Feedback Policy
Rationale
We believe feedback should improve the learning for every child, focusing on success and improvement needs against learning intentions; enabling children to become reflective, confident learners and helping them to close the gap between current and desired performance.
Aims
o To ensure that all children progress, knowing their achievements and what they need to do next.
o To ensure planning is amended in order that the teaching and learning meet the needs of all children.
o To have a consistent approach that measures school progress against national standards.
Principles
Marking and feedback should:
o Identify attainment and not just coverage
o Recognise achievement
o Highlight key areas for improvement
o Encourage self-evaluation and future learning
o Be manageable, motivating and meaningful
o Support quality teaching and learning
o Be given and acted upon promptly.
Basic Skills
o Punctuation, spelling and grammar errors are to be addressed if the child has been taught the correct usage and yet errors are still being made.
o Spelling mistakes are to be identified according to the ability of the child at the teacher’s discretion.
o All dates and LI must be spelt correctly and addressed if not.
o If a high frequency word is spelt incorrectly the teacher will model the correct spelling and ask the child to rewrite it, a given number of times, under their work.
o The importance of high quality presentation is to be taught and emphasised to pupils. Regular handwriting practice needs to be taught to demonstrate joins, flow and correct and consistent letter size.
o Care must be taken not to over-mark, particularly where spellings and grammar are concerned as these can be addressed as part of Sp&g lessons.
Frequency of Marking
Wherever possible, work should be marked in the presence of the child so that suggestions, praise and other comments can be given shortly after or during the production of the work. However, this is not always possible; therefore, work should be returned to the child as soon as possible.
Feedback for pupils with Special Educational Needs
o Children who struggle to understand a written comment will have their feedback explained to them by either the class teacher or a teaching assistant. This will be recorded as FE (feedback explained) in their books.
o If verbal feedback is given VF will be recorded in their books.
o Children are encouraged to recognise their success and supported, if necessary, to make improvements.
Quality marking
Not all pieces of work can be quality marked.
If the LI has been achieved the letters LI will be highlighted in green in all subjects except RE.
Closing the Gap Marking
A focussed comment should help the child in ‘closing the gap’ between what they have achieved and what they could have achieved.
Teacher’s comments must model good handwriting.
Written or verbal feedback in Maths, English and Science should:
· help them to close their learning gap so they achieve the Learning Intention eg write a comment that expects a response. (see appendix)
· identify errors or misconceptions
· guide them to extend their learning even further eg write a question or set a challenge.
· Wherever the task is open or narrative, feedback should focus first and foremost on the learning intentions for the task.
Maths
o Maths should be marked after every lesson to prevent errors and misconceptions from being repeated and reinforced.
o Written or verbal feedback should guide the child towards improving their understanding.
o A4L - Pink and green highlighting is used to clarify feedback for the child. Green is to highlight the LI if the child has achieved this. Pink highlights errors which need addressing, by the child, before the next lesson. (in the correction and reflection time)
o Misconceptions will be identified and addressed before the next lesson. This might be through verbal feedback (VF) or immediate intervention with a teacher or a teaching assistant (II), as part of the starter for the next lesson or as part of a guided group in the next lesson (G).
o A closing the gap comment will be given at least once a week, for each child, to move their learning on or to extend their thinking.
o If manipulatives have been used to support a child this should be written as an annotation. (by the child or by the T/TA) or the symbol M can be used.
o If a child’s work is all correct, a pink highlight may be used to give a question or a challenge to extend their thinking/understanding further.
Literacy
SP&G
o There will be discrete marking of skills 2-3 times weekly. Children could self-mark and initial their own work if it is just a closed task or practice exercise.
o Most spelling and grammar work will be in Sp&G books (RED)
o Green LI if the LI have been achieved. Pink to identify where a child needs to make a correction. Or pink may be used to provide a question or comment to help the child improve the quality of their work.
Writing
o Ideally Writing should be marked after every lesson to prevent errors and misconceptions being repeated and reinforced.
o Written or verbal feedback should focus on how the child can make the biggest difference to the quality of their work.
o A4L - Pink and green highlighting is to be used on extended writing pieces. Green is to highlight good aspects linked to LI and Pink improvements they need to make.
o Children will edit their work using a purple editing pen. Presentation must still be good quality. (not ‘rough’ work)
Science
Ideally Science should be marked before the next lesson, and any misconceptions/errors identified and addressed through feedback. Pink and green highlighting will be used.
RE
RE should be marked before the next lesson. Teacher’s comments should encourage children to be reflective.
Other Subjects
These should be marked at least once a week. Ideally all work should be marked before the next lesson, and any misconceptions/errors identified and addressed through feedback. Pink and green highlighting will be used.
Where the lesson has been practical (i.e no written work) children need to write/stick in the date, LI and a brief explanation of the lesson (eg drama, speaking and listening, Art & DT, Music) followed by a brief self-assessment comment.
Responding to comments
o Before the next lesson begins, children will be given time to respond to the ‘closing the gap’ comment written by the teacher (Correct and Reflect). i.e at the start of the next lesson/registration time
o The pupil will initial the teacher’s comments, in purple pen, once they have read the comment.
o Any improvements will be made, by the pupil, in purple pen.
o The teacher will respond to the pupil’s response with a tick and/or a comment, addressing any mistakes.(Full circle marking)
Self Assessment
o At the end of each lesson, children are expected to self assess against the LI/Success Criteria in all subjects.
o They will indicate whether their understanding of the LI is Red, Yellow or Green and will write a reason to explain this/write a comment explaining what they have learned/write a comment explaining what they need to do to improve further.
