Why does the NEU say that teachers should not be expected to mark work during the pandemic?

[Thenagainmaybenot]

The national education union says that:
'Worksheets and textbook pages for maths and English can work if they are already used in school and all children have them at home. However, teachers cannot be expected to mark work. Schools should not be setting SATs tests or mocks at this time.'

Why shouldn't teachers be expected to mark work? Fair enough they shouldn't be marking as much as they do normally, but (say) 1-2 maths and english tasks per week to be marked is surely reasonable?

Keeping them open for keyworker and vulnerable children, and now some year groups, did mean that some schools were stretched very thinly.

Some primary schools were stretched thinly. Anecdotally secondaries weren't at all. Most beef on here seems to be with primary schools so perhaps there is a correlation there.

What have I done about it?

Have you asked the school why? There may be reasons you aren't aware of. I'm also willing to accept they are rubbish however unless you ask you'll never know. An email would take less time than a post on here.

The not marking work because of the coloured pen thing has sent me over the edge

Did you read my post and give it some consideration? At any point in that did I say I personally hadn’t done marking because of that? Because I explained there the sheer amount of effort it takes to do marking to policy and that it is taking even longer than normal to mark to policy in the current situation. A full working week, in fact, every time I give a piece of writing to my students to complete. If on top of that, I mark everything else we do - speaking work, listening exercises, reading comprehension answers - probably another 10hours or so a week. So all in, every 2 weeks with planning, marking and teaching, I work for the equivalent of 3 weeks full time hours or thereabouts. At home. With my own children to educate.

What do you think has happened to my children in the last 3 months? Do you think they have had my full attention? Or even any attention? Do you think they might, perhaps, be feeling a bit resentful their mother is prioritising other people’s children quite so blatantly in front of them?

Private school, of course. We have no choice. But goodness me, if the unions have reduced the workload for some of us and made this less of an obligation for the time being then that’s great. Just like all those other services out there that are operating at a reduced capacity. These are not normal times so why you expect normal service is beyond me.

"Have you asked the school why?"

A friend was complaining about her child's Spanish teacher, who is apparently providing recorded lessons to a reduced timetable but doing very limited marking.

I happen to know that that teacher has also been working in a local primary school, plugging the gaps so they could open while many of their own staff were still shielding.

If you're not happy, please just email and ask instead of assuming that you are in Poseidon of full facts.

*possession

Honestly the NEU have been a disgrace throughout. A can't do attitude

Exactly.

I can't believe people took the OP at face value too. "Well it's paper so it could transmit the virus". Heard of email? Google Classroom? My son's college sent out booklets for work, too. We didn't scream and shout and say "AAAAGH VIRUS SHEDDING PAPER". We opened the letters and he used the booklets, just in the same way that I would expect a teacher to deal with paper homework from the few who can't submit by email or electronic means. And when people say "mark" they don't mean put ticks and crosses on it with red pen, they mean give feedback.

Also the unions were saying no video lessons, no face to face lessons. Nobody has yet explained what they thought was acceptable for their members to do to earn their salaries during this time.

Our bins have been collected completely as normal, but our refuse centres were completely closed for? 8 weeks, zero taxis operating, zero dentists, GPs offering text appointments only as a consultation method. So, no, not normal service.

Anyway, as others have said, most likely f us are marking. I'm spending roughly two full days a week marking - much more than normal because in normal times a lot of that would be verbal/live and lots would be whole class feedback.

So significantly more time marking than normal, and overall, significantly more hours worked than normal. I am looking forward to the last week of term when at least there won't be any work to set (because the week after is the holidays) so with that tiny bit of "gained time" I can do some of the other parts of my job.

In my school, the students who have done the work set have all had every single piece worked (some of the maths and MFL is on self-marking on line platforms, of course). They have all progressed in their learning because of the individual attention.

Those that haven't done any work - haven't.

