This paper considers the pros and cons of giving formative feedback by audio as well as in writing. Post-qualification nursing students studying mentorship skills received both types of feedback, and were then asked to give their views on the two methods, either by participation in a survey or by personal interview or by both. Audio feedback proved popular: students found it more ‘personal’ than feedback in writing, though they valued the complementarity of blended feedback (audio and written), and preferred to have both rather than either. A focus group with lecturers uncovered a degree of ambivalence, however: they shared with students the ideal of feedback as inter-personal and relationship-based, but providing both sorts of feedback required more of their time and appeared to involve duplication
