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Showing posts from June 30, 2008

Gaining Marks for Obscenities

Pupils are gaining marks for writing obscenities in their GCSE English exams even it has nothing to do with the question. A pupil who wrote “f*** off” has been given marks for correct spelling and successfully conveying meaning. More marks would have been given if he had put an exclamation mark after it, as this shows a grasp of very basic grammar.Peter Buckroyd, the chief examiner of English for the AQA - Assessment and Qualifications Alliance - is responsible for standards in exams taken by 780,000 candidates and for training for 3,000 examiners. He has instructed other examiners to mark in the same way adhering strictly to the mark scheme, to the extent that pupils who write only expletives on their papers should be awarded marks. 2 marks, out of a possible 27, where given for the 2- word expletive. As a marker of English papers myself, I do understand the idiosyncrasies of working to the criteria of a mark scheme and the difficulties of finding the "best fit" to mark posi