Clarity, succinctness and structure are important.
Especially for extended answers.
(Those answers worth 8 marks or more, or those with ‘graded’ marking that have multiple criteria per grade boundary.)
That’s exactly what I’m discussing in detail, with examples, in this (final!) 2019 EMVD entry.
Every year I’ve been selected to be one of the Referee Markers
(phew! That basically means you’re good)
and it’s like the grand finale *think fireworks bursting all over the sky!* when it comes to me learning what’s letting students down and possibly leading to them missing out on marks.
Because, this stage is full of the responses where both markers have judged the same answer to be worthy of two different marks.
It’s like one big, bright spotlight shining on the more complicated aspects of marking,
showing all the ways students are (inadvertently) making it difficult for the marker to award certain marks for certain criteria, or simply writing their answers in a confusing or non-succinct way!
Now, there are two ways this could go when an answer is confusing to mark:
- The marker accidentally awards credit where they shouldn’t.
(Possible, but less likely as we can only mark what we read, and there are strict rules around not ‘reading in’ meaning – i.e. where we can see what they mean, but they haven’t actually conveyed it fully). - The marker misses wording that could earn credit, because it’s jumbled within another point being made,
not clearly worded or the grammar makes a clear connection difficult,
or it’s led to a random tangent that isn’t relevant.
(More likely because markers are expected to mark to a time-frame and therefore cannot re-read over something more than 2, or total max. 3, times realistically.
Plus, we know the key points we’re looking for and if they are ‘hidden’ amongst waffle or off-task content, then we’re simply more likely to miss it).
*Side-note: Honestly, exam marking isn’t that different to sitting the exams!
So see if any of this sounds familiar for your teen, and then grasp my advice to ensure they don’t end up putting any marker on the fence or miss a mark they just maybe shoulda-coulda got.