to think teachers should stop marking books?

[Notsuretoday]

It is the single biggest waste of time and it would improve teachers' work-life balance no end.

In Germany where I am from books are not marked. Tests are marked, verbal feedback is given in lessons. Homework is discussed in lessons. It doesn't seem to mean that German pupils do less well...

I think that's another primary / secondary difference - homework. I find marking primary homework challenging as there is so much variation in how much support parents give. Some parents actually do it for them, others have no adult input at all, so I can't assess each child's understanding of a concept by looking at it.

When I was in school, I was in a fairly disruptive group of children (fairly representative of the school unfortunately) and as a result, pretty much the only interaction I had with most of my teachers was through their written comments marked on my work. If I didn't get this, I can honestly say I'd have stopped putting the work in. I may even have stopped turning up.

Feedback is only useful when it is good quality and when it reaches the child. Tick and "good" doesn't tell them anything beyond the fact that you've looked at it. A lengthy comment with next steps (or 2 stars and a wish) takes longer but can help them improve -IF they see it at the right time and IF they can read it.
When I taught P2/3 I gave quality feedback (verbally) on writing to about a third of the class and just checked that the other children had written something (I read everyone's writing). This way I would update their targets and give good feedback every three weeks. That might seem a bit lax but it had a much better impact than spending a lot of my own time writing comments that the children never looked at.
I'm now in nursery though so don't do marking. Learning journeys though...

I think the fluency and selection of methods is not actually required till A2 maths now. Particularly now they've got rid of coursework. There's a little bit in the functional questions but mostly it's rote learning and practice. If you're dragging a group through foundation GCSE they just need the right method. Now is the ideal way to get our workforce more numerate and logical probably not? The whole concept of school is a bit odd really and if it started tomorrow I'm sure it would look a lot different.