Edith Cowan University, Research Online, Perth, Western Australia
Abstract
Anecdotally, teachers take up opportunities to mark large-scale assessments because they are told by colleagues that it is \u27good PD\u27. Assertions about the value of marking are passed along with little question. However, research into the benefits of participating as a marker in large-scale marking has not been conducted in the Australian context. This paper reports the results of an online survey of Australian teachers (N=43) about their participation in large-scale marking in order to examine whether the research that has been conducted internationally is likely to be generalisable to Australia. The responses to the survey are described and then compared with four main areas of benefit identified in the literature. It found that Australian teachers\u27 views of large-scale marking are similar to those of their international colleagues, and that teachers report a broad and varied range of benefits. Additionally, it was found that survey respondents identified a range of costs and drawbacks of marking that have not been reported in the literature, but that in spite of these the respondents would still recommend the experience to other teachers
