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Notre Dame High School, Norwich

Psychology is a very popular subject
We teach AQA
This year we had

110 year 12 in six classes
105 year 13 in six classes

I taught

All six year 12 classes for half of their timetable
Three of the year 13 classes for half of their timetable

At the end of every unit they have an exam made using Exampro resources
We have been working to reduce workload but maintain standards
I want to talk about what I’ve been doing and how successful it’s been (spoiler alert – not all of it)

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I’m slightly fearful that this might be your response at the end of this session….

But I am fortified by the words of Tom Sherrington from a post of his in 2022

Grandmothers and Sucking Eggs. It doesn’t have to be patronising… – teacherhead

“If teachers are skeptical or cynical about being presented with ideas in CPD, it might well be because they’ve been burned too many times with egg-sucking presentations.”

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So starting with the obvious - Feedback

One of my problems was even if I did do all that marking and handed things back, the chances are the students will forget everything except the mark and the negative things
How do I know this?….thanks to the ATP (of course)
Those of us fortunate enough to hear Rob Nash’s Keynote speech at the ATP conference at Aston (2017) heard a different take on the benefits of feedback

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What do students do with written feedback?

“I often give it a glance over when I first receive it, but hardly ever go back to it”

“I keep all feedback but rarely look at it after the day I receive it despite good intentions.”

(Nash & Winstone, 2017)

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Students’ engagement with feedback

Boud & Molloy (2013)

“Information does not act automatically, it has to be processed by learners and they have to decide whether to act upon it”

Irwin et al. (2013)

“If students cannot remember their feedback when doing future assessments, it would be difficult to use it to improve performance on those assessments”

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Your students probably forget most of your feedback.

Sorry about that.

All the super *feed-forward* that you write for your students is SUPER forgettable.

My condolences.

Nash’s Concluding thoughts from that lecture…

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When recalling advice, people often focus on retrieving ‘criticism’, which means they fail to search their memories thoroughly.

This may be because of a maladaptive “advice schema”�

Explicitly prompting people can get them to remember feedback more fully. But… perhaps only if they can clear their minds of ‘criticism’ first!

Concluding thoughts…

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Recent research!

20^th March 2024

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Summary of Introduction

The willingness of learners to engage in feedback is a popular topic in research
Seen as a core way that learners improve their skills and performance
Individual differences to responses to feedback is a little researched area
Is there a way to measure language used by students to see if it is associated with their tendency to access or ignore feedback? [spoiler alert – no]

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Findings from the 2024 research�

Only 66.3% of feedback items were ever accessed by students, and the distribution of feedback-accessing among this student sample is illustrated in Figure 1. Of note, just 16.9% of students accessed every piece of coursework feedback they received throughout their first two years of study, and 3.3% of students accessed none of their feedback throughout this entire period

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Future Time Perspective Theory

Students who tend to focus more on anticipating the distant future and visualising goals typically:

achieve better grades
Show greater persistence
Have more satisfaction with studying

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From the research published in March this year Nash suggests that…

Attitudes to feedback drives engagement behaviours?
What does that mean for feedback design?
We need to look at the barriers to feedback accessing

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Interestingly, this chimes with what I’ve been doing in my classroom modifying my assessment techniques

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What assessment am I talking about today

Homework tasks
Peer assessment
Dot marking

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�

This is where if I set too much the marking starts well but by the end of September I’m getting behind
The school adage is ‘an hour working out of the classroom for every hour in the classroom’
But only the very motivated do that consistently
I have been trialling two different homework tasks

Homework tasks

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Homework task 1 – notes from a video

I wanted to use Nick Serifin’s videos as he has resources to support each of his videos

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Why videos?

Left over from when I tried flipped learning
Positive responses from students especially the dyslexic and other neurodiverse students
Homework can be done using a phone
We have the digital Green Hair book but it doesn’t work on phones
The school is workbook mad and this provides another media format

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Problems with Homework 1

Not everyone wanted to fill in the sheets the way Nick had laid them out
The work became a duty rather than a task that reinforced what we were doing in the classroom
Therefore, for the Spring Term I modified the task
Notes had to be taken and turned into a revision resource of their choosing
This turned the corner for most – mind maps, quizlet etc
Some stayed with Nick’s resources, especially the neurodivergent students

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Homework 2 - Seneca

We have a whole school subscription to Seneca
It is easy to monitor who is doing the work
It can be set as flipped learning

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Problems with Seneca

The content is inconsistent
Some students could not access Seneca or could so intermittently
Did I have enough time to dig into it?
It did tick a box for school expectations and keep my workload manageable
Some students loved it, others didn’t

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�

Lots has been written of the benefits of peer marking
I have been using it for many years
Every year I think about how effective it has been
If I’m honest it’s not always been my strongest technique
So now I’ve honed it
Is it perfect?
No!

Peer marking – what is it good for?

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Peer Marking technique one – Short answer questions as part of class work

Timed questions in exercise books (kept for all assessed work)
Marked by someone else in the class in blue
Mark scheme on board
Not double marked by teacher

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Peer Marking technique two - assessments

End of unit assessments peer marked
Anonymous
Mark scheme on board
Marked by someone in another class
Double marked by teacher

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My thoughts on peer assessment

The first technique wasn’t really part of any learning journey, it was evidence, if anyone came to look at our assessment books, that work was being done.
It was difficult for all the students to engage with the conversations I tried to have with the whole class about awarding marks
The second technique was much more successful. The anonymity of marking someone else’s work liberated the students.
Reading the peer marking (with www and ebi) it was clear a great number of the students understood the mark scheme and were able to give marks accurately
But not all

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Dot Marking

Timed questions in exercise books
Read by teacher and given a dot in
Red – very weak answer – either confused or not enough psychology
Orange – on the right lines but not enough detail for full marks
Green – nailed it for full marks
Then the student has to work out why they got that mark and if they have an orange or a red they write an improvement.
This improvement is is read by the teacher before the end of the lesson and stamped to indicate the improvement is up to standard

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Dot marking – practical bits

All students need something else to do whilst waiting for the teacher to get round the room
Choosing that work is critical it has been

Worthwhile
Able to be completed independently
Does not need assessing by the teacher

Students are encouraged to read answers that have been green doted to get the idea of what is a full mark answer
One of my colleagues did the ‘full’ version of making students work out how to get the marks themselves
I did the ‘light’ version where I talked to the students and asked questions, gauging how much they really knew.
I had lots of ‘light bulb’ moments and a few ‘not a clue’ looks. All were useful

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I asked my students what they thought

That was a bit disappointing if I’m honest, but this was after mocks when they hadn’t marked the exams

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Comments on Peer Marking
You can see how other students approached a question
I find that when students mark other students’ questions, there is a lack of effort and so sometimes feedback received isn’t very helpful.
its not our job to mark other peoples work so we don't have the knowledge or experience to give good criticisms.
Obviously being a student, marking other students work comes with the risk that I may not have all the knowledge required to judge someone else's efforts
It varies a lot, I find it not as good as other marking strategies
sometimes the person marking doesn't clearly state what was wrong with the answer
I think its better for the teacher to mark our answers as they have knowledge of the subject more than the students and are familiar with exam marking skills
Helps to know what the examiners are looking for with studying the mark scheme
Peer marking's usefulness depends on the student
We don’t have mark schemes so it’s hard to give feedback
Hard to read handwriting and understand what some people mean but is helpful as it allows you to see what others have put.
Peer marking isn’t as useful as teacher marking as it can be less reliable since, as students, we don’t have the same level of experience and knowledge as the teacher would, meaning we give less effective feedback
It’s always difficult and is better for the teacher to give a definite answer on what we did wrong because peers may miss it
Peer marking helps you learn the mark scheme but can be hard to give marks

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What has been the most useful thing about dot marking?
Seeing how to improve
clearly being able to see how strong my answers were but also having to figure out the correct myself so i didn’t just read the feedback and not really listen
It is a clear and consistent method that makes seeing where to improve easy. It makes it easy to look back at previous questions and know what you need to improve
Improving it ourselves
Immediate feedback
Understanding what grade level my answer is and being able to improve and understand where I lost marks.
It is like teacher marking but much faster , while still allowing the discussion that comes with peer marking.
Understanding what I’ve missed out in my answer and what could be improved.
Personalised and clear feedback
gives you an idea of what level you are at
Being able to go through the answer quickly with the teacher and know what you get marks for in the answer for reattempts
you get helpful feedback straight away
Easy to see which level our answers fit in
it’s a fun interactive way of trying out marking
It shows what band you are currently at
It's Simplicity
Seeing where to improve.
It is a simple and different way of indicating whether you answered a question well or not so well
It means you can’t be caught up looking at just one question for too long
Quick and shows where marks were awarded
Getting individual feedback on the work
It’s easy to see how I’m doing

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What has been the most difficult thing about dot marking?
The time it takes to see everybody individually within the lesson
not immediately knowing what i’ve done wrong to drop marks
Sometimes not knowing how to improve
Nothing.
The time waiting for Ms Ping to mark everyone in the class and then come back to check
Waiting for other people to get their answer marked before your own, as well as sometimes trying to figure out what is missing in your answer.
Marking in lesson takes time
not specific
Short time window in which it happens
waiting a long time for a teacher to mark your answer
not sure
finding tasks to do whilst miss ping is marking
Not knowing exactly what went wrong and where exactly you sit on the boundary
Not much specific feedback
Hard to remember what’s been said.
Sometimes it’s a little unclear in how to work on certain areas
No elaboration or advice
The time it takes and losing the rest of the lesson when it's done
Not knowing an actual mark
Would like a key each time

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Are there any other comments you'd like to make about assessment in psychology this year?
n/a
None.
It has been very good
Marking in Psychology has been the most accurate and positive in all three of the subjects I take, with members of staff being supportive, regardless of results that you receive.
nah
Can we do more test papers?
I feel like our work very rarely gets marked🙁
It’s goid
Hard
No assessments were good

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