Formative assessment is a powerful tool to empower students to own their learning, practice self-reflection, and enhance their knowledge retention.

It is critical that it is constructively aligned with learning outcomes and engaging for students to use, and appropriate to the stage of their learning.

Throughout my anatomy courses I have developed an extensive range of resources for students to test their knowledge and received immediate feedback on their learning which are targeted to a range of types of motivations to learn to cater to a diverse group of learners.

Type 1. I have designed these to be conducted individually and are focused on intrinsic motivation. The constitute a range of self-directed activities with immediate feedback. They are formulated on resources utilized in the classroom and the test-recall-retest format is pedagogical principle proven to enhance knowledge retention. An example of these resources is drag and drop h5p activities developed for ANAT2511. These are available to students at all times, allowing flexibility to their studies. The success of these has been seen in the feedback from students enjoying the activities and wanting more of them covering more of the topics.

Type 2. I have designed these to be in conducted individually, but they are conducted in class, and the answers are shared anonymously with the class. Similar to type 1, they are formulated on existing resources, but the platform is through a polling software. While providing an opportunity for me to provide immediate feedback to the class and reflect on their answers to adapt the classroom teaching, it also strengthens their extrinsic motivation to learn. This early correction of errors, and an opportunity for self-reflection is important to scaffold their knowledge development. Benchmarking knowledge against peer knowledge is shown to be a successful extrinsic motivator to learn. The success of these has been demonstrated in student mid-term exam results increasing since their implementation, and student feedback through the staff/student liaison describing a level of confidence with the content.

Type 3. A key element I bring to all my teaching is application of anatomical knowledge. Even at an introductory level it is important for students to develop higher cognitive understanding of anatomy. Clinical application of anatomy knowledge is known to be an important motivator for students to learn anatomy, but real-world application also assists with developing higher cognitive understanding and knowledge retention. Across my anatomy courses (ANAT3131 and ANAT2511), I have developed and implemented a range of case-based learning exercises which require students to work in groups to research and apply their anatomical knowledge before receiving feedback. This style of developing higher cognitive application through case-based learning with feedback has also been introduced into the Medicine course I convene in conjunction with the embryology academics. This approach dramatically altered the student's intrinsic motivation to learn, their results, and the feedback that was given about embryology at the end of the course. Comments from students reported that the topic was hard, but they were determined to really understand it because they could see the importance.

Type 4. Creating competition in learning, especially in highly competitive groups of students such as medical students, has been shown to be, when not used in excess, a successful tool for learning. I have created activities that utilize competition, at the point of students' learning when they have concluded their initial understanding and are ready to revise and consolidate. In MFAC1521, in the last small group class, I have developed an inter class "battle". This "battle" as it has affectionately become, has been enjoyed by both students and facilitators for the last two years since I was appointed convenor of the course. It involves a competitive trivia event, where students form groups within their class, but also compete against the other class running at the same time, and when possible, also includes groups from our rural sites to enhance their sense of ties and community with the Kensington campus students.