Guides for markers
How to write rubrics, mark a cohort consistently and give feedback students act on.
Rubrics
- How to write a marking rubricA practical method for building a marking rubric: choosing criteria, setting levels, writing descriptors and weighting, with a complete worked example rubric.
- Analytic vs holistic rubrics: which to useWhen to mark with an analytic rubric and when a holistic one fits better, with the trade-offs in speed, consistency and feedback, and examples of each.
- Writing rubric descriptors that markers agree onHow to turn vague rubric descriptors into observable ones that different markers apply the same way, with a table of before and after rewrites you can adapt.
Feedback
- Writing feedback students actually act onHow to write marking feedback that students use on the next task: feed-forward, specificity, tone and length, with weak comments rewritten into useful ones.
- Marking faster without losing qualityPractical ways to cut marking time while keeping marks consistent: time budgets per script, batching, comment banks and marking by criterion, not by script.
Moderation
Assessment design
- Late penalties and extensions: models, maths and fairnessHow common late penalty models work, with worked calculations, plus how to apply extensions fairly and explain the rules clearly to students before they submit.
- Marking group work fairlyHow to mark group work fairly: separating group and individual criteria, using peer assessment, gathering contribution evidence and a worked split of marks.
- Marking programming assignmentsHow to mark programming assignments: criteria for functionality, code quality, testing and documentation, running versus reading code, and handling similarity.