To all teachers: What color do you use to grade papers and homework?

[PianoMan14]

According to http://teachertipstraining.suite101.com/article.cfm/teacher_grading_papers one should grade with green and blue ink...

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A child sits at their desk waiting for the teacher to hand back their test and praying that it is not sprayed with red marks. Fellow students in the classroom know a paper that has several red markings on it will usually receive a lower grade. The child with many red markings on their test will quickly fold the paper and stuff it into their desk in the hope that no one saw their test.

 

There is an education movement to retire the reds for the softer colors of purple, green, and blue pens to mark student work. Many educators understand the psychological harm the constant red markings on the paper do to a child’s self esteem. After a child receives their test back with countless red markings there is a minimal chance they will bother to find out their errors. It is too embarrassing in the classroom to examine their errors and also many children do not want to show their parents their red stained test. Children want to please and a paper that is filled with red markings makes a child feel inferior and it is not a motivator. A child is not motivated to do better because they begin to shut down since the learning environment is not safe.

 

The purpose of grading a paper or test is to identify the child’s weakness and offer suggestions to improve their ability in a specific subject. Red markings are too bold for the student to calmly understand their errors; instead they become agitated and begin their self-critical dialogue. No student wants to fail; they just do not know how to excel.

 

<br clear="both"> <br clear="both"> All colors have an impact on our state of mind. Most children who are placed in a bright red room will be full of energy that will be harnessed in a negative or positive way. Red is a powerful color that gives us energy. Think of the sun with the brightness of reds, yellow, and oranges. These colors make our hearts beat faster, our internal temperature increase, and it symbolizes power. Colors such as blues and greens are calming colors to the body. Hospitals often have doctors wear blue or green scrubs because it relaxes the patient on a subconscious level. I have never seen a doctor wear red scrubs because it will stress the patient. Remember this when you decide to mark a child’s paper with red, the color of blood.

 

 

Read more at Suite101: Teacher Grading Papers: Should I Mark a Student's Paper with a Red Pen http://teachertipstraining.suite101.com/article.cfm/teacher_grading_papers#ixzz0dT8pCski

 

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Personally, I don't attach much weight to the whole self-esteem thing; and I prefer my teachers to use red.

 

But I'm curious: What do you grade with?

 

[dizzypen]

Noodler's Fox Red. It's permanent. It stands out on the page. I'm still a student and I still receive things marked in red. I don't think I have any self-esteem, self-confidence issues.

[hollyuk]

I think it is rubbish - children have to learn to fail in order to appreciate a win. I had plenty of red pen on my work when I was learning and I turned out just fine. Yep, you have to give them lots of love and attention, but I do think children these days are mostly too sheltered. We have to build adults with character.

[Penman222]

Skrip red from a wet wide Parker "45". Screw educational theory.

[limesally]

I'm firmly in the camp that feels you can only learn by correcting your errors, so I take issue with the self-esteem thing. Self-esteem is an issue that's bigger than ink color, for heaven's sake.

 

But this isn't a discussion on emotional resilience, it's on pen ink and perhaps my situation is different, I only grade college-level stuff. I don't use red, but not for fear of hurting anyone's feelings, I just don't particularly like reading it myself, it feels hard on my eyes. I tend to use

 

PR Arabian Rose

PR Naples blue, Waterman SSB, Lamy Turquoise

violet pensee

 

also, because they behave well in the fine-nibbed pens I prefer using on crappy, bleedy printer paper.

[yachtsilverswan]

If educators abandon red ink for some perceived confidence-crushing effect of red ink, and instead mark mistakes with green, won't green quickly be associated with mistakes just as red is now? Won't green then be the confidence crushing color? I wonder what effect green-is-bad, green-is-wrong will have on the Green Movement? Yes, there are always unintended consequences...

 

I understand that many high school teachers and college professors are now requiring longer papers to be emailed in specified formats (usually MS Word or MS Word for Mac), rather than printed. By accepting only digital papers, students' work can be easily tested with plagerism software. But when papers are submitted digitally, how are corrections and comments marked?

[Juan in Andalucia]

I use red; a cheap pilot G2, Bic or something like that. I read about that color theory you've posted some years ago and I gave it a try... it didn't work.

 

Juan

[HelzBelz]

If educators abandon red ink for some perceived confidence-crushing effect of red ink, and instead mark mistakes with green, won't green quickly be associated with mistakes just as red is now? Won't green then be the confidence crushing color? I wonder what effect green-is-bad, green-is-wrong will have on the Green Movement? Yes, there are always unintended consequences...

 

I understand that many high school teachers and college professors are now requiring longer papers to be emailed in specified formats (usually MS Word or MS Word for Mac), rather than printed. By accepting only digital papers, students' work can be easily tested with plagerism software. But when papers are submitted digitally, how are corrections and comments marked?

 

I agree on your first point: surely green would quickly strike the same fear into children's hearts, if it were going to in the first place.

 

On your second point: at my undergraduate university, we submitted a paper copy for marking and a digital copy for plagiarism checking. At my postgraduate university, incidentally, we're not required to submit anything digitally (although the undergraduate are, I think).

 

For what it's worth, I've never been crushed by red marks (or any other colour) on my work: for one thing, the older you get, the more likely it is to be comments, rather than criticism or correction anyway. Frequently the comments are praise or agreement. When I was at school most work was marked in red: at university it's usually been in blue, or, rarely, black.

[fierdog]

Noodler's Ottmoman Rose.

 

Every once and a while I ask a student what they think about grading in red. They usually look at me like i'm crazy and tell me that they don't care what color i use.

[Keye Skware]

But when papers are submitted digitally, how are corrections and comments marked?

 

I always have to print out my students' papers in order to grade them. Same thing with articles and grants that I peer review. I need to sit in a quiet place with paper and a pen. It's just easier for me to flip back and forth between parts of the document and I'm sure there's a part of me that just likes to hold a pen while I'm doing it.

 

Now, one thing I will do for a paper that I am trying to provide detailed feedback to the author that they can use to make it better (not just to explain why I gave them a particular grade), is open a word processing document on my laptop while I'm reading. If there is a little something I can write in the margins, I do that in tanzanite ink. If I need to make a longer comment I will write a number with a circle around it on the paper. I then go to my computer and make a numbered list. The comment on the computer corresponds to the number on their paper. This allows me to write more and do it quickly. It's also nice when someone makes the same mistake multiple times, I just keep writing that number on their paper.

 

I print out my computer document and attach it to the paper. I scan the whole thing back into my computer, so I know what previous comments I made, and hand it back. If I have a student who can't make it to campus easily, I will e-mail them the scanned version.

[JMX]

R&K Morinda, most of the time (it's the only red I have at the moment), but I do think it might be fun and also beneficial to experiment a bit here. 

[loweevan]

I like marking papers with Skrip red or CdA Sunset. They don't bleed or feather.

 

I know it wasn't your question, but since others are responding to the brilliant educational insight from that article, I don't feel bad about doing it too. If you switch to blue or green ink, they really just become the new red, right? i.e. "Did you see all the green on Billy's paper?!" The color of the markings doesn't seem to be the problem, but the amount. So, the way I see it, a teacher has 2 options: 1) mark the errors, or 2) don't mark all the errors. I fail to see how the second is a good idea for one charged with the task of education. I'm sure that there is some psychology report that says that red carries a strong feeling of condemnation and shame that the more pacific blue and natural green don't. While I don't necessarily believe that, it probably also doesn't matter. As a boy, I certainly felt ashamed when my tests or papers came back with a lot of markings indicating errors. Shame is a powerful teaching tool. If the child is ashamed in earnest, the only true way to remedy the shame is by restoring their respectability (improving their performance).

 

But those are just musings. I've recently gotten papers back that were graded with a medium or broad nib. I definitely appreciate that the corrections are done with a nice pen, but comments in the margin are tough to read sometimes. Fine or Extra Fine would be better. Also, black ink doesn't really stand out enough considering that most students turn in computer-printed papers. Blue doesn't seem to be a good idea if they're writing in blue pen either.

[gylyf]

I grade in green, but it's nothing to do with the potential psychological harm red ink might inflict upon my students. I just don't like red, and a nice green stands out just as starkly. Best,

David

Edited January 23, 2010 by cellulophile

[dmmcf]

I mark student papers in red. (I mark my own work in red when editing.) Studies that suggest this is damaging strike me as absurd.

 

While it hasn't yet affected my field much, I'm more troubled by the trend to make educators into plagiarism cops, with software assistance and all it implies. I fear we're teaching students that anything they can get away with is acceptable.

 

Michael

[Keye Skware]

My wife is a teacher (she would want me to say "real" teacher since she jokingly tells me that college professors aren't real teachers) and she mentioned this years ago.

 

I don't use red ink because I grade so few papers it doesn't make sense for me to keep a pen inked in red.

[Yuki Onitsura]

I don't do much of my marking in red because I rarely have a pen loaded with red ink. I prefer to do most of my marking in green or purple anyway.

 

Yuki

[roger3]

Red ink can be offensive and threatening to some cultures who may interpret it as a portent of ill fortune or worse, death...I use royal blue or green. Student work I correct is english language learners as well as grad students in education at Gonzaga University

[ailleurs]

I teach English at the college level, so lots and lots of essay grading for me. Essays that are submitted electronically are commented on via Microsoft Word's 'insert comment' feature which allows me to provide more detailed feedback than if I hand-wrote comments (I type faster than I write, so more comments in the same amount of time). I mark up essays *more* than if I had to hand-write my feedback.

 

When I hand-grade tests, grammar exercises, etc., I use purple. I have no objection to red, and share the opinions of others who've already posted here about the ridiculousness of attaching self-esteem to an ink color. I just like purple. Also, I don't allow my students to use anything other than blue ink, black ink or pencil, so using purple is one way to avoid "but I wrote the right answer, see!" claims that would arise if I graded in a more conventional color.

[churl]

Psychologically, red is a very strong color associated with warning and hazard and danger. As such, seeing one's mistakes lit up in red can be somewhat traumatic. Since we don't associate green or blue with warnings or alarms, it doesn't carry the same connotation.

 

Whether you believe this sort of stuff or not, I will admit that I don't grade in red. I grade in pink with a gel pen (I tried with FP's but I was getting a lot of drying out). My theory is that pink makes the criticism less biting. I've never asked my students if they agree. Still, I don't see a big deal with grading in red. It's just not my cup of tea.

[Sandy1]

hello,

I'm slightly off-topic, but:

 

What if one were to use Red ink, but scented Red ink: MB Xmas edition, some from Herbin I think, also DeArtrementis (sp?)

Would the smell of roses, cookies, etc. provide balm for wee tender feelings?

 

Best Regards,

Sandy1