I spent a goodly portion of the day marking today, with a colleague. Marking is so much more enjoyable when you have someone to do it with. You can randomly babble, or share examples of illegible handwriting, funny phrasing and the like, and it doesn’t feel quite so much like a punishment.

We decided early on that we needed to have a rubber stamp made with some of the choice comments we found ourselves writing (or wish we could write!) over and over on our respective piles of marking (exam for her, lab assignments for me).

That stamp now would have to be the size of a sheet of paper, but here it is, courtesy of mulled cider and too many cookies:

• please demonstrate your knowledge on this subject.
• this is not an answer.
• NO!
• there are no baskets on