Pres (mocks) do you correct your own?

Terri26 · 27-02-2015 12:05am #1

hi guys,
don't know how to add a poll. I'm wondering what is the story in other schools with their pres? Listening to friends it differs greatly school to school. We get a choice of sending LC out but not Junior Cert. Seems very unfair some schools get to send out everything and others don't get the choice at all. Correcting some subjects is very intensive.

seavill · 27-02-2015 12:07am

All sent away no choice

r93kaey5p2izun · 27-02-2015 12:14am

We aren't allowed send anything out, even if we were to pay ourselves.

Noccy_Mondy · 27-02-2015 12:26am

Sent away thank god. Too much to be expected from teachers to correct them themselves imo.

Benicetomonty · 27-02-2015 12:32am

Sent away. Would ruin mid term if they werent.

Terri26 · 27-02-2015 12:39am

I agree. It's a lot to expect from teachers and it doesn't seem to be appreciated for the teachers who do have to correct.

acequion · 27-02-2015 1:31am

All sent away here too,thank god.

duffyp · 27-02-2015 10:58am

We correct our own which I agree with- you get a good idea of the strengths and weaknesses of your classes and although I had over 70 to do both lc and jc if you're organised you can get it done before mid term.

katydid · 27-02-2015 10:59am

Noccy_Mondy wrote: »

Sent away thank god. Too much to be expected from teachers to correct them themselves imo.

Correcting mocks is a huge demand. And anyway, surely as the real exam is structured and marked now, it's better that the mocks get marked in the same way?

gaeilgebeo · 27-02-2015 2:53pm

Not a popular opinion, but I feel correcting mocks is part of our job.

As an aside, students in disadvantaged schools can not afford to pay to have mocks corrected.

theboy1 · 27-02-2015 2:56pm

OP a trick to use is just think of the grade you think the student should get and just give them that grade.Then just say they wont be getting the preys back.

Its actually fairer overall.

solerina · 27-02-2015 5:18pm

All of ours are sent away thank god...would hate to have to correct them !!

evolving_doors · 27-02-2015 5:26pm

theboy1 wrote: »

OP a trick to use is just think of the grade you think the student should get and just give them that grade.Then just say they wont be getting the preys back.

Its actually fairer overall.

What we actually need is a new system where everyone else tells us how to mark and grade our own students... oh wait!

Benicetomonty · 27-02-2015 5:29pm

I could live with correcting Geography but hl jc and lc English would destroy my mid term. English can be subjective so beneficial to get a 2nd opinion, for teacher and student imo.

katydid · 27-02-2015 6:12pm

gaeilgebeo wrote: »

Not a popular opinion, but I feel correcting mocks is part of our job.

As an aside, students in disadvantaged schools can not afford to pay to have mocks corrected.

Why is it part of your job? Mocks are extra exams taken voluntarily by students to prepare them for the real ones. They are facilitated by the school, but the teachers in the school are not responsible for them. They have enough to be doing

Apart from anything else, under the current system, you're not doing students any favour by not getting them corrected externally, if you want to truly replicate the exam system.

Surely a school could have a fund for anyone who couldn't afford to pay.

duffyp · 27-02-2015 6:25pm

If you follow the markscheme you're being fair to the student, it shouldn't make any difference to the grade whether it's externally or internally marked. On the point about it being funded by the school if the student can't afford it, surely the moneys better spent on ict or sports or fixing buildings, seriously lads and lady's it's not that big an ask.

sitstill · 27-02-2015 6:30pm

katydid wrote: »

Surely a school could have a fund for anyone who couldn't afford to pay.

You obviously haven't taught in a disadvantaged school.

Hazelnut Button · 27-02-2015 7:56pm

We correct them here. No way the school could afford to pay in our case either.

katydid · 27-02-2015 9:09pm

sitstill wrote: »

You obviously haven't taught in a disadvantaged school.

It's been a long time.

Obviously not all schools could afford it, but schools often have contingency funds. This kind of thing should be a priority, if they have, as it is both unfair on teachers to expect them to do this work for nothing and a pity that the student doesn't get an independent marking.

katydid · 27-02-2015 9:10pm

duffyp wrote: »

If you follow the markscheme you're being fair to the student, it shouldn't make any difference to the grade whether it's externally or internally marked. On the point about it being funded by the school if the student can't afford it, surely the moneys better spent on ict or sports or fixing buildings, seriously lads and lady's it's not that big an ask.