That guideline was written on 26/3 when no one expected 6 months off, surely there’s not a school in the land still adhering to it?!! Seriously is there kids still not doing marked work at all

My dd’s primary school hasn’t requested for pics of the work to be sent in at all, and about 8 weeks into lockdown I got an email “save all your work....” - which was too late, we’d decluttered by then, and fairly intelligent dd had lost enthusiasm for lovely neat work given that nobody saw/checked. If we get asked for it on her return, we have now kept a few bits and bobs but nothing special. Sometimes Dd doesn’t want to do the work as too easy/babyish so I find alternatives. I’m hoping that they will too busy with the curriculum when they do do back to insist on seeing a huge stack of work undertaken at home.

@Mostpeculiar

That guideline was written on 26/3 when no one expected 6 months off, surely there’s not a school in the land still adhering to it?!! Seriously is there kids still not doing marked work at all

Yes! My y5 ds’s school isn’t marking, or providing feedback beyond a Seesaw like, and that not reliably and often after a gap of several days.

Oh, and I'm not in the NEU but I haven't paid particular attention to what my union have said or not said about marking/not marking/live lessons.

I'm interested in their advice about safe practices and would seek out their support if I felt my school wasn't providing a safe working environment, but when it comes to providing as good an educational and pastoral provision as possible, I listen to my SLT, my HOD and my own professional instincts which are to work as hard as possible to replicate the classroom experience for our students and to go above and beyond to support their pastoral and emotional (and in some cases, financial or safeguarding) needs.

Ok - to resolve the coloured pen comment (the poster was not, I don’t think, suggesting she wouldn’t mark because she didn’t have a purple pen. It was a comment on the marking policies schools sometimes have.

I’ve attached a snip of an example: not my school.

If it was business as usual there would definitely be some SLTs who would try and hold teachers to their policy.

If you're not happy, please just email and ask instead of assuming that you are in Poseidon of full facts

I have said this many times, emailing and asking why a teacher isn’t working is not really going to yield results. That some are redeployed, ill themselves, dealing with the loss of family members, or any other aspect of life that may be happening to them personally at the moment is really none of the parents business. A good head will not be saying ah yes, Mrs X is currently not settong or marking work cos she’s on a ventilator in the local hospital. That’s confidential information and shouldn’t be given out to parents willy nilly.

The unions didn’t say no video lessons, they were cautious about live lessons. Two different things! All you have to do with paper is leave it 24 hours and it’s should be fine so booklets being delivered less of a problem. Adults generally much better at hand washing too. Shall we just forget any kind of risk assessment ?

As people have said marking need to have impact proportionate to the amount of time spent on it, which is why feedback rather than traditional marking has become popular.

Of course some form of feedback is important and if none is received raise it with school. Sometimes I wonder though if when people say they are not receiving any it’s they are not receiving it in the format they expect. It’s the same as online learning. Which is why communication with school is useful. Not saying there are not bad examples but I know lots of teachers and parents in lots of different schools and all are providing/being provided with work and feedback.

“ just in the same way that I would expect a teacher to deal with paper homework from the few who can't submit by email or electronic means. And when people say "mark" they don't mean put ticks and crosses on it with red pen, they mean give feedback.”

By ‘few’ that’s just over 40% at my school. 10% of my school we have been providing weekly food boxes for. I am not going to apologise that my school have prioritised these things over marking.

When the NEU said mark they did mean mark and not ‘give feedback’. They can and very often are different things in teaching. As the teachers that guidance was aimed at.

There will of course be some individuals teachers or schools that aren’t great. In the same way that you get that in every job or profession. That needs to be taken up with individual schools.

There have been a lot of posts here explaining possible reasons and scenarios why the guidance was given.

“Just go in to school” 🤣🤣🤣🤣actually can’t even respond to that. That has to win for most stupid comment so far.

Yeah, 40% of our students are doing work on paper. Those that are physically dropping it to school are getting it marked by teachers the next time they are in or scanned in by other teachers or TAs and emailed to the (shielding) teachers who are still wfh.

Or some students email just one teacher (the one they've developed the best rapport with during home learning) with every single piece they're doing and that teacher looks up the child's timetable and distributes to the relevant teachers.

It is incredibly time consuming. And just imagine if ALL the kids were doing work (they're not)?

