The Joys of Marking IELTS Writing

Sally Lloyds and Ruth Carr, UK

Sally Lloyds has taught EFL for 32 years in the USA, France and Sicily as well as in the UK. She currently teaches at Itchen College, a publicly-funded sixth-form college in Southampton where she is the IELTS co-ordinator. She became an IELTS specialist in 2008. In addition to her EFL and IELTS teaching, she is also qualified to work with students with specific learning difficulties. Materials and strategies she has used for this part of her teaching have actually enhanced her IELTS teaching and she has developed several resources for use within the IELTS classroom, self-study and peer assessment. E-mail: slloyds@itchen.ac.uk

Ruth Carr has taught EFL for 35 years both in Africa and the UK. She currently works part-time at Itchen College, a publicly-funded sixth form college in Southampton, and also has a part-time home-based one-to-one IELTS tuition practice. At college most of her IELTS candidates are aged 17-19, while her private students are mainly adult medical professionals, keen to qualify for practice in the UK or in English-speaking countries such as Australia. The resources she has developed to help IELTS candidates assess each other’s performance, can also be adapted for BEC and other EFL exams. E-mail: rcarr@itchen.ac.uk

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Introduction
Active learning
Activities using the form
Other uses for the form
Uses for multi-level classes
Post-marking activities
Marking writing for other non-IELTS exams
Conclusion

Introduction

Marking IELTS can be tedious and time-consuming. This article will show ways to make the marking of IELTS essays less onerous for teachers and more purposeful for students. The resources we have created promote active learning and can be readily adapted for working with students at all levels.

Active learning

Handing back students’ writing can be a very teacher-centred activity. However, we have discovered a way to make it more student-orientated. As with many activities, students need to get to grips with the public domain descriptors of the exams they are taking. We have applied this in the case of IELTS where the descriptors can be found using the link below:

http://takeielts.britishcouncil.org/sites/default/files/IELTS_task_2_Writing_band_descriptors.pdf

By highlighting band 7 descriptors across all four criteria, a set of positive features in writing becomes apparent. However, ‘examiner-speak’ is too confusing and the unfamiliar jargon e.g. ‘using cohesive devices’ is too complicated for most students to understand.

We have created a simplified user-friendly version which has been very successful in our IELTS classes and in individual teaching. A similar form can be adapted to use with IELTS Task 1 writing.

TABLE

Activities using the form

In pairs, read a sample answer or each other’s answer and use the feedback form to make comments on each criterion:

• Task Response (TR)
• Coherence and Cohesion (CC)
• Lexical Resource (LR)
• Grammatical Range and Accuracy (GRA)

What the students write in the blank spaces below each feature, gives clear guidance on what they may be doing well (a √ will do) and brief comments show how they can improve. Misspelt words can also helpfully be written in the space below ‘good spelling.’ Grammar mistakes such as missed final ‘s’ and articles can be written below in the spaces in the grammar column.

Other uses for the form

• Useful for 1:1. The student and teacher read and mark together and complete the form
• It can be laminated and then be used repeatedly using non-permanent marker pens
• It provides a useful resource for collaborative active learning such as paired and group work after writing under test conditions

Uses for multi-level classes

• Differentiate the task by using a sample with obvious errors for lower level students
• Standardise by using an approximate band 6 student answer but do not ‘red ink’ it. Instead, hand it out to pairs for them to mark. Put teacher comments on a post-it to show students when they have marked it, so they can compare.
• Paired work: after a timed writing task, students swap scripts and peer mark using the form. They then discuss their comments with their partner. The teacher can later check the marking and give feedback beyond the level of their classmates.

Post-marking activities

A student’s higher band answer can be adapted to highlight particular features of IELTS writing. Possibilities include:

• Omitting paragraphing and sign-posting words
• Omitting final ‘s’
• Vocabulary spaces to fill in
• Omit verbs tenses – just put infinitive form
• Deliberate spelling errors
• The teacher could take error sentences from the essay to make an exercise for the whole class to correct either individually, in pairs or in small groups. We have found it works well to take at least one from each criterion: TR (Task Response) CC (Coherence and Cohesion) LR (Lexical Resource) GRA (Grammatical Range and Accuracy)

Marking writing for other non-IELTS exams

The form can be adapted for any EFL / ESOL exam or Cambridge Business English. See examples below:

Cambridge Business English Certificates (BEC) PART TWO WRITING FEEDBACK FORM

Target reader.................................Topic.................................Letter / email / memo / report

www.cambridgeenglish.org

ESOL Skills for Life
LEVEL 1 AND 2 WRITING PEER FEEDBACK FORM
Date ________________ Task _____________________Name_______________________

www.cambridgeenglish.org

Conclusion

With this approach, we have practised writing skills much more frequently because marking students’ essays has become more of a classroom rather than teacher ‘take home’ activity. We have found that this approach helps students to know exactly what is expected of them when they take the actual exams, and our results have improved accordingly.

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