I marked all of my students' essays over Christmas. They were an OK batch - none dreadful, none brilliant, but most in the 'pretty good' to 'good' to 'very good' scheme of things. There are a lot of students, and quite a few tutors on the course, so we moderate the grades by swapping a few essays with another tutor, and today I have been looking at 4 marked by another teaching assistant. I find myself with a professional dilemma: some of her comments are, for want of a better word, 'incorrect'. On one essay, she has not corrected a series of factual errors and confusions, and in another the punctuation / grammatical corrections she has made are wrong (in the latter, the student's version was actually correct before she changed it).
Now, for the first essay, I think this is because the essay is on a topic which is outside the tutor's area of expertise (and inside mine, so I would speedily recognise the mistake). Although there is not much in the way of alternative on 'survey' courses, this is one of the disadvantages of having the same tutor teach all topics - there is always going to be something that might catch us out. I'm know that I don't know everything! So, for this essay, I'm not too worried. I don't see it as too much of a dilemma, because I can point this out as being something I might reasonably know that she doesn't. The only problem is that she has written 'good points!' next to some of these errors. Maybe that could be altered to say these would have been good points, if this were true?
But, what about the grammar / punctuation 'corrections'? I feel it is important that student errors in this area are highlighted and corrected. And with this in mind, I don't feel comfortable ignoring the incorrect corrections. But I'm also a bit uncomfortable telling a fellow teaching assistant (who is mid PhD in English, and should be able to construct sentences) that not only is their punctuation poor, but they have done this on one of their student's essays. In black biro. I don't hold a supervisory position over her. We are merely peer moderating. I know I shouldn't be correcting her grammar.
I don't know what to do...
1 comment:
That is always the nightmare scenario with moderation. The grades are always likely to have an element of subjectivity but facts and references are either right or wrong. I always hate being given a 'specialist subject' essay in these processes, as invariably an odd error slips in that somebody with different research interests might not spot. I can only suggest tact on the first one...whereas the second is more complicated. I take it from your comments that corrections have been made, but corrections that render correct grammar incorrect. Hmmm, you could possibly suggest that you're not sure about the essay and that it should be one of the ones selected for convenor moderation, but that might not be appropriate. Aside from that, I guess something needs to be said, but good luck on phrasing it...
Post a Comment