Instant formative feedback: How technology can help in the music classroom

Emma Hayward, Director of Music, Heathfield Knoll School, UK In order for our students to make progress within the classroom, music teachers are particularly adept at giving immediate, usually verbal feedback based on the development of skills as well as understanding. Booth states that ‘teachers who model, observe and give learners constructive comments are using formative assessment… it focuses on what the next steps are on an individual and personal level’ (Booth, 2017, p. 27). It is often noted that ‘music teachers have long been used to doing proper formative assessment; indeed, the whole history of musical teaching and learning involves dialogic formative assessment’ (Kinsella and Fautley, 2020, p. 72). The point of formative assessment is for assessment to be used as responsive to the learning that it has affected (Wiliam, 2013). Booth states that ‘formative assessment is a process and involves working with students so that learners know where they are in their lear