teacher and unmarked work

[Gardeningwithdcs]

DS is in Year 10, and DD is in Year 8. They have the same teacher for a core subject.

Both DCs bring exercise books home and they haven't been marked since October also DD has done two pieces of assessed writing, only it hasn't been assessed. DS appears to have been reading the class text forever and complains its boring as he's already read it at home over the summer holidays.

Wibu to ask the teacher about this?

YANBU! Am a teacher, y8 books get marked every 3 weeks minimum, assessed work marked and returned to students for feedback/ improvements within a week. Y10 work marked weekly as above. How are they to progress of they don't know how they are doing?! Do they know their targets and how to achieve them? Would definitely be on the phone to school. Hope you get it sorted x

Antlers, why? I don't want any trouble. I'm just worried about DS especially not reaching his potential.

Antlers Get off mumsnet and go and mark your books!!!!

I'm a teacher too. I collect all books in every two weeks, although GCSE books might not always fit the cycle - if we are prepping a Controlled Assessment I can't mark the work until it is complete.

The main issue is ds and dd work hard and I've drummed it into them they must do this. I feel upset no one has acknowledged their hard work. DD was proud of her last assessment and its upsetting her no ones looked at it.

This sounds bad but it is important to check first- in my school students have workbooks that contain drafts, notes, prep etc- often this will be only marked by peers or have verbal feedback, however, all assessment and final work is thoroughly marked- there are lengthy reading and writing assessments each couple of weeks. So the workbook that goes home doesn't ever contain the completed work, only work towards it which is formatively assessed.
If this is NOT the case at your dc's school then since Oct is not good at all!!

At ks3, so dd, they do a piece of work given a level every half term, this goes into a portfolio that is sent home with the child at the end of each year. However it only has the level so DD doesn't know how to improve her work and plus she hasn't had anything assessed this year. I wouldn't mind but she's getting a bit upset as she is only 12 and badly wants to please her form tutor who is also head of the subject, as she was Dds teacher last year and gave DD lots of lovely encouragement in her book, lots of praise and suggestions as to how to improve. DD hated English at primary as her spelling is poor but started to enjoy it and the spelling improved naturally.

DS had his controlled assessment marked and didn't do very well. I am worried about this happening again.

No marking since Oct is appalling. I'm an English teacher and if that teacher were in my department they'd be shot.

What Yes2014 said about the status of the exercise book. I'd still be astounded not see marked work of any kind after so long. All my classes will have some marked work returned within a fortnight of starting a course. How else can I prepare my lessons so as to help them progress? a term is rather a long time to spend on a text, though, the having read the text over holidays is irrelevant. I'd expect all exam texts to to have been read beforehand by any student with a particle of ambition. The fact that it's the same teacher is a worry. Ask for a meeting to raise your concerns. Is there a course outline for the year? There should be so you can see the running order for texts.

Terrible use of commas there.

No marking since October? How does the teacher get that through the book scrutiny?

Ours are supposed to be marked daily. I can't quite keep up with that, but English and Maths tend to get marked at least three times a week. UKS2 write a lot and my class can get a lot of Maths done in a lesson.
My foundation subjects are a bit weaker,...but even they get marked once a week or so. Assessments get done in the same week. Practice papers get done the same day. Homework gets marked and returned within 24 hours.

Echt, there's hardly any work in the book and when I asked DS what he had been doing he said they are reading the book.

So, op - is it the same teacher but marking differently this year to last? I couldn't tell. The quality of marking is crucial to students' success- they should know how to improve, where they did well, etc and the planning has to be done from assessment of where students are at.

No different teacher sorry if I wasn't clear

Ah I see, then that's doubly hard to see a change from a good quality of marking to none. Unless the dept has changed its policy or method of assessment, this is not ok- and if they had, parents should know what the expectation is.

Thank you :) Who should I contact - HOD or teacher? The HOD taught DD last year.

Usually, I'd contact the teacher first, but the apparent lack of marking has the potential for major fallout, so I'd go for the HOD.

I'd usually go teacher first. Then HoD. HoD ought to be aware anyway, through book checks