Marking 180 mock papers….can’t cope

[Supermummy88]

Good everyone.

I’ve been teaching for over 10 years and had a career break for 2 years whilst my children were young and not in full time school. I was doing supply a few days a week. However, I’ve now gone back into work full time and taken the role as head of geography. I started in October. I have 3 year 11 classes, 2 year 10 classes, 2 year 9 classes, 1 year 8 and 1 year 7.

The year 11’s had their mocks in december and I marked both paper 1 and paper 2. Both papers were about 20 pages long each…120 papers in total! I really struggled to mark them all. I have 2 young children of my own and I felt they really struggled as I spent no time with them at all.

Year 11 now have mocks again in February and I will have to mark again, however this time I will also have to mark paper 3. I know deep down I won’t be able to cope…especially because of the work load I already have. I’m now thinking that I perhaps should have just stuck to supply teaching. It took me about 40 minutes to mark each paper as there are many extended questions.

What are your thoughts on this? In previous schools I’ve only ever had one year 11 class so the mock marking wasn’t as intense.

Thank you

Did you decide that timetable? And make yourself so ks4 heavy???

Is there no other teacher in your department who could help? My son goes to a fairly small school but in subjects that pretty much the whole year group sits the marking is divided up between the teachers (at least that's what my son was told in these classes). It sounds stressful and surely they should allow some of your in school time to mark?

@ArnieLinson No way! That was the time table that I was given when I started! What are your thoughts on this?

How many gsce yr 11 classes are there? And how many teachers? One thing we do is either take the same amount of papers each (boo!) or take the right amount of papers for the classes we have but a mix across classes, so everyone has an equal mix of top middle and bottom papers.

@Perhapsanorhertimewouldbebetter There is one other geography teacher but he is not experienced in teaching GCSE so won’t be able to help. I know I’m not going to manage to mark them. My children have extra curricular activities on weekends, we also have quite a few things booked with the kids over February half term etc. I don’t know how I’ll fit it in!

It sounds stressful and surely they should allow some of your in school time to mark?
😂😂😂

Can you request time off timetable? Not ideal but worth a try?

Then tell your line manager now snd ask for a solution. And the one other can take a sample of the papers too. Call it cpd. He wont be experienced if he doesnt get the chance.

@ArnieLinson There are 3 year 11 gcse classes for geography in total and I teach all 3 of them. There is only one other geography teacher but he won’t be able to mark as he’s never taught gcse before.

You could actually respond instead of laughing.
I am not a teacher but am aware of teachers marking things in school, as well as having to take things home/out of school.

If the mark scheme is pretty straightforward, is there a Geography TA that you can ask the SENCO to send your way for a couple hours of hours?

Are you looking for a solution or just to tell us how rubbish it is?
(Either is ok, but you might get more realistic replies if you say which).

It’s wild to me that the school is making the students sit 5 geography exams in year 11 and your marking load is excessive. At our school we have one mock window and even then we wouldn’t sit all 3 papers. I can’t see how staff or students benefit from so much time out of lessons sitting all these mocks!

i would talk to your line manager/headteacher and some additional time to support the marking.

who made the decision that students would sit two geog exams in mock 1 and three in mock 2? I’m assuming as Head of dept you would have some say in this?

Have you talked to your line manager and asked for support? I's also request a day off timetable. Otherwise you light end up being off sick with stress long term and that would have a bigger impact! Sounds stressful to go back FT as HoD straight after extended maternity! Could you step down or go PT next year? They shouldn't have given you 3 y11 sets really...

Tell the school now and ask them to provide support. This could be time off timetable to mark. I would actually time yourself marking a paper so you can be specific about exact how many hours are involved.

I teach English and I feel your pain! You need to go to your line manager and tell them. It is unreasonable for you to mark all those in your own time. You need to request: time off timetable or they should pay an outside company/ person to mark them. You also need to train the other teacher. They are a qualified professional with a degree and can read a mark scheme. They won’t learn if they don’t give it a go. If your line manager gives no solution you go to your union rep. This is the type of thing as teachers we need to push back on. It’s reasonable (just) to mark one set but the amount you have said is not reasonable. We work to live- not the other way round!

So when teachers complain they spend half term working, that isn't actually the case?

I'm not a teacher, but if you're expected to do that on top of your normal timetable then that's crazy. You need to seek help. You could be single hermit with no kids or social life and you'd still struggle to get through all of that.

Can they not draft in a supply teacher to free up some time for you?

I can’t see how staff or students benefit from so much time out of lessons sitting all these mocks!
quite. We do two rounds of mocks in year 11. Two weeks off timetable for each round. In my subject we are still teaching and will be until halfterm at least. Probably beyond that.

I have only been there for less than 3 months so I haven’t had a say at all. It is the vice principle who organises the mocks and what papers they should sit. I don’t think there is any need to have another set of mocks as they just did them in February…makes no sense at all. I will talk to my manager and see what the solution is. I’m just about managing with the 3 year 11 classes. In my entire career I’ve only ever had to mark one set, so this has come as a shock to me, hence why I have posted so I can get some advice from others and what their schools are like.

They won't give you any time in the school day because of the cost. It's very intense, but I suppose you're going to have a very light timetable in May. Not much help now, but what I often do is a little and often eg 10 per evening, 5 during break etc to break it down into manageable chunks. I do agree with speaking to your line manager, though. It's very onerous.

Unfortunately, there's no budget for that.

Is there a deadline of when they need doing by? Is that a real deadline or can it move?

Gosh that is an awful lot. Can you get the other teacher to mark the more simple questions and then pass to you to mark the extended questions? Ask for more time and any possible support from school. Mark in small batches when you have any windows of opportunity (whilst children are doing a extracurricular class or whatever).