Select three exercise books or composition notebooks that represent a range of achievement in a class that you teach. Read through the written feedback that you have given.

Now read the following characteristics of constructive written feedback and, using traffic-light colours, code those statements in terms of how they reflect your own practice (red: rarely; amber: often; green: typically).

The written feedback:

• focuses on the learning objectives selectively;
• confirms that pupils are on the right track;
• stimulates the correction of errors or improvement of a piece of work;
• scaffolds or supports pupils’ next steps;
• provides opportunities for pupils to think things through for themselves;
• comments on progress over a number of attempts;
• avoids comparisons with other pupils;
• provides pupils with the opportunity to respond.