelings of others, especially when it comes to writing. Writers tend to be viewed as these precious, delicate beings who will be absolutely shattered if someone tells them one of their verbs sounds wonky, but the fact is that writers are (or, at the very least, need to be) made of stronger stuff. When it comes to feedback, you have to be honest. Don't tell someone that something works if it doesn't. The point of getting a critique is to make the piece better. If you're not being honest, you're not being helpful.
2. Don't be rude. This might seem really obvious, but it can be easy to forget, especially after reading that first tip. While it's not helpful to be overly polite, it's equally bad to be overly rude. Every writer has a different level of sensitivity, and that can change from piece to piece, but no one likes to be made fun of. If your critique is 30% feedback and 70% snark, the feedback is going to get lost. Phrasing things respectfully is not only more professional, it also assures that the writer will both understand and lend credence to your ideas.
3. Listen to the writer. We write because we have something to say. When you're critiquing someone's work, it's important to understand what the writer is trying to express. There have been plenty of times when I read through a story, poem, or paper and made notes and comments only to discover that I had taken the entirely wrong message away from the writing. If you get the wrong message, explain why, and talk to the writer about what they can do to make their message clear.
4. Offer suggestions. Another one that seems like a no-brainer, but again, it's easy to forget. When there's something you don't like about a piece, there is always a reason that you don't like it. Telling a writer, "I didn't like that part," or "This part seemed weird," ends up just being confusing instead of helpful. If the writer doesn't know why you don't like it, they can't fix it. So whenever you give someone a critique, explain why you want certain parts changed, and offer a couple ideas on how to change it. Even if the writer doesn't take one of those specific ideas, they usually help them come up with other fixes of their own.
5. Let the writer write. Not everyone is going to take all of your suggestions. Some people might not take any of them. That's okay. Even though it's frustrating when someone doesn't listen to you, 99% of the time, the writer isn't doing it to offend you. It doesn't mean that they think you're stupid, or a bad writer, or even a bad workshopper. It just means that they felt that your suggestions didn't fit their piece. Maybe they didn't line up with the writer's intended message. Maybe they didn't fit the writer's style or process. That's fine. At the end of the day, it's not your piece. It's not your name that will be on it, and it won't be your grade that's affected. The piece belongs to the writer, so you have to let them do what they're going to do.
