Dialogic Feed-Forward in Assessment: Pivotal to Learning but not Unproblematic

A key debate in higher education is how assessment and feedback can be constructed to maximize opportunities for meaningful student learning. In this paper, we explore a learning-focused model of feedback, teacher-student dialogic feed-forward, enacted practice, exposing many affordances but also some challenges. Adopting small-scale intensive approach, trace the learning journeys four students through second-year undergraduate unit at British university on into their third final year study, accessing verbal testimony, teacher written comments draft summative coursework, performance within beyond unit. We present in-depth responses, understanding, behaviours, achievement with respect feed-forward dialogue, revealing subtleties reactions. Our findings evidence transformative power dialogue range achievers. Dialogic act as pivotal moment learning, where reflect work, judge standards against criteria, co-create positive actions improvement. Students develop cognitively, meta-cognitively, affectively, becoming more comfortable challenge productive conclude by widening our frame reference problematize current debates about pedagogy.