5 (essential) tips for marking the ToK Essay Draft
Marking, and feeding back, on the ToK Essay Draft is the key process in improving ToK scores. This post is designed to save ToK Teachers time, toil and possible trauma - it’s focussed for teachers who are new to teaching the ToK Essay, it’s in the “if only I’d known this” category.
1. Keep a copy of both the marked and unmarked Draft.
A copy of the unmarked Draft can come in useful if the student does not submit a final essay, and you have to send off the Draft. A copy of the marked draft is useful in case the student ‘loses’ your marked draft (it does happen - honestly). The easiest thing to do is to mark the essay in an cloud based platform such as Google Docs, but if you’re marking hard copies by hand take a photocopy before handing them back - it could save you a lot of time later on !
2. Check that the PT is written at the top of the essay exactly as published by IB.
This is a lot more important than it sounds, If the student has written the PT at the beginning they’re much more likely to have directly answered the PT, you will find that as you mark the essay you are constantly referring students back to the wording of the PT, this is all made a lot easier if the PT is there at the beginning.
3. Share a proforma checklist with students beforehand.
A proforma checklist is going to clear up a lot of the problems before you get to marking the essay. It will also save you a lot of time not having to repeat the same points over and over again. You can also use the checklist in peer review before submission.
Don’t rush writing the written feedback, nor explaining it verbally face to face. Time invested in these processes now will save you time, & stress, later on.
Free ToK Feedback Proforma (Google Doc)
Free ToK Feedback Proforma (PDF)
Feedback Presentation (Google Slides)
4. Format & Style matter.
Format is easy - standard font (Arial / Times New Roman) double spaced, the double spacing is important, as is the style of the essay. The essay is best written in a formal academic style, not overly formal, but certainly not informal, colloquial nor familiar. The student certainly can refer to themselves in the first person, and include their personal reflections, but this should all be done in an academic style.
5. Feedback as 2nd / 3rd Interaction
Use the handing back of written feedback as the 2nd or 3rd recorded interaction with the student. You have spent a lot of time writing the feedback, so it’s worth using a little more time holding individual feedback meetings with the students- checking that they have read the feedback, understand the feedback, and have plans to act on the feedback. After this feedback meeting I ask students to record the meeting as their second or third interaction with me.
Written feedback on the draft is a crucial moment in the ToK Essay writing process which can have great influence on the grades that the students get in the essay.
Well - that’s how I do it, if you have any tips, things that you do differently, please let me know either in the comments section, or email me at Daniel@ToKToday.com
Have a wonderful time marking the ToK drafts,
Daniel,
Lisbon, Jan 2023