It was great to start the second week of our final Marking and Feedback Fortnight of the academic year by hearing from four colleagues in the Performing and Visual Arts Faculty about their excellent approaches to marking students’ work. Highlighting smart and effective strategies gave colleagues across the school tips on how to provide detailed feedback to students, but in a less time-consuming way.

In Music, teachers are experimenting with self-marking tests which provide students with instant feedback as to how well they have performed through graphs and detailed data analysis. In Dance, standard feedback proformas provide clear essay feedback and track progress over time. In Drama, staff have been experimenting effectively with strategies that give large groups feedback using a data source that students can refer to when they purple-pen respond or practically improve their performance work. Staff in Drama are also using learning walls to capture strengths and areas for development and are then using this data to inform future planning to ensure excellent progress week by week.

It was another impressive set of examples from staff at Bushey Meads going the extra mile in providing feedback for students in their care.