Project Feedback Structure

As I was thinking about how best to give feedback for projects I started reading about the subject a bit and, long story short, I developed my own structure that I attempted to model which includes:

1. Guidance
2. Formative feed-forward
3. Formative feedback
4. Summative feedback

The following schema details this idea a bit more:

In terms of initial guidance/instruction, feedback should be of a nature to let project participants understand what is expected of them and, if needed, give them instruction in the skills needed to carry out the project.

The formative feedforward, is feedback that lets participants know if they are on the right track and quickly corrects course if they are off track. This also includes ensuring that the skills necessary to carry out the project are indeed mastered and, if not, a secondary instruction phase can be initiated.

The formative feedback, usually around or slightly after the project's midway point is to give participants feedback on how they are doing, to review that which was done and to validate that their production is up to the expected standard. This allows participants to proceed with confidence, in the best case scenario, and to make necessary adjustments, in all other scenarios.

Finally, summative feedback is overall feedback after the end of the project to help participants how they did, where they shined and where additional work is needed for "next time".

This framework appears to have applications in business and in the classroom - and I intend to use it in both settings to see if it needs additional tweaking.

If you have any comments or suggestions let me know.