Introduction and Rationale

At Coed-y-Dderwen Community Primary School we believe that marking and feedback is an important part of our Assessment for Learning strategy, as well as providing us with summative assessment information. Therefore, we ensure that the marking of children’s work is completed promptly, and with the child wherever practicable, and that it is consistent and constructive, giving each pupil encouragement and sound, positive advice enabling the child to move forward.

Marking is a stepping stone to improvement. It shows children that their efforts are valued and are worthy of our time and attention. The purpose of marking is to help children learn.

When appraising children’s work we adopt a sensitive, tolerant and respectful tone, in order to encourage children to achieve the highest standards and fulfil their potential in every area of the curriculum. Marking is constructive and sympathetic, but recognises and responds to areas of weakness and difficulty; it is used to set realistic targets for improvement.

Guidelines

Wherever possible, the teacher should work alongside the child to discuss work together.  If marking is done without the child, the child must respond to the marking by answering any questions posed, completing corrections or making any suggested improvements. Time must be allowed for pupil response, either immediately or in an allocated time eg during reading carousel for KS2 or on Fantastic Friday. Support will be needed during response time for younger pupils; pupils in KS2 will gradually become more independent and self-reflective when responding. The focus of marking should be on the skills being taught or practised, and on deepening thinking, but basic accuracy must also be a focus. Children should be made aware of the success criteria to be focused upon in the marking and what they are expected to achieve

A Welsh comment should be at the start of each marking comment, for example ‘da iawn’ or ‘ardderchog,’ ‘bendigedig’, ‘gwych’, ‘da’. A bank of comments has been provided for teachers by the Welsh Subject Leader.

Marking is to be done in green pen. Pupils must be taught that all green pen marks require a response from them. The adult should take care to use language or symbols that the child can read, so that an independent response can be developed.  

Green ticks are used throughout a piece of work to show that success criteria are being met, with double ticks to show excellent responses. This helps pupils of all ages to develop an understanding of what ‘good’ looks like.

Marking over time should be a combination of two types, ‘challenge marking’ and ‘secretarial marking’: 

• A mixture of two types of challenge marking should be used:

• A challenge question could be written to either deepen a child’s thinking (e.g. ‘Show me a better method of solving this sum.’), or to stimulate further thought and writing (e.g. ‘How did Santa feel when you said that?’) Care must be taken to ensure that all questions posed are open-ended. The challenge question may be written during the lesson in the middle of a piece of work, or at the end. This applies to ALL subjects.
• Challenge questions can also be feed-forward comments e.g. ‘You need to think of some great adverbs to use in your writing next time.’ Feed forward marking should be picked up and commented on in the future.

• Not every piece of work needs detailed challenge marking, but secretarial marking focusing on Spelling, grammar, punctuation and letter or number formation must always be done. It is inappropriate to highlight too many inaccuracies in any area not identified as being a marking focus. However, some spelling, punctuation and grammar errors should be underlined in any piece of work: corrections must be made by pupils.  In the Foundation Phase, at least one incorrectly-formed letter should be selected for practice (where necessary), and at least one common word should be selected for practice (where appropriate). Underlined errors in common spellings, spelling patterns, punctuation and grammar must be corrected by the KS2 child on the line above.
• The non-negotiables must always be corrected by pupils.

Work should be marked by the supporting adult where possible, so that immediate challenge can be posed, and so that the level of independence can be accurately noted, by writing i for independent, S- for a little support and S+ for heavy support. The learning objective should be ticked by the adult if met, rather than a comment being made to that effect. Teacher marking should conform to our agreed handwriting style. Any teacher assessment comments are to be written at the base of the page, in black.

From the summer term of Year 2 up, children must use double line spacing in written work. Pupils should be taught to use this space to improve their work, and to realise that redrafting and improving is a good thing to do. Opportunity for re-drafting must be given.

Over time, pupils will become more confident is assessing their own work. Steps to achieve this include:

Shared marking: used to evaluate a piece of work as a class or a group and identify ‘ways forward’. Pupils can also work in pairs to evaluate and ‘mark’ a piece of work. Teachers and pupils need to ensure that each piece of work is respected. The distinction between effort and achievement should be noted and reflected in any children’s comments recorded.

If children have failed to complete work for any reason, for example due to absence, a note of this is made on their work.

Peer assessment

Children should be given opportunities to assess the work of their peers. They should be taught to identify the positives first, before suggesting a way forward. Through this procedure, they gradually develop an understanding of how to identify the way forward, which they can start to apply to their own self-assessment.

Self-Assessment

Marking should allow opportunities for self-evaluation. Children use the ‘traffic light system’ to evaluate how well they achieved the learning skill. In the Foundation Phase, pupils children should comment on what was good in their work, and what they could do better next time, referring to the success criteria. Oral evaluations could be uploaded to Seesaw; UFP pupils may begin to respond in writing. Children in KS2 will undertake 3 written evaluations per fortnight: at the end of each writing journey, on one piece of maths work and on one piece of science work. Children should self-evaluate against specific success criteria, commenting on (for example) the success of their learning, what they could improve, where else they could apply this learning, if there would be a better way of doing the work next time, and if they have fully achieved the skill or need more practice. Teachers should indicate that they have read these assessments. Time should be allocated for self-reflection.

Symbols

Teachers in the Foundation Phase use symbols for the children, so that children can easily understand what to do next. These symbols may be drawn, or shown on stickers, as appropriate. (See attached sheet) These symbols may also be used with struggling readers in KS2.

KS2 teachers use the following symbols when marking children’s work:

• Two oblique lines  //  where a new paragraph is being suggested;
• A double tick for work that is very good;
• Underlining for spelling, grammar, punctuation and handwriting errors. The amount of spelling errors the teacher draws attention to will vary depending on the ability of the children and the spelling patterns/phonics being taught at that time. These errors must be corrected by the child on the line above.
• Incorrect use of capital letters will be circled, and should be corrected by the child.

Work that a child wishes to cross out should be done with a pencil and a ruler

Evaluation and Review of the Policy

Each subject leader will evaluate marking procedures as part of their general monitoring role. This may entail visiting classrooms informally or asking to look at books in a particular curriculum area.

Reviewed July 2018

           This policy will be reviewed in July 2020 or earlier, if necessary.

           Date: ………………………………………………….

          Signature(s): ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..….

          Chair + Headteacher