Designing tools and interventions for a more engaging formative feedback process

To teach effectively, teachers rely on feedback from their students. But students often dislike conventional forms of feedback such as taking tests or answering questions in front of their peers. For my MFA thesis project, I have designed tools that k-12 educators can use to elicit formative feedback, even from quiet and reserved students and those who do not feel their feedback is of value. My overarching intent with these lowstakes, low-tech, inexpensive tools is to improve teaching and learning. By giving teachers tools that generate useful feedback in a way that is low-stakes for the students, all students are given a voice. Through this design process, I also developed some generalizable principles about the way in which good formative feedback can be elicited in learning environments.