02 October 2008

On practicalities of marking

Peter Barry's article from today's Times Higher Education has some sound things to say about how to communicate feedback to students. He even mentions what he calls "two-shot" methods, which we know as "dry runs", where students get comments on an early version of an essay, and revise it before submission for marking. And he has a version of what Phil Race calls "feed-forward"—concentrating comments on recommendations for subsequent work rather than critical remarks about a piece now past.

I do however rather wonder how much of this is re-inventing the wheel. On the other hand, you do appreciate more the wheel you have invented for yourself rather than the one someone else supplied off the shelf before you knew you wanted one... It might not be such a bad strategy after all.

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