Practitioner research and formative assessment.

Background: Several workplace-based formative assessment (WFA) tools exist; however, text-based feedback is minimal but valuable because residents have difficulty extracting meaning from numerical scores or rankings. Our programme lacked a formal WFA programme, so we aimed to develop and assess a primarily text-based tool, named formative assessment of skills in training (FAST), using action research.

Methods: Action research (AR) methods, including iterative plan-act-observe-reflect cycles that included the FAST tool and our clinical context.