Sure, if you follow the marking scheme, there's no problem. So what's all the fuss about the JC proposals? :-)

implausible · 27-02-2015 10:15pm

katydid wrote: »

Why is it part of your job? Mocks are extra exams taken voluntarily by students to prepare them for the real ones. They are facilitated by the school, but the teachers in the school are not responsible for them. They have enough to be doing

Apart from anything else, under the current system, you're not doing students any favour by not getting them corrected externally, if you want to truly replicate the exam system.

Surely a school could have a fund for anyone who couldn't afford to pay.

They're not voluntary in my school or most that I am familiar with.

I work in a DEIS school, where there is no way in hell we could ask students for €100+ after Christmas. Our principal is very much against sending them away, due to cost, time and quality. I swap with a colleague in another school, charge the students for the paper (€2.50) and add on 50c for postage. We are both experienced examiners, so they are marked properly and are back in fairly good time. Though it is a torture, I find it good to get some perspective by marking scripts from another school.

I am very sceptical about the quality of marking; examiners are often not experienced, are poorly paid and there seems to be no moderation. This is not doing the students any favours.

katydid · 27-02-2015 10:23pm

implausible wrote: »

They're not voluntary in my school or most that I am familiar with.

I work in a DEIS school, where there is no way in hell we could ask students for €100+ after Christmas. Our principal is very much against sending them away, due to cost, time and quality. I swap with a colleague in another school, charge the students for the paper (€2.50) and add on 50c for postage. We are both experienced examiners, so they are marked properly and are back in fairly good time. Though it is a torture, I find it good to get some perspective by marking scripts from another school.

I am very sceptical about the quality of marking; examiners are often not experienced, are poorly paid and there seems to be no moderation. This is not doing the students any favours.

What I mean by "voluntary" is that they are not part of the school curriculum; they are an exercise schools choose to offer their students to help them.

I do understand about the cost, honestly. But there are schools where most students could afford them and those that couldn't can be helped. Naturally that doesn't apply in all cases.

I know what you mean about the quality of marking. A school shouldn't use a company that they have a negative experience of.

jayo76 · 27-02-2015 10:26pm

Changed in our school last year from all sent out to internal correction. The change was a major source of contention in our school, not so much the extra workload though that of course wasn't welcomed but the manner in which the change was introduced, basically done over the head of teachers at Board and Management level with no consultation.

katydid · 27-02-2015 10:31pm

jayo76 wrote: »

Changed in our school last year from all sent out to internal correction. The change was a major source of contention in our school, not so much the extra workload though that of course wasn't welcomed but the manner in which the change was introduced, basically done over the head of teachers at Board and Management level with no consultation.

You could have just refused. It's not in your job description - yet...

jayo76 · 27-02-2015 10:34pm

katydid wrote: »

You could have just refused. It's not in your job description - yet...

No we could not have refused, we got Union involvement and were advised that if Mocks went ahead we had a duty as teachers to correct them.

katydid · 27-02-2015 10:55pm

jayo76 wrote: »

No we could not have refused, we got Union involvement and were advised that if Mocks went ahead we had a duty as teachers to correct them.

That surprises me. It's not in your contract, mocks are extras to the normal curriculum.

Interesting.

seavill · 27-02-2015 11:08pm

There's no S&S written in my contract that I have a copy of here, but we all know how that ended. What is right and what happens can be two different things at time

katydid · 27-02-2015 11:12pm

seavill wrote: »

There's no S&S written in my contract that I have a copy of here, but we all know how that ended. What is right and what happens can be two different things at time

Yes, but that was specifically negotiated into our terms and conditions. It used to be voluntary and we VOTED to incorporate it.

I wasn't aware that the marking of mocks was considered part of our terms and conditions, when they are not standard school assessment.

jayo76 · 27-02-2015 11:21pm

We were simply told that if mocks are held in the school we can not refuse to correct them, we were told assessment is part of a teachers duty and this was from the Union. Look in reality the real issue in our school was that this was a massive change in our working conditions which was imposed on us without any consultation. I understand people who have the view that teachers should correct mocks and that it is part of your duty but the reality is that for the first 15 years that I worked in the school and for some teachers for 30 years it was not part of our work, to have that changed overnight by a management decision is simply not right.