Paired/peer Assessment
During lessons children will sometimes be asked to edit work in pairs.
The following points will have been taken into account
· Children need to be trained for this, through modelling with the whole class, watching paired assessment in action
· Ground rules are discussed, agreed e.g. listening, confidentiality
· Children should work out what they like first, and then suggest ways to improve the piece but only against the learning intention first-before spellings or handwriting etc.
· Pairings need to be based on trust
· Children will be encouraged to discuss each other’s work together rather than taking turns to be the ‘teacher
Organisation
· Where possible children will be encouraged to self-assess
· Children need to have some feedback about their work, but flexibility is important, depending on the nature of the task and the time available
· Distance marking should be accessible to children and manageable for teachers Codes will be used against learning intentions wherever possible
· When work has been distance marked, time will be given for children to read and respond to the teacher’s comment (correct and reflect)
· In order for the marking to be formative, the information must be used and acted on by the children
· Marking and feedback will be completed in any colour except blue and purple (as the children write in blue and edit in purple)
All staff, other than the class teacher, will initial to show they have acknowledged the work.
If a TA has worked with a child/group they will annotate using the codes in the policy.
Monitoring and Evaluation
A review of samples of work is carried out on a regular basis to monitor the implementation of this policy. The findings are shared with staff.
The Success Criteria will be:
o Improvement in children’s achievement and attainment
o Consistency in teachers’ marking across the whole school
o Participation of children in the process.
Marking Codes
Children’s work should be marked using the symbols included below. These symbols have been chosen in order to be relevant to children, and because they are easy to administer and reproduce. These symbols will become recognisable to the children as they progress through the school. These symbols should be on display in classrooms as a reference point for teachers, support staff, supply staff and children.
Symbol / MeaningLI: / Well done this work shows you have achieved the Learning Intention
5+5=9 / An error has been made. Children are expected to correct it/redo the calculation.
...... / A pink highlight: The child is expected to respond to the question/challenge before starting the next lesson.
VF / We have talked about this piece of work. (verbal feedback has been given)
FE / Written feedback has been explained to a child.
T/TA / Teacher/TA support
G / Guided group with an adult
I / Independent working
X / Incorrect
______ / Spelling incorrect (underlined)
// / New paragraph needed.
^ / An omission.
/ Missing punctuation or incorrect punctuation
/ Not enough work completed in the time
hh / Does not make sense
II / Immediate intervention is needed and will be given /has been given before the next lesson to address misconceptions.
Wednesday X3
(written under their work) / Model the correct spelling and state how many times the child should write the word out correctly.
M / Manipulatives have been used.
A selection of stamps may be used as appropriate.
APPENDIX 1 - FEEDBACK GUIDANCE FOR TEACHERS
Quality Feedback NOT more feedback is needed!
APPENDIX 2-ENGLISH MARKING GUIDANCE FOR TEACHERS
Quality feedback through marking.
This takes four main forms.
1. Elaborating and extending (‘tell us more….’)
a. This may take the form of reminding the children of the learning objective and asking them to focus on improving their work in keeping with it. (Most suited to more able children).
b. It may include scaffolding prompts which focus the child’s attention on specifics:
What did the lion’s breath smell of?
Describe what the old house looked like as you approached it, using either a simile or metaphor.
Add a little more suspense as they enter the house.
c. Or prompts which delve a little deeper with two or more questions or statements.
Tell us more. What do they look like? How do they move?
Can you tell me more about why Daniel enjoys his hobbies? Why does he want to play in the competitions?
d. Example prompts can be used where the teacher models words, phrases or sentences to guide improvements.
I have rewritten the first part of your story showing you how to correctly set out direct speech. Think carefully about the rules we discussed. Please re-write the section I have highlighted in pink correctly.
2. Adding a word or sentence.
Ask the child to add a word or sentence to the existing text.
Now add some adverbs to describe how they fought.
Daniel, think of a really good adjective to describe the roast lamb.
Use an adjective to describe the tree.
Choose a more effective word to replace ‘said’.
Please finish- As slow as ……..
Tell me two things Ben liked doing.
What did the children say to the ghost before they left the house?
3. Changing the text.
Asking the child to change the existing text in some way.
a. Replacing individual words.
Look at the words I have highlighted in pink. Can you add adjectives to describe these things?
Think of a better adjective than big and replace it.
(Depending on the age and ability of the children you may want to give examples to help support them- you could try large, enormous, huge…..or one of your own.)
b. Replacing individual sentences.
You have understood the genre well. Can you think of a better way of writing the sentence I have highlighted in pink?
Look at the sentence I have highlighted in pink. Rewrite it so it begins with an adverb.
c. Replacing paragraphs.
I’m not quite sure what happens at the end of this story. Please rewrite the ending, explaining what happens in more detail.
4. Justifying (‘why…?)
Asking children to justify something from the text by asking why. These improvements have the potential to make significant improvements to the text. However, it may be useful when training children up to add the word ‘because’ to ensure they continue with the text rather than respond to the teacher.
Why was he speechless? Tell me more! Jack was speechless because……..
Why were the ugly sisters jealous of Cinderella? Cinderella’s ugly sisters were jealous of her because…….
Why was it obvious to you? It was obvious to me because…….