Marking Less to Achieve More
Making sure marking helps children to learn
What Teachers Hate About Traditional Marking
• It is extremely time consuming
• It’s boring and repetitive
• Worst of all it has little or no effect
The Marking Dilemma
• Feel pressure to correct all spelling errors
• Provide a mark
• Provide comments
• Satisfaction of having been seen to do a thorough job
Problems with Corrections and Comments
• Marking too many aspects of a piece of work
•Making too many general and unfocused comments
•Marking away from the classroom
•Marks alone do not improve achievement.
•Allowing little or no time for children to read or follow up on comments
Three Strategies Teachers Use to Mark Less and Achieve
More
• Do more marking with the whole class
• Do less marking yourself away from pupils
• When you do mark make sure that it counts
What Does More Marking with the Whole Class Look Like?
• Modelling – a specific example of a learner’s work can
help pupils practise and improve their own work
• In work that has only one right answer e.g. sums and
spelling children can find their own mistakes and make their
own corrections. They will need guidance in where to look
for the wrong answers
• Targets and prompts to focus on the important points and
aid them in marking their own work
How do Teachers do Less Marking Away from Pupils
•
Classroom situations are created to allow teachers to
give immediate verbal feedback or short written
comments while working with groups or individuals
•
Space in jotters are used to write a prompt
1. A reminder (say more about)
2. A question (can you describe how)
3. An example (offer a choice of words or phrases)
•
Stamps may be used in the jotter to show that this has
taken place
Teachers Mark to Make Sure that it Counts
• Use comment only marking as much as possible and only
give marks when necessary
• Don’t focus on too many things in the one piece of work
•Corrections and comments put responsibility back onto the
pupil who should spend more time responding to the
marking
• Give time to respond to marking in class
• What does this look like in a jotter?
Highlighters used to
show areas of good
work and an area for
improvement along
with a comment on
how to improve
Three spelling errors
pointed out which
are easily checked
in a dictionary
A thinking point
concerning speech
marks which will be a
discussion with the
teacher
1. Target set by
the teacher
against which the
child is judging
their work
3. Smiling or
frowning face for
the teacher to
tick in response
2. Highlighters used
by the child to show
the teacher success in
reaching their target
Two Stars and a Wish written
by the teacher. Could also be
by the child.
Dots, crosses, question marks to indicate that a correction
is required. Replaced with a curly tick or curly c once the
work has been altered.
The teacher has
indicated with a red
dot that this work has
not been understood.
This could be for the
individual or group
The teacher has
indicated with a green
dot that this work has
been understood
Children can also
indicate how well
they have understood
the work with a
coloured dot
What Will You See in Your Child’s Work
• A marking code to show that a correction is required but
not too many of them and always part of an agreed target
• Insertions into their work
• Redrafted piece of work
• Stampers or stickers to show that they clearly understood
the learning
And Finally …
Good marking does three things
1. It says specifically what has been done well
2. It identifies what has been less successful
3. It suggests how improvement can be made
A good marking comment should refer to the original
learning intention and to the target/s set for your child at
the outset of the task