Teachers and their red pens...

[Suzy Mouse]

Just curious to know...do your children have teachers that use red pens and tend to "go to town" on their papers?

I work with someone who loves to mark the students papers with red pens and it drives me crazy. I tend to use purple, blue or black and try hard not to make to many markings.

 

[Sonya]

I guess I'm one of "them". I can't see the corrections I make if I use any other color other than red or pink. These 2 colors stand out for me the best. Also, since I'm often correcting grammar and vocabulary I tend to correct everything that is wrong, in the hopes that they student will see their mistake and not make it again.

 

[Suzy Mouse]

I can understand using them in that case. I guess that's why I tend to use purple more. It stands out better than the blue and black.


I have those pens that have red on one side and blue on the other. One of my students went to go use it and tried the red side. He said how come the red sides of your pens never work. I had to explain to him that they've never been used.

 

[DemonLlama]

Only a few of my coworkers still use red pens. The psychological connotation of blood is very powerful and tends to inflame reactions from students. They either get very angry, or shut down entirely and don't read a single mark. Most often, teachers at my college will use the alternate color ink (blue for typewritten papers) to make corrections.

I've given up the pen altogether. My students submit their papers electronically through my email and I grade them using the comment feature in Microsoft Word. There is a neat little box (in whatever color you choose) in the margin with typewritten comments and corrections and a line leading to the part of the essay to which the comments correspond.

I've only heard positive comments from my students. I type much faster than I can hand-write comments, so they get more feedback, and the neatness of the page is not intrusive or overwhelming. Our on-campus writing center loves working with students who bring in my graded papers because of the clarity and ease of interation with the corrections.

 

[Pin Wizard]

It doesn't bother me on kids papers. I expect it actually. But my last boss used red pens all the time! I wanted to go in her office and break them all!!

 

[Pooh93]

Funny, you bring this up, because I was just discussing how dd's 2nd grade teacher loves her red pen!

 

[SoonerKate]

My teachers always used green pens, especially my English teachers. I have issues with green ink now.

 

[Kallison]

Yesterday we were working on a test and a student told me that I reminded him of his grandmom -- I just reached over and wrote a big fat F on the top of his paper. Of course they knew I was joking because I don't grade their tests, I'm a learning support aide. All the kids got a kick out of it.

 

[Ratpack]

I teach fourth grade...and I try to use a different color on each set of papers- just for these reasons given!! I am not one to go crazy with the pen. If the answer is wrong, then I circle the number. I will have the students go back and correct the answer then write a "k" beside the "o". This tells them that the answer is now "OK" and I will recheck it. Sometimes I average the first and second grade together, or I will just give them the second chance grade. We all make careless mistakes from time to time. I like to give them chances to find and correct them. Most of the time, they will say-"Now , I see what I did wrong the first time!" EXACTLY what I was hoping for!!!

 

[faithinkarma]

A parent teachers meeting where way too much time was monopolized by a group of parents ( former teachers BTW, now SAHMs ) who wanted teachers to stop marking incorrect answers with check marks.

They claimed their children were being emotionally scarred by these marks that were pointing out their mistakes.

They wanted the teachers to be compelled to only put a small dot next to each mistake.

I kid you not !


Personally I figuured it was only a matter of time before the small red dot began to traumatize the kids also.

 

[rwcmath]

College math professor here, I use red pencils!

 

[caitycaity]

i don't see the big deal in using red, personally. i don't think i suffered any damage from seeing red on my paper.

are little kids these days like bulls when they see red?

 

[faithinkarma]

i don't see the big deal in using red, personally. i don't think i suffered any damage from seeing red on my paper.

I should have mentioned this happened about 20 years ago, so these emotionally scarred kids are probably over on the debate board now wreaking havoc

 

[caitycaity]

Originally posted by faithinkarma
I should have mentioned this happened about 20 years ago, so these emotionally scarred kids are probably over on the debate board now wreaking havoc

 

[Dan Murphy]

How about a puzzle, Suzy??

 

[Lanshark]

I should have mentioned this happened about 20 years ago, so these emotionally scarred kids are probably over on the debate board now wreaking havoc

And here I though it was because they weren't breastfed

 

[BHFan25]

LOL, Marcie. Red marks or bottlefeeding--it is something, that's for sure!

As a parent, I don't mind the red marks.

My oldest sister actually went to the school to discuss NOT ENOUGH red marks on her dds papers. On the way to the room, she ran into another parent who was speaking to the teacher about TOO MANY red marks on the paper!! LOL And the reasons this other mom gave were the same as faithinkarma stated! (& this was NOT 20 years ago)

 

[Rutt and Tuke]

I dont' see anything wrong with red pens as long as the teachers write both good and correcting remarks on the papers.

 

[JDY]

I usually use green or something similar and I only mark what I tell my students I'm looking for. So, if I assign a paper and tell them to focus on content and agreement then that is what I mark. There's no sense in destroying their confidence. I will mark silly mistakes that could have been avoided by proof reading carefully.