30 March 2019

Great place to do an exam feedback session

In my student days, we would get our exam papers back after they'd been marked. We could read the feedback on them and then either archive them or bin them. Nowadays things work differently! At least here they are. The students get only one chance to see their exams and the feedback on them: during an exam feedback session. These are 1 hour slots, organised by year. You just plonk the module organisers at a table with a pile of exams in front of them, and then the students (the whole year!) pile in and ask to see their exams one by one. We're not supposed to let them rummage through the pile themselves; the grades are confidential and they're not supposed to see other students' grades on the other exam papers. So you spend most of the time looking for the right paper. The students don't often have many questions! Just showing them the paper tends to be enough. This year I fielded none. My feedback must have been clear. And there were no issues with erroneous totting up the points. This can happen! And that's the sort of things the sessions are for.

When the students have seen their feedback they hand the paper back and move to the next module. And at the end of the hour they all get collected and stored away for the external examiner.

This time the second year's session was in a glamorous place. The zoological museum! We have one. Pretty cool to be surrounded by skeletons and jars and taxidermy and whatnot while waiting for the students to have a question. I should go there for real one day. Soon it'll be Easter and 'll have time! And maybe even an interested guest!





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