What is formative evaluation?

Formative evaluation is a method of judging the worth of a program while the program activities are forming or happening. Formative evaluation focuses on the process (Bhola 1990).

Here are some examples of formative evaluation:

• Testing the arrangement of lessons in a primer before its publication
• Collecting continuous feedback from participants in a program in order to revise the program as needed

• How to do formative training evaluation
• What is pretraining evaluation?
• What is summative evaluation?

Bhola 1989:152--163

Bhola 1990

• Concept module: formative evaluation
• In overview module: Glossary (Literacy): F
• In modular book: Glossary of literacy terms
• In document collection: Reference materials
• In bookshelf: Literacy

This page is an extract from the LinguaLinks Library, Version 4.0, published on CD-ROM by SIL International, 1999. [Ordering information.]

Page content last modified: 8 December 1998

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