Marking is exhausting, subjective, and time-consuming.
Gerry Dee, a Canadian actor and stand-up comedian who used to be a teacher, says the worst part of teaching was marking (CBC Comedy, 2018). Although he adds humour to connect with his audience, it's evident that he genuinely didn't enjoy grading. Many educators can relate to this and get good laughs from watching this stand-up comedy episode, finding humour in the shared experience of the time-consuming nature of grading and providing feedback. His grading strategy on Mr. D is solely based on his feelings toward his students and has nothing to do with the quality of the essays his students submit (CBC Comedy, 2011). Gerry's jests about not really 'marking' after September imply the subjective and inconsistent nature of the task, as providing detailed, constructive feedback becomes exhausting over time (CBC Comedy, 2018).
Zhao et al. (2023) claim that grading is “inherently subjective and time-consuming; automatic scoring tools can greatly reduce teacher workload and shorten the time needed for providing feedback to learners” (p. 7031). “redirect their time to spend on more complex pedagogical tasks such as designing lessons to cater for learner diversity and to motivate learning” (Zhao et al., 2023).
As intermediate teachers, we spend considerable hours marking and giving consistent feedback to our students, especially in writing and reading. While offering feedback and grades is invaluable for students' learning, the process is tedious and time-consuming, especially when aiming for personalized feedback on a regular basis. Educators juggle countless tasks and student interactions throughout the day other than grading. In order to help educators save time on grading, we thought of using a mobile AI technology that would identify the patterns of student writing and evaluate student reading skill level and comprehension skills; this would help keep students on track and motivated while allowing teachers more time to focus on providing in-person support and lesson preparation. There are many existing technologies out there that act as a teacher’s assistant to provide feedback to learners.
In addition, instantaneous feedback can be exceptionally beneficial for students. If AI was implemented into formative feedback within a classroom, LMS, or other learning systems, students would not have to wait hours, days, or weeks to get feedback on their literacy levels or assignments. While current implemented technologies allow feedback on spelling and grammar, they do not provide feedback on style, length, detail, or complexity of language. Our rationale include a vision of a future where students can gain constant feedback on a variety of literacy outcomes without waiting, helping them achieve their goals in a much more efficient manner.
Our website will explore existing mobile technologies that help provide feedback to students in writing and reading while proposing future ones to benefit educators and learners.