The unfortunate truth is that we were told we had no option but to correct them. Sure we could kick up a massive fuss and refuse to hold mocks at all but who's interests does that serve.

Teach30 · 28-02-2015 11:50am

We were told that students had choice to send them out or not. Unfortunately only 4 out of my class group sent them away, I have 24 to correct and to be very honest I am allergic. I feel hard done by as the other teachers in my dept sent most of their papers away.

I've had them for over a week and haven't touched them, I've never corrected JC/LC exams so I don't know if I'm even doing it properly!

Must try and get down to them today but feeling overwhelmed by them already.

ejak1 · 28-02-2015 12:13pm

Correcting mock exams is so exhausting. I have 5 exam classes and have up to 30 in each class. I have over140 exams to correct and one of my subjects has 2 papers. I don't have a choice to send away and I feel so envious of teachers of non-exam classes and non-exam subjects at this time of year. I just wish sometimes I had chosen different subjects, although I do appreciate that there is no such thing as an easy subject to teach. It's just that some of them involve a lot more corrections. I'm also carrying out mock orals before and after school. I know we won't get sympathy from the wider public, but at least fellow teachers understand how hard the job has become. Is there any end to the work that we are expected to do?

dory · 28-02-2015 1:17pm

We send all ours away. It's the way it's always been done and I don't mind. I like getting someone else's opinion on my students' work. My department send them all to a guy who is an experienced department corrector.

muteswan · 28-02-2015 4:04pm

Got mine done already - 120 in total.

Don't know what all the fuss is about.

r93kaey5p2izun · 28-02-2015 4:26pm

I think that it is part of our job to correct unless parents want to pay for independent marking. I don't agree with making parents pay for mocks or corrections but if it's mutually agreed then fair enough. That said I think the workload can be huge for many teachers (depending on subject and number of class groups) and getting an outside view of standards would be helpful. In my school results must be in just four days after the final exam and that can be stressful. I also don't feel I get any more insight from correctng mocks than from correcting tests and exam questions so I personally wouldn't see that as a reason to oppose sending out corrections.

We must do our own corrections because of poor experiences with outside companies in terms of quality of corrections and delays in getting scripts back. We buy in papers but this must come out of subject department budget.

implausible · 28-02-2015 4:30pm

muteswan wrote: »

Got mine done already - 120 in total.

Don't know what all the fuss is about.

The fuss is around whether teachers see it as part of their job or not and if they are used to doing it. If you work in a school where they are all sent off, I can see how it sounds like a mammoth task.

Many teachers like the idea of an external eye over their students and that is perfectly reasonable, but my issue is that the people who mark them are often underpaid and inexperienced and in that case, the teacher is as well off marking them his/herself, even with his/her biased view of the students.

It matters less in some subjects than others, but in my subject, English, given the choice between sending them off to someone inexperienced and marking them myself, I'd chose myself. I'm lucky that I have someone experienced to swap with and I think, especially in schools where cost is an issue, swapping is something that should be promoted as the ideal compromise between external marking and cost.

katydid · 28-02-2015 4:46pm

Chase Some Flab wrote: »

I think that it is part of our job to correct unless parents want to pay for independent marking.

But the mocks are something that is not part of the school curriculum. They are additional voluntary exams facilitated by the school. It's no more your job to correct them, surely, than it is to run the school debating team?

seavill · 28-02-2015 4:47pm

Chase Some Flab wrote: »

We must do our own corrections because of poor experiences with outside companies in terms of quality of corrections and delays in getting scripts back. We buy in papers but this must come out of subject department budget.

Thats a bit mental

Inspector Coptoor · 28-02-2015 5:01pm

I corrected my own mocks.
~20 papers.
5 hours work or so.
Grand.

Other teachers send them away.

katydid · 28-02-2015 5:04pm

Inspector Coptoor wrote: »

I corrected my own mocks.
~20 papers.
5 hours work or so.
Grand.

Other teachers send them away.

That's alright if you have only 20

r93kaey5p2izun · 28-02-2015 5:08pm

seavill wrote: »

Thats a bit mental

Well it's a DEIS school. Charging students is out of the question. Departments could choose to make their own (a few do and certainly LCA options where no papers available) but otherwise where would the money come from?

implausible · 28-02-2015 5:08pm

seavill wrote: »

Thats a bit mental

Why? In some schools, getting money off the students can be nearly impossible. They're probably saving a lot of grief by taking the paper out the subject budget.

