The broom cupboard 3 - for briefly stranded republicans

[TheHoneyBadger]

First in tops up the gin supplies and turns on the tea urn.

I remember very clearly that for public exams we were not allowed to take anything of our own into the exam room at all, except our own fountain pen & replacement cartridges because it was acknowledged that that might have adjusted to fit our writing best. Different world!

@MrsHamlet

I only have black pens in my Bob box but they're allowed blue or black.

I 'm just curious - as someone who prefers to do Maths in pencil, and can see very obvious practical advantages - why a blue pen is allowed but a pencil isn't, if the only reason pen is used is due to worries about habits for future exams, and blue pens aren't allowed in those?

We always encourage them to write in pencil for maths. All the way up to sixth form. The only time they're encouraged to write in pen is in the exam. Even us teachers write our worked solutions and any handwritten worksheets in pencil.

I've no idea!
I'd be cross if they wrote in pencil because I want to see their editing (breaking Felicia's reliance on Tippex has been a challenge) but I don't care beyond that.

@noblegiraffe

Because if they're in the habit of using pencil to write in lessons for maths, they slip up and use it to write exams and that is NOT ALLOWED.

Except, those scripts still get marked as long as they're dark enough to be scanned. So it's not as big a deal as it used to be. At least, not for AQA GCSE, or Edexcel A Level.

What happens if they forget and write their exam in pencil, MsAD? Like switch halfway through after drawing a diagram?

They can write in blue in lessons, or those friction pens (which also aren't allowed in exams) because they won't be bringing those pens into an exam to accidentally write in.

But what if it's not dark enough?

Nothing noble. Absolutely nothing bad happens at all. The exams still get marked as long as they're dark enough to be scanned. And if they aren't dark enough to be scanned they go as a physical paper to a senior marker, according to our resident team leader.

Who spots it? Is there potential that a kid could switch to pencil halfway though, it's not dark enough to be scanned so scans as blank pages and the kids' answers end up not being marked and no one notices?

I'm pretty sure I've had scripts in pencil before. Especially diagrams/graphs etc. The scanner picks up yellow highlighter now.

We have at least 2 or 3 a year who use pencil in their exams, plus a few more who switch to pencil after their first graph. Their marks/grades never look unusual. It genuinely doesn't seem to make a difference, which was a real shock to me, but it seems to work. The black pen in exams makes it easier for the exam board but they don't penalise kids who forget/break that rule.

The papers are scanned by a human so I assume that they spot it and escalate it.
I get nonstandard scripts in the post to mark. Luckily not maths though

Scanning exam papers by hand must be such a tedious job!

By the time ours get to GCSE they just don't forget and write in pencil so I guess the 'what happens if?' doesn't come up. Good to know nothing bad!

I’d always recommend to students not to use Frixion pens though-the heat from the scanners rubs out the answer! Learnt the hard way. Maybe some pencils are similar, who knows?!

They can be too pale to read if written in pencil or blue, and now that extra pages are also scanned in there is a genuine risk of them losing marks because they could not follow instructions ( who’d have thought it) ( i am a senior examiner on 2 gcse papers)
You are no longer allowed to ask anyone else to see if they can read it, and yes it can be escalated but my eyes aren’t any better than a regular examiner.

Going to show my ignorance here, but wouldn't the exam invigilator (or someone) tell them at the start to use pen, not pencil?

Yes. And they also have a Bob box.

It won’t always get picked up though if they write in pencil. Markers mark one question at a time and not the whole paper. It’s tricky to tell if working is just showing up feint or if it is pencil writing and not pen or sometimes you can’t see it at all. It will get escalated if someone thinks there might be writing there and then as team leader I can see the whole paper in one go so would look at it as a whole and make as decision. Then the paper might get pulled and checked in person but it also might slip through the net if the team leader doesn’t seen anything. I had no idea the scanning machines could make the writing disappear?!?! Surely not?!!!? It just says to write in black ink or ball point pen - those pens are sold as ball point pens? Nowhere does it say they can’t use them does it? I know loads of kids use them!!!

We make them write in pen, diagrams in pencil, A4 books and they draw a middle margin to fill the space….

Yes they’re told and it is written on the front of every exam paper.

I had no idea the scanning machines could make the writing disappear?!?! Surely not?!!!? It just says to write in black ink or ball point pen - those pens are sold as ball point pens? Nowhere does it say they can’t use them does it? I know loads of kids use them!!!
If you mean the Frixion pens, friction from rubbing aka heat rubs the writing out so some scanners through their heat do the same thing. Had issues with pupil exam papers a year or two after they first came out (had to work with OCR exam board to work out a pupil grade at the time and I’ve done my best to ensure pupils don’t use them ever since!

Even Frixion themselves say not to use them for school exams etc. Always makes me nervous!

When I was telling my Y7s they had to write in pen one of them asked if they were allowed friction pens and I explained yes in class but not in exams because of the scanning issue. I said the friction causes the ink to disappear by heating it up and what did they think would happen if their exam went in a hot scanner? There was an audible gasp as they realised ‘all your writing would disappear!’

There should definitely be something on the front of exam papers about them, I can’t remember where I heard the scanning issue.

I'm going to teach my year 3 and 4 children to use biros. It's what real life is about. At the moment it's pencil though. Handwriting pens are crap, they just blob all over the paper.

I am going to spread this information far and wide….. 😱

I've had issues with those pens when I laminated a piece of work a child did and it all disappeared. Hadn't made the connection they'd used a frixion pen. Did find out that if you put it in a freezer the writing comes back though!