Auto and Teacher Marking in Online Assessments – A Teaching Perspective
Esther Lury
The marking dilemma
As a teacher, I found myself strangely conflicted about the idea of auto-marking. But why? Shouldn’t I be grateful at the prospect of never having to spend my evening marking 30 (or more) papers? And why am I not revelling in the knowledge that I will never again have to fill in 1s, 0s and -s in a spreadsheet in order to know where to direct my efforts?
But instead of this anticipated feeling of release, I feel a sense of regret and unease at the loss of the rich and valuable diagnostic information gained from the marking process. I know that my teaching – and therefore the children’s learning – is founded on the information gained from marking. I am fascinated by the mistakes they make and what that can tell me about their misconceptions or test taking techniques. The ongoing planning process begins as I see their responses. Simply using descriptors of what a question assesses does not tell me which part they don’t understand, particularly in more complex problem-solving situations.
But I’m also aware that I can be my own worst enemy. There are only so many hours in the day and always more tasks available to fill it, not to mention the importance of some down time.
So, is there a solution that can offer the best of both worlds – quick whole-class trends and tailored individual data; a summary of overall progress and rich diagnostic information for adaptive teaching; improved well-being and effective assessment?
Perhaps a hybrid model could enable essential time savings without compromising the link between my pupils’ responses and ongoing teaching and learning.
Auto-marking
Some question types lend themselves to auto-marking, such as closed items where responses are limited to the options given. Multiple choice style questions are a good example of this. Here are some examples from the 2023 key stage 2 maths and reading national assessments:
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In both instances, a computer could instantly mark pupil responses and provide immediate cross-cohort data on proportions answering correctly. Some platforms also provide data showing which pupils have chosen each option. This would enable me to see the most common misconceptions and design my lessons accordingly without spending hours marking and inputting data.
This would also be true for matching, ordering and ticking questions such as these (also taken from the 2023 national key stage 2 assessments):
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Teacher marking
In the case of questions which require some problem solving, interpretation or explanation, valuable information can be gained from the marking process. This question is from the 2023 Maths SATs paper:
An auto-marking system could quickly identify those pupils who can accurately carry out all the steps to solve this problem: multiplying, dividing and interpreting a remainder. From the computer marks, I might discover that 30% of my class have the skills and understanding to answer this question but would have little idea about the interventions required to support the other 70% - arguably the very information I need to support progression. Even if the computer used final answers as a proxy for common errors, essential information would be lost.
Take these three responses:
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From marking this, I can see that one pupil needs support identifying the correct operations to carry out from a word problem; the second needs help with the written division algorithm while the third one would benefit from some times tables practice (or perhaps just needs to slow down!) .
Even in the case of a correct response, much useful information can be gained. From the response below, I can see that the pupil understands the maths required but would benefit from more efficient methods of formal calculation, yet this information would be lost if marking was solely automated.
In the case of reading, even questions that look as if they only have one answer benefit from a teacher marking them. This is because there is potential for an enormous number of acceptable answers due to misspellings. For the following question from the 2023 Reading SATs, an automarking system would not tell me which of my children need intervention with spelling and which need work on vocabulary and reading comprehension.
Answers from find and copy questions are also an excellent source of information about test technique because of the number of instructions that children must process. When marking these answers, I consider whether children have understood where to look in the text and whether they have written a single word from the text as well as whether they have been able to use the context in the text to find a synonym for the word in the question.
Other open questions, such as the three-mark question below, are clearly complex to mark and are best suited to teacher marking - especially in low stakes formative testing. Self-expression is personal and can take a long time to develop. As I want to mark assessments positively, it is important for answers to be interpreted with the child in mind. I know the children in my class and so I understand how each individual uses language to express themselves. My knowledge of my class allows me to contextualise responses and mark them accurately.
Reading digital assessments that prioritise auto-marking do not include open, longer format questions. However, as a teacher, I need to know whether my children can reason and express their opinions about the texts they read and where they need more support and opportunities to practise.
Although marking some items manually may take slightly more time than computer marking, it is still quicker than traditional paper marking. Once I have marked items like the ones above on a digital platform, the data is instantly available alongside the responses of other pupils and other questions. Analysis is automated and I can begin to adapt my teaching immediately with no need for additional data entry (those dreaded 0 and 1 spreadsheets) - the planning cogs in my teacher brain have already started whirring from the rich information marking those few questions have given me.
Overall, there are definitely time savings that can be made from the automarking process. However, by including just a few items for teachers to mark manually, the assessment can offer the detailed information needed to move the learning of my children forwards.
To find out more about NFER’s range of paper assessments and our new NFER Online Assessments, visit our NFER Tests page.