Inspector Coptoor · 28-02-2015 5:09pm

katydid wrote: »

That's alright if you have only 20

Yeah, true.

I'll have close to 60 JC papers to do in April, but again, I'll do them myself. I seeming as a long class test

implausible · 28-02-2015 5:11pm

katydid wrote: »

But the mocks are something that is not part of the school curriculum. They are additional voluntary exams facilitated by the school. It's no more your job to correct them, surely, than it is to run the school debating team?

Are there schools in the country who do not do mock exams? Debating is voluntary on a student by student basis; mocks are not. Some schools don't run Christmas exams because the mocks are so soon after, they are equivalent to an extended house exam and are regarded as such in most schools.

katydid · 28-02-2015 5:14pm

implausible wrote: »

Are there schools in the country who do not do mock exams? Debating is voluntary on a student by student basis; mocks are not. Some schools don't run Christmas exams because the mocks are so soon after, they are equivalent to an extended house exam and are regarded as such in most schools.

I'm sure they all do them. But the fact remains that they are a choice made by the school outside of the norms of the curriculum, for the specific purpose of preparing students for the exam. The school facilitates them.

They may have become the equivalent to a house exam but that's a different matter.

Bobsammy · 28-02-2015 5:18pm

We have to correct up to 60 papers and anything in excess of that can be sent out. I think this is a fair way of doing it.

I'm not sure how the cost is met as students aren't charged per paper sent out but the cost must be built in somewhere.

I didn't send any out this year as I've no Junior Cert class so didn't hit 60.

seavill · 28-02-2015 5:47pm

katydid wrote: »

That's alright if you have only 20

Yea true I would have had nearly 100 this year

Meangadh · 28-02-2015 8:34pm

Thank God we send ours away. I sometimes have up to 4 exam classes and because I teach Irish, there are two papers, an aural and an oral (at LC level). It would be absolute torture to have to do that much correcting and to be honest it would interfere with all the other work I need to be doing to prepare for classes and I wouldn't be correcting one single thing other than the mocks for a few weeks whilst I was trying to get through that mountain of work.

I totally understand the money thing, but I think if it's any way feasible at all (and I know unfortunately in many schools it isn't), they should be sent away. I don't see it as part of our job- I do enough correcting as it is to know what level my students are at. Let someone else do it and I'll happily take the feedback.

seavill · 28-02-2015 8:39pm

Chase Some Flab wrote: »

Well it's a DEIS school. Charging students is out of the question. Departments could choose to make their own (a few do and certainly LCA options where no papers available) but otherwise where would the money come from?

implausible wrote: »

Why? In some schools, getting money off the students can be nearly impossible. They're probably saving a lot of grief by taking the paper out the subject budget.

It was the part about taking it from a department budget I was surprised at. not the fact that students couldn't afford it.
However your second post about having the option to make your own paper clears that up slightly

painauchocolat · 28-02-2015 9:41pm

Ours must be corrected in-house. No one enjoys it, but it's accepted that for many of the kids it would be too expensive to send them away. (DEIS school)

evolving_doors · 28-02-2015 11:47pm

painauchocolat wrote: »

Ours must be corrected in-house. No one enjoys it, but it's accepted that for many of the kids it would be too expensive to send them away. (DEIS school)

can you swop with another teacher outside the school?

I think it should be left to the teachers decide (with due consideration for student finances etc.).

Depends on the subject too.. some of the solutions can be fairly straight down the middle and other subjects can be a bit trickier. Also some students can get a bit of a wake up call when its an outsider correcting (as obviously you have it in for em

)

I prefer to adjust the companies exams to focus on certain things I want to.

rainbowtrout · 01-03-2015 1:37am

implausible wrote: »

Are there schools in the country who do not do mock exams? Debating is voluntary on a student by student basis; mocks are not. Some schools don't run Christmas exams because the mocks are so soon after, they are equivalent to an extended house exam and are regarded as such in most schools.

Yes, I know of a school in my part of the country that doesn't do them. I've encountered one or two students over the years from that school that have got mock papers from my school for practice in their own time.

Pres (mocks) do you correct your own?

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