Unmarked books in year 11

[Oinkyoinky]

My dd is in year 11 at a good state school.
Her physics book has not been marked since June of year 10. Her chemistry book is newish, but has not been marked since mid Sep year 11.
I understand that no teacher has the time to comment and mark a book fully, however, there is no indication that either book has been looked at at all - not even a cursory tick. There was a short period of time at the beginning of year 11 when they had a few supply teachers, but now all teachers are permanent.

It turns out that my dd has not not completed some class or homework during this time, but she has not been pulled up for it, as the teacher does not look at their books. I only noticed while having a quick snoop.

I approached school and they have stated that the teachers are very busy and expect a lot of independence from year 11s. Some tests / assessments have been marked by teachers and some tests are self or peer marked. But these are on separate sheets to the actual exercise books.

How much independence is a reasonable expectation of year 11 students (top set) for doing all the work set diligently?
Is it totally up to the student, who ultimately can slip under the radar with no consequences or should a teacher be looking at books and checking if work has been completed every so often?

From what I can see and have been told, if I hadn't highlighted this to the school, my dd could have gone under the radar for the whole of year 11, with class and homework. Is this OK and would it just be labelled as 'her fault' or should there be a system in place to catch students who start to wane and then get them back on track?

Of course she is in the wrong for not doing the work - that goes without saying, but she never used to be like this - I get the feeling the lack of feedback combined with the ease of 'getting away with it' has
taken its toll, combined with the normal teen rebellion stuff.
I'd just like her to get some consequences from the school to handle this, but they don't seem to think it's an issue.
Opinions appreciated!

I teach History and do mark year 11 books as I set lots of exam questions as homework tasks etc so I measure progress this way. My dh teaches a science subject and sets weekly past papers, these are not done in exercise books. He only marks these and measures progress this way. He doesn't then mark books unless the student is performing badly in the past papers and he needs to see what is going wrong.
So it depends on the the subject and the monitoring style really.
Schools are obsessed with year 11 progress so it's unlikely that the teacher has just not bothered.

Our school’s policy is to only mark Home work and exam style questions. ‘Tick and flick’ or a cursory ticky takes a lot of time and does not benefit anyone. Marking is only useful if it informs planning or helps your child to improve their work.

What is being marked?

Does she have mocks now? Or had them just before Christmas?

Since surely that would be the consequence of not doing the homework - she would find some of the questions on the mocks more difficult. Seems like a very natural consequence to me. I don't see that much point in marking books that contain notes and things that they do in class. Practice papers and homework from study guides often have answers available as well. I'd be surprised if they didn't have some sort of mocks that the teacher would mark, so you have a general idea of how she's doing - as would she. If she hasn't been doing the homework, either she doesn't really need to, if she can do the exams well enough without, or she will realise that she has to catch up, which is a consequence now.

I'm not a teacher, though; I tutor students of that age, and I am often surprised how little responsibility some of them take. In my school, tops sets often had all the answers available to them for homeworks in things like maths or science; you were worried and asked for help if you found that you couldn't do it, or figure out where you'd gone wrong after seeing the answer. Or you didn't bother, if you felt you could do it already - and got your comeuppance on the unit tests if you couldn't. We were worried enough about marks at that age that it was enough of an incentive/consequence.

Thanks for the feedback flowersWB. It makes sense in your husband's situation to just mark the weekly past papers, and then he can see any issues.
However, my dd is certainly not set weekly past papers, and when she does have one to do, it is generally self or peer marked, and the teacher does not ask for the marks. If there are gaps or questions missed, the teacher is unaware. The teacher only seems to mark the big assessments. So it's easier to go under the radar for a longer period of time.

Thanks Chaos - on average homework (practice questions / paper) is marked by a teacher once or twice a term tops. Any other homework is peer or self marked.

Picklefish - she had her mocks just before Xmas and results out soon - so some consequences may be on their way! Agreed students need to take some responsibility, I'm just surprised at how easy it is to not do work and get away with it (in the short term anyway)!

I have the same issue with my Y11 son's History. He has had nothing marked or reviewed this academic year at all. And no, they don't do tests or anything like that in class either. He tells me that in class they mostly write their own notes based on reading the text book, and that's about it, other than the odd video watching session, then their homework is usually the tasks as set in the textbook. So basically, he could be writing a load of crap in his book, or not doing it at all, and the teacher wouldn't have a clue!

It surprises me as I keep hearing about teacher's high workloads due to having to regularly mark, having to plan lessons, etc., yet his teacher just seems to turn up and tell them to continue working through the text book or put a video on.

Kazzy that does sound particularly rubbish.
I get the whole independence thing, but there comes a point when if the student knows that the teacher is setting work that isn't marked or even looked at, then they will question whether they should bother to do it in the first place. Yes, in an ideal world they should be more motivated and yes this will affect their exam results, whether it's in the short term with mocks or in the long term real thing, but many teenagers are stuck in the now and don't think that far in advance. Surely in this important year there needs to be more safety nets in place, so any issues are able to be discovered more than once or (or at a push, twice termly)? Or am I seriously deluded!!?

Or am I seriously deluded!!

No, you're right, but there appears to be a massive variation in the quality and standard of teachers. I thought that Ofsted inspections, supervised lessons, etc., were supposed to weed out the poor/lazy ones, but it appears not. The thing is, for my son, some of his other teachers go way above and beyond what would be reasonably expected. His geography teacher, for example, marks his book work in detail every 2/3 weeks, as does his English teacher - and I'm not just talking about random ticks, I'm talking about red writing all over each page highlighted the good bits and making suggestions for the not so good. I find it really difficult to understand how teachers can be so different in the same school.

Kazzy - I think in my dd's school, they have such a shortage of teachers, in particular science teachers, that the SMT are scared to push some too hard, in case they leave. One particular teacher is notorious for maybe marking 1 or 2 pieces of homework a year - but it seems that he is better than nothing and they don't want to ruffle his feathers, lose him, and face using supply teachers and having to recruit. The gaps in knowledge are often covered up in the gcses by private tutoring so it doesn't always show in results. Have you had a chat to the school re your ds's history teacher?

Have you had a chat to the school re your ds's history teacher?

Yes we've spoken to the teacher, but he just brushes it off with the usual guff about how they should be self-sufficient and responsible when they're year 11's! Unfortunately, nowhere else to go at the school as he's HOD and also a school governor so he's got his feet well under the table! He's been there 30 years - he was actually an ex-pupil himself and started teaching there straight out of Uni, so knows no life outside the school! The statistics show problems with his department. In the GCSE results tables, a far lower proportion of pupils get good History GCSE grades compared to virtually every other subject!

Kazzy - if I were you I'd take it higher - to head of year or headteacher. Surely they must see the stats and realise there's an issue?!

Ask for the school’s marking policy. If it’s not being adhered to then you should complain to the HOD.

I’d have thought that in Y11 students would need specific feedback more than other year groups not less. It’s such a crucial year!