But we're going above and beyond because we always do (and yet people still choose the outstanding - uninspected since 2005 - school down the road. It's more of a mn school, by out of date reputation alone).

“Our bins have been collected completely as normal, but our refuse centres were completely closed for? 8 weeks”

This was because the bin men had a high sickness rate obviously as not the nicest job during a virus so they redeployed the staff at the tip to work on the bin rounds.

My year 10 has not had a single piece of work marked. He now asks what is the point. Like most teachers I’m working full time from home so don’t have the time to prioritise my child over my need to keep my job.

"Like most teachers, I’m working full time from home so don’t have the time to prioritise my child over my need to keep my job."

Isn't that a tad over dramatic? No teacher's job is at risk because they struggled to juggle their own DCs with their work.

(I wasn't complaining about the refuse centres... It was illegal to leave your house apart from for four reasons, anyway!)

Isn't that a tad over dramatic? No teacher's job is at risk because they struggled to juggle their own DCs with their work

What is it you actually want? Teachers who are fully engaged with your children doing normal planning, teaching and marking or not?

Because if we’re doing it properly, our own children come a very poor second,

And yes, jobs are at risk. They were before the pandemic, let alone now.

So are any parents who report a woeful experience from their school thinking about moving their child to a different state school, one like mine, even if it's not the "right" "middle class" "bite your arm off to get your child into" school?

It is interesting hearing about the different approaches schools have adopted to following the government guidance. It shows that you cannot generalise at the moment about all schools with one blanket statement.

For example at my school now we are expected to hear children read sitting alongside them and we must send reading books home after a quick antibac wipe to clean them. We are touching papers etc that the children are using in school and haven’t been told to quarantine them. Children are also able to bring any lockdown projects in from home to show to the class. Another school may have a completely different approach such as children not being allowed to take in anything between home and school.

In terms of specific union guidance individuals and schools may decide whether they are going to follow all, part or none of it.

I do think school staff need the unions. I think there are difficult times ahead and I really think we need the unions to be asking questions regarding the welfare of school staff as I’m doubtful about the government doing it in an honest and open way. Case in point - unions asked to see the scientific modelling for June 1st returning year groups and why PPE wasn’t recommended. Eventually it came out that the combination of returning year groups were not modelled by SAGE and the representative of the DfE didn’t attend even the meeting about PPE.

I've marked throughout the lockdown. We were asked to use our own devices if we had them, so the two school laptops could go to those who didn't. These days, most teachers have their own computers at home.
Yes, it's not ideal. Yes, I'm trying to read upside down scanned photos. But it's a global pandemic and I care about the kids so...
Every teacher in my school has done this, in fact, we were doing more marking than usual until we got Teams set up so we could do live lessons.
I'm a member of the NEU. I think they have been incredibly unhelpful with this statement but none of us have to obey them, it's our choice.

@echt

Who made you the MN police? - that is puerile response - you're really not a good representative of teachers with your aggressive posts and your

Are you really saying you have received nothing from your daughter's school?

I haven't said that. The school has refused - on the advice of unions - to engage with video conferencing apps which is the format I think would be most beneficial for secondary school pupils - that's why private schools are doing it. It doesn't have to be a full timetable of live teaching, I'd appreciate some audio described power points or some recorded introductions to lessons - something that gives the pupils a connection with their teachers.

The quality of work set has been inconsistent - lots of very good resources provided by the MFL dept (including detailed feedback) and virtually nothing from the English dept. I have tried to engage with the School but they insist that they know best and their provision is good.

My question about your DD's education being impacted is relevant because I'm sure you'd be kicking up a fuss if it had been.

And the attempts to shut down discussion by accusing parents of teacher bashing is tiresome - it's because most of my DC's teachers are good that I want them to get back to teaching her!

"Go into school and use the computers there." My apologies. I had naturally assumed that you were complaining about the period where most school buildings were closed and relocated to community Hubs.

Not where I live. Schools remained open throughout to vulnerable children and those of key workers. I'm suggesting teachers without computers go into school and use the equipment there. Though i find it difficult to believe teachers don't have laptops etc- what do they do their planning and school admin on?