Context and Methods

Depending on goals and delivery styles, formative feedback can be shared in a variety of contexts and formats throughout a single lesson and an entire course. When offering feedback on teaching practices, it can be valuable to offer multiple opportunities for, and multiple types of feedback in response to, a single enacted practice. This provides recipients of feedback with multiple perspectives and opportunities for reflection, which they can then incorporate into later iterations of the same or a similar practice. Sources of feedback can include observations from an "expert," such as the course instructor, from facilitated peer groups, or from self-reflection. They can take the shape of graded or ungraded knowledge checks, detailed rubrics or checklists, informal exchanges such as comments left throughout a video and casual conversations, as well as more formal, structured written reflections.

Considerations About Formative Feedback

How are practice and feedback shared?

Synchronously:

Classroom observation
Video chat

Asynchronously:

Video of teacher in a classroom
Online communication

Who offers feedback?

"Expert"
Peer
Self

Groupings

"Expert" and teacher
Facilitated peer group

Which methods do you use to provide formative feedback?

Auto-generated knowledge checks
Checklists
Rubrics
Conversations
Tagging and commenting on student videos of practice
Audio and video messages
Written feedback
Grading, including some opportunities to revise and resubmit for new grade
Other

Go to Activity 10 in your Journal (PDF).

What is a goal you have for formative feedback?
Do you want to add or improve a particular method?