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

40 mins per paper is too long. I mark 3 hour long complex professional papers in about 15 mins each.

definitely share it with junior colleagues. It’s mocks anyway and I’m sure you have a good feel for the scores they should be getting so second mark any unusual results.

can you get some of the marking done by the students, so they each get someone else’s anonymous paper and you go through some of the harder questions together? They get a lesson in exam technique and understand the question setting process a bit better too so it’s great exam revision. Spot check/hover over any marker you don’t trust to do it right.

Any work that is completed in class is usually self- or peer-marked. “Tick and flick” marking or marking books just to check class work is not routinely done any more.
Any teacher marking is usually for a specific task. In my current school we mark 2 pieces of work per term.
This is part of the drive to reduce teacher workload, which OP’s school is clearly not on board with.

I’m up on Scotland but was previously HOD in Scotland. We did things a bit differently we had 2 teachers also. We both taught first and 2nd years (years 8 and 9) but for 3rd -6th years (years 10-13) we split the classes so I taught all the physical geography and the other teacher all the human geography. That way when we came to prelims (mocks) we could split them.

for this year speak to whoever you report too and I would use this as a learning experience for the other teacher as you can’t continue the brunt of the work.

get the other teacher to mark a few papers and then you essentially mark his marking. Once your confident that your singing from
the same hymn sheet give him half.

for next year get him now to start looking at the GCSE so he is ready for teaching. Invite him to a few classes to teach whilst you observe.

@Supermummy88 Don’t stay because you think the department will collapse without you. You are not a martyr and you have yourself and your own children to look after. Do not work yourself into the ground due to a misplaced sense of duty. Leave.

Dear God.... what a load of crap. I get multi choice etc but really....

Nothing will ever change in the education system if we all continue to break our necks like this when faced with a completely unreasonable workload. The OP must speak up!

I totally agree. I am also an examiner, and this wouldn't phase me at all in terms of managing it - but as a union rep, I would absolutely defend the right of my members to call out this absolutely ridiculous situation.

Sounds like the VP thinks more mocks will slow progress and improve outcomes. To quote Dylan Williams Weighing the pig more often doesn’t fatten it.

Have you contacted your union about these unrealistic expectations? PPA should be protected and you should have a directed time budget.

As others have said I would be looking to get out of this job at Easter. It doesn’t sound like it is worth ruining your mental health and keeping you away from your family.

This is not crap, at least not in my experience. Books aren't marked anymore and whole class feedback is given on the pieces of work that are marked. Why do you think it's crap?

Not in all schools. Certainly not in mine.

Supermummy88

Forgive me, I have read only your Original Post and the one after. Nothing else.

I am aghast. Unreasonable cannot cover this, it is CRAZY! It is the worst management in a school I have come across for a while - and I saw a lot because they had me working with the Inspectors for a bit!

Nobody can do this! This is FAR too much work!

40 minutes to mark each paper.

120 papers. = 80 hours Most people are employed on a 35 to 40 hour week basis. That is two weeks of 40hrs a week full time just marking!

Exams sat in December - presumably you marked over Christmas when you should have been on holiday with your children.

Now coming up in February you have to repeat it? They are sitting them again?? But papers 1, 2 and 3 - thus with a third more?

I make that 120 hours of marking. How many hours a week are Teachers paid to work? (I was a Teacher quite a long time ago so I know the longer holidays are not paid but the salary is paid over 12 months equally).

The Vice Principal does not know how to do his/her job, but having known three closely, not through work but personally, I can say this does not surprise me. Indeed one I knew was defrocked as a Bishop for sexual misconduct. It was in the MSM

I also take on board that you have only been there three months. Why does that not surprise me? How long did your predecessor stay? What is the Staff turnover?

As well as seeing your Manager, are you in a Union? Get in touch with your Rep. Just brief them so they are ready. You never know.

I began Teaching as one of those earnest dedicated women who was there to make school a better place for children and improve their education so they did really well. I wasn't 'the Union sort'.

I was soon working from 8 to 6 in school and not even going to the loo - there wasn't time, and 3 hours or more in the evening, plus nearly all the week end. I was spending my own money on materials up to £100 a week in 1990s.

Then some parents began to demand more and more, literally expecting totally unreasonable results for their children.

The Head just said anything, pleased the Parents, and dumped his Staff in the mire.

I was doing marking every weekend all weekend and every evening. I'm a mum.
I joined a Union.

Then I went part-time, studied again, and changed career. Mind you, in the process I did some Supply and found myself having to stay till midnight to do the marking. Also part time, paid by the hour in a Uni dept, I was given over a 100 exam scripts to mark unpaid!

So the OP's school.....
Only one other Geography Teacher? Who cannot teach GCSE? So cannot mark the papers? What??? Is he actually a qualified Geography Teacher?

This school needs you!!

Tell them, you will not be teaching for three weeks following the next exams because the marking takes 120 hours to complete. That is 3 x 40 hours = 3 weeks' full time work.

When they say who will take your classes? That is their problem. I'm sure they have a list of Supply Teachers.

I agree too - what will the Pupils gain from doing another batch of Mocks so soon after the last? In many ways it is dead time. They'd be better prepared for the Summer by going to class and learning the material. It's wasting time which could be used so much more valuably spent learning and revising and doing short practice papers.

Why would you want to work in a Secondary School where they still mark books, given that so many don't, and all the evidence points to book marking being a waste of time? Teachers don't exactly have much time to waste, so they may as well spend the time that they do have doing something useful.

Because I happen to like my school. I know plenty of schools where whole class marking happens, but where I would not like to work.

Wouldn't you like to have less pointless marking to do though? We do WCF, and it's a lovely school to work in, so I wouldn't move to one that marked books. Why would I, when some lovely schools don't, it's not all crap comps that's can't retain teachers that have abandoned book marking. We still mark work, students still get feedback. But we don't waste our time writing the same comments multiple times over in books, we don't mark stuff that's likely already been corrected in class. We spend our time on stuff that's of higher educational value, because we follow evidence based practice.

Why are you assuming that I'm writing the same comments multiple times, or marking stuff that's already been corrected? I'm not.

Not really. My second school had a completely pointless marking policy where I had to tick and flick and write comments on every lesson’s work. My first school did whole class feedback with simply a code written for the more occasional piece of extended work and, yes, students self-marked short quizzes and things. Guess which school I had more time to actually plan lessons for and therefore taught better in? And was able to actually make sense of trends in my students’ strengths and weaknesses and plan accordingly.

So what are you actually doing, that's different to marking a few select pieces, and giving whole class feedback?

I'm not entirely sure what's got your goat about the fact that I'm happy with the marking policy of my school.

Rubrics, mainly. Exam board ones since I only teach exam classes.

OP - do you have Union Rep at the school who could review the amount of directed time? You should also not be having management meetings in PPA time. If you and other members of staff across the MAT approach your Union - you may be able to advocate together.

I am also a Head of Geography - and the workload you are describing is unreasonable and unsustainable. Unfortunately, I know from my own experience in my previous job, that this is the reality in many MAT’s at the moment.

Yes, so you're marking PPQs, not books. Didn't you say you marked books or have I got that confused with another poster? It would be normal in my school to mark and give feedback on PPQs on paper, not in books, as looking for the work in books takes about 10 times as long. I'd you're not actually looking at the whole book, I don't understand why you're against other people not making books?

Are you talking to me? No idea what a PPQ is.

I've not a clue where you've got your assertion that I'm "against other people not making books".

Maybe I've confused you with another poster. A PPQ is a Past Paper Question.

I'm marking a variety of things, in books. Because scratty bits of paper are a pain in the arse. But I'm not, nor am I expected to, writing screeds of pointless stuff or putting red ticks on things for the sake of it.

I also don't look for the work because I never take a book in closed.

OP - lots of people have mentioned your union. Are you a member? If so, are you going to speak to your rep?

I’m so glad it’s Geography and not English.

@GeogGeek what is your workload like as head of geography? How many meetings do you have every week. Unfortunately there is no union rep at the school. The school don’t follow the burgundy book either so I think they are free to make their own rules. Workload is not something that is even spoken about at this school or even considered.