Collective feedback as a formative assessment practice in an e-learning platform for teachers’ professional development

The paper reflects on the formative potential and the limits of a typology of feedback scarcely explored in the literature, the collective feedback in the field of online education. The study evaluates the quality of formative feedbacks in a Professional Development Program on school evaluation addressing 194 Italian teachers. The didactic model adopted is described whilst lingering on the formative value of the collective feedback provided by the e-tutors. In addition, a qualitative- quantitative analysis of 24 cases of collective feedback is presented. The analysis, based on Hattie e Timperley’s feedback model, highlighted the presence of different feedback goals (feeding up/back/forward), with a focus on the task and learning process, and sometimes, on its self-regulation. The lower presence of suggestions for improvement and indications for self-regulation shows some limitations of collective feedback in facilitating situated processes of self-regulation. On the other hand, the articulation of the feedback and the presence of authentic examples that increase the possibility of peer learning for teachers’ professional development, emerge as strengths.