Formative Feedback Essay

CHALLENGE: As universities and colleges strive to enhance student access, completion, and satisfaction, providing high-quality formative feedback has become an indispensable part of an effective teaching-learning environment in higher education. The primary goal of assessments with formative feedback is to provide ongoing information that can be used by instructors to improve their teaching and by students to improve their learning. However, as the number of students continues to increase in university classrooms, much more staff time and effort seem necessary to produce high-quality formative feedback from assessments. These time constraints typically result in delayed feedback as well as student dissatisfaction about the effectiveness of …show more content…
We will design, implement, and evaluate an interactive score reporting system that infuse formative feedback principles into computer-based testing practices. The objectives and practical outcomes of our research program are threefold: First, we will identify the essential components of formative feedback that are most relevant to university students. The practical outcomes will be specific and practical guidelines about the application of formative feedback that will help promoting student learning in higher education settings. Second, we will determine the most innovative and engaging ways of presenting formative feedback in score reports. The practical outcomes will be new interactive score reports that present individualized, engaging, and high-quality formative feedback to diverse groups of university students. Third, we will implement the interactive score reporting system for undergraduate courses and begin to evaluate the impact of the interactive score reporting system on student learning. The practical outcomes will be a comprehensive understanding of the qualitative and quantitative factors that affect the quality of the interactive score reports as well as the effectiveness of formative feedback in promoting student