Marking work
/ By Strategy Education / Advice • Classroom • Pupils/ • • • / 0 Comments

The Great Marking Debate

Sometimes it seems as though there is no greater issue of contention in education than marking! Whether in Primary or Secondary education, there seems to always be an ongoing conversation about the value, necessity and regularity of marking with differing opinions from teachers, pupils, parents and SLT.

Teachers themselves don’t always agree about the benefits of marking, with some seeing it as an essential tool for feedback and progression while others see it as a waste of their precious time with no real benefit to pupils.

What exactly is it that causes marking to be so open to debate with no agreed solutions?

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Building Resilience in Children
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Building Resilience in Children: COVID-19

The stress and anxiety experienced by children due to lockdowns and lack of socialisation has already been well documented. However, one thing we are beginning to see is the effect of the government’s pressure to “catch up” children to meet their age-related goals and regain momentum towards pre-pandemic results.

Inevitably, teachers are already coming under intense pressure to ensure the pupils in their classes are reaching their expectations with very little mitigation of the difficulties this is causing.

Unfortunately, it isn’t just the teachers feeling this pressure, as the children are at risk of experiencing the fear of failure too.

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Military Service Pupils in Schools
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Supporting Military Service Pupils in Schools

Did you know that whilst many children of parents serving in the British Armed Forces attend schools that have a high percentage of service pupils, the majority attend schools with less than ten service children?

Children in this situation have unique circumstances where they may have been separated from a parent for long periods, moved homes and schools frequently, or even relocated to different countries.

Teachers can be ill-equipped to understand how they can help these military pupils but fortunately, a charity called Little Troopers has developed a programme of resources to help pupils from reception to sixth form. Designed with the help of educational psychologists, behavioural experts and play therapists, the resources are very helpful to any school that has children from a service background.

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Teacher Feedback
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Reducing the Burden of Teacher Feedback

Time spent on marking students’ work and writing individual feedback has long been seen as adding to teacher workload. Moving away from written feedback is an obvious option to reduce teacher workload but schools are often reluctant to let go of the evidence that written feedback provides.

In an environment where school leaders are looking to reduce teacher workloads, it is important to be able to prove to Ofsted and parents that verbal feedback is an effective alternative to providing written feedback.

Looking at some current research into verbal feedback methods may help school leaders and teachers ensure they are following best practices. It should certainly open a debate into how changes could be trialled.

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Great Head Teacher
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What Makes a Great Head Teacher?

A question often asked in education is how to determine whether a head teacher is a good one. The attributes required to be one of the best head teachers may well be the same as required by any great leader, but a head teacher’s role can be particularly complex whatever type of school they are leading.

This is a list of eight qualities that you will want to see in the best head teachers.

A great head teacher:

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Teachers Read Books
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Why do Teachers Read Books About Education?

According to the NEU, many teachers suffer from stress and a heavy workload during term time, so is it unexpected that many teachers choose to read books about education during their holidays?

There has been some stigma attached to teachers who use their free time reading education books with many on social media showing a lack of understanding and using derogatory language to suggest that they don’t have a life.

There are many reasons why some teachers choose to do this extra reading in their holiday time.

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Teacher Stress
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Teacher Stress in England

Teacher stress in England is a topic that has been raised over several years with many teachers opting to leave the profession, retire early or look for alternatives within education. Professor Wettstein carried out a study in 2020  that concluded that many factors lead to teaching being a highly stressful career across the globe.

Many teachers in England each year look towards the private sector for a less stressful teaching option but is this a viable alternative that will reduce teacher stress?

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Working Memory
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What is Working Memory?

Working memory is defined as a cognitive system that holds information temporarily and has a limited capacity. Working memory is considered to be important for reasoning and decision making and also controlling behaviour. In education, working memory is something often talked about by teachers when they notice students struggling with processing or retaining information in the classroom.

Baddeley (1974) developed a working model that established that working memory is distinct from long term memory and not only does it deal with retaining information but also processes the information to develop cognition.

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