Philosophy of Marksbook 2000

Marksbook 2000 was initially developed in response to a need in current education to provide an accurate, immediate and comprehensive feedback to the students and their parents regarding their progress in any subject.

Essentially Marksbook 2000 will monitor a student's individual progress but at the same time it will relate this to the performance of a class or a year group of their peers.  In this way a student and their parents immediately know how that student is performing and also how this equates to what standard might be reasonably expected.  A student's trend is established in which the relative difficulties of the various assessments are removed and the individual's true progress is shown.  It can be easily seen if a student's variations lie within 'reasonable' limits. (i.e. +/- one standard deviation.)

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The underlying  philosophy of Marksbook 2000 is essentially a simple one; that the strong students are congratulated for their efforts and the weaker students are encouraged to achieve just a little more next time and to identify the source of their weakness.  Common to all students is the right for each of them to know exactly how they are performing at any point in the course.

There are some countries, notably the United Kingdom and more recently Australia that have taken, what is considered by many educationalists,  the retrograde step of removing references to marks, grades and any mention of an average or a standard that might be expected from their school reports.  Parents and students alike are being blinded by a plethora of information which, whilst true becomes incomprehensible and meaningless.  For the students that are weaker their true weakness is being disguised behind a comfortable veneer of  lexical illusion.  Interestingly, such reporting, and marking within the schools,  is now beginning to be removed from the reporting criteria of such countries and a move to a more comprehensive and accurate reporting is underway.

Modern theorists are often hesitant to 'label' the weaker students as such and a glossary of meaningless positive statements began to abound in pedagogical circles.  What has been missed is the subtle difference between 'labeling' a student and 'informing' a student. There will always be students who struggle in a subject and it is these students who deserve our greatest attention and professionalism.   A student who struggles is not labeled by such reports but rather by the uncaring attitude of either their teachers or the parents.   It has been shown that such students who receive reports from this software and can see the graphs of their results are encouraged to achieve. The students are not 'labeled'  in any way. A considerate and professional teacher can break the progress of a weak student down into smaller and more achievable goals.

Obtaining the feedback that is available through this software can also encourage friendly and healthy competition that encourages the students to bring out the best in themselves and each other.

There are those students who, whilst able,  will not put in the required effort.  Such students also benefit from seeing the immediate impact that this has on their score and position.

At the other end of the academic spectrum, the students that cope  and perform well also deserve to be encouraged, congratulated, acknowledged and rewarded for their effort - and Marksbook 2000 will assist the teacher in doing this.

In summary, whether the student is a weak or a strong one within the classroom, they and their parents  should know in simple but accurate terms how they are performing and coping with the course.  This is the underpinning philosophy that lies behind the Marksbook 2000 software.

Andrew Stuart (2007)

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