Marking communicates information to learners.

Effective marking communicates the information the teacher wants to communicate and does so in a form that learners can access.

Different types of information can be communicated – a tick or a cross, a detailed comment or even a simple question mark.

In all cases, efficacy will drop if the learner doesn’t understand what the information means or if the teacher has attempted to communicate one thing, but the learner has interpreted something different.

The most obvious consequence of this is that we should pay attention to the clarity of our marking.

Often this is straightforward and requires little extra effort on our part.

In certain cases, however, the situation alters.

This is especially true of written formative feedback, where there is an emphasis on learners decoding and internalising the information presented to them.

There is an impact on efficiency as well.

If learners do not understand the information we are seeking to convey, or if they misunderstand that information, then we will have to do additional work further down the line.

Either in the form of supplementary explanation (not always a bad thing) or in trying to work out how learners incorrectly interpreted our feedback and what this has led to.

One option is to train learners in how to respond to your marking.

Training differs from teaching in that it is more about habituating learners into a way of acting that they can repeat in the future.

Here we are thinking about how we can train learners to analyse and interpret the information our marking contains.

For example, a teacher taking on a new class may spend some time talking to learners about why they mark, how they mark and what sort of information their marking communicates.

They might then go on to outline how they would like learners to engage with this information.

How they would like them to think about it and use it.

This teacher might provide learners with a small handout summarising what they’ve said.

It might contain information like this:

• If you see a question mark, this means I don’t understand what you’ve written. You need to look at this again and either change it or explain to me what it means.
• A cross means the answer is wrong. Your challenge is to try to identify why it’s wrong. Then we’ll talk about it together.
• In my comments, I’ll always write strengths first, then a target. You can use a highlighter to pick out the target so it’s easier to spot in your book.

Each of these statements is an articulation of a rule the teacher wants learners to follow.

The aim is to minimise ambiguity, maximise efficiency and, as a result, ensure the teacher’s marking is as effective as possible.

Taking an approach like this at the start of the year – or whenever you pick up a new class – can save a lot of time and effort further down the line.

It also means learners know what to expect.

They can start to predict what they will see when they get their work back.

This speeds things up and helps develop a sense that marking and feedback is always a two-way process – a collaborative effort aimed at helping learners to get better.

Finally, remember that the aim of training is to make a habit second nature.

If you adopt this approach, you will need to put more into it early on.

As time passes, learners will internalise the information and won’t need regular reminders.

They will become habituated to how you communicate through your marking.