How does formative feedback differ from summative feedback?

Formative feedback is designed to promote improvement through ongoing assessments that provide insights about a learner's performance during the learning process. This type of feedback allows both educators and students to identify strengths and weaknesses and implement changes to enhance learning outcomes. It typically occurs throughout a course or project, enabling adjustments and targeted support that can lead to better performance.

In contrast, summative feedback evaluates the overall performance of a student after a specific learning period, typically at the end of a unit, course, or project. This type of feedback summarizes what has been learned and assesses the final performance against established criteria or standards. Its primary purpose is to assign a grade or determine competency rather than to facilitate continuous improvement during the learning experience.

The other options do not accurately capture the essence of formative versus summative feedback. For example, formative feedback is not necessarily retrospective, nor does it only occur at a single point in time. Also, summative feedback is typically accumulated at the end rather than being continuous throughout the learning process, and while summative feedback can be detailed, it is not inherently more detailed than formative feedback, as both types can vary in depth depending on the context.