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

The best advice would be to follow what Stewart Lee's character does in an old Fist of Fun sketch, mark according to the child's background.

"Lisa Jones, her dad's a doctor and her mum's a university lecturer: A plus. Rob Smith, his dad's dead and his mum's in prison - what chance has he got? D minus."

This.

An administrator? Do you mean the Senior Leadership Team, or Admin staff? The Admin staff don't do that sort of thing, and SLT certainly don't!

Think carefully about whether you need a reference.

While I admire your stance and agree the schools expectations sound toxic, as a teacher you should be expected to assess students work. My advice would be to say that you are willing to mark one paper for each student, but three is excessive (especially for multiple groups) and outside of the remit of a “reasonable request” in a two week window unless additional time can be given. They may relent on this is they are desperate, which I think they are.

as others have said, leaving on bad terms from a school is not always easy although I completely understand why you want to leave and support this! There are good schools out there and you shouldn’t be made to feel like this. I just think a hard line of “I’m not marking any” flips the narrative to make you look like the unreasonable one

I think this is good advice - it allows you to show that you haven’t just totally given up before you leave. I’d mark the Paper 3, given that it wasn’t done in December.

Genuinely, in your situation, I’d hand in my notice tomorrow and leave at Easter. They might then start rethinking their attitude to teachers and in the long run the students will benefit. Your children will be better off. You will be healthier and happier. You can go back to supply temporarily and then find a better job, knowing what to look out for. There are good schools out there - mine would never do this - although they tend to have lower staff-turnover and fewer vacancies! Geography teachers are in short-supply and you’ll be snapped up somewhere that will appreciate your experience and skills. You’ll be able to explain why you left with clear, dispassionate reasons that anywhere you’d want to work in would understand.