Teachers & exam marking people - advice please!

[Hixxy1]

Hi all,

Have just been having a heated discussion with my soon to be 16 yr old on how unreadable her handwriting is.

She's changed her handwriting fairly recently and now writes in a lovely looking cursive script, however it seems to be a bit style-over-substance. I find it hard to read when she's showing me her creative writing or her art GCSE annotation for example, and even she struggled with a few words when she was reading something out to me recently!

Academically, she's really bright and all of her grades are reflecting that at the moment, but if I struggle to read it and SHE struggles to read it, surely she's doing herself a disservice when it comes to the teacher or exam paper marker (I can't think what the word for that person is!), trying to read it.

Teachers and exammy people - am i worrying unecessarily or would you not put as much effort into something that was difficult to read?! (I know which side I'd be on, and there's no judgement here whatsoever!)

FWIW she doesn't seem to think it's a problem and people who are grading her will just know what she's written! * *

Urgh - teenagers!

I remember experimenting with handwriting at that age, I wouldn’t be too hard on her about it- I expect her usual handwriting will return when she’s in an actual exam - she’ll be more worried about getting everything written down than making it all flowery!

Tell her this:

If an examiner can’t reasonably be certain which character was intended, they are obliged to presume it’s the worse of the two, and mark incorrect.

They're allowed to give benefit of doubt, but that relies on them taking the time and effort to look at in-context examples elsewhere in the response, and even then it can be over-ruled in moderation.

It’s particularly an issue around numerals - eg 1 vs 7 - and in algebra - eg s vs 5

I examine GCSE and A-Level and we are basically told you need to try as hard as you can to read it but if its totally illegible to escalate it to a senior examiner (which I would argue you really don't want marking your paper as they tend to be harsher and more particular on the whole)

The odd funny word or two is fine and par for the course when students are rushing

I'm an examiner for GCSE English and what @bzarda said is 100% right

Can you show us a sample?

I'm a senior examiner. I can read most things BUT if I am struggling to decipher something, I won't spend ages on a single word or phrase.

Try her with a variety of pens. That often helps.

Yes I agree with the others. I was an A-level exam marker for about 10 years. Some of the handwriting was absolutely shocking! It was even harder because of reading it on screen. I think it's much easier to read bad handwriting on paper. However if we couldn't read anything, whether that was a full script or just one answer, we just passed it to the senior examiner. We were always told to be really rooting for the student so she needn't worry about being discriminated against because of it. I remember a senior examiner saying about one student's work that he would ask for the original copy to see if he could understand that one any better.

Her handwriting will go to shit in the exam and she won't bother with anything too flouncey.

If she wants nice handwriting tell her to look up Lithuanian cursive, I don't know how they teach their children over there but every Lithuania child I've ever taught has had the most beautiful (and legible) cursive.

I am an examiner too. You have to try and read it as much as possible. However, would you risk someone having to guess every other word? I always tell my students with poor handwriting to imagine the examiner is someone who has been marking for 3 hours after a full day at work and wants to go to bed. It may not be that bad for us as we read poor handwriting every day as teachers.

That must be board and subject dependant, I mark for two boards on a number of different papers and that is not the rule on any of them.

We apply the same approach as @bzarda but unless it was totally illegible it would be very unusual for the whole script to be referred upwards

I'd tell your daughter that I try to do the best by every student but it's human nature that if you struggle to even read the writing it's not putting the candidate on the best footing. Deadlines can be very tight and we don't always have the luxury of being able to spend ages trying to decipher the words.

Thank you all - you're confirming what I thought!

Here's a sample. I mean - it's not totally awful, but i do have to really concentrate!

You maybe don't want to hear this but I dont think thats bad at all, I've seen a lot worse

Oh gosh, I was expecting much worse!

That's actually really neat and readable compared to a lot of the handwriting I see most days!

Perfectly legible

It's actually a bit like Lithuanian cursive!

Thank you. I might be obsessing/tiger mom-ing a bit then! I just don't want her to diddle herself out of any marks! 🤣 I'll try and calm my tits!

I could read that without too much effort. It helps if you know the subject material, which the examiner will, so there are particular words you’re expecting to see.

Was expecting much worse. Also an examiner. That's fine. I don't love the style when I come across it as it's more effort to read, but it's decipherable - we get so much worse.

It’s fine. I’m an examiner and would have no concerns to open this paper

English teacher and A-Level examiner - that’s fine and perfectly readable. Examiners will be used to deciphering much more difficult writing that doesn’t sit on the lines than this.

That looks perfectly legible. You and DD have nothing to worry about.

My eyes are crap, and it's bit blurry, but I can read this fine. My own handwriting is terrible, I'd guess it's less legible than this.

Examiner here and I think that will be fine. I’ve deciphered far worse!!

Oh bless you OP! That is absolutely fine. You would not believe some of the scrawls that I have deciphered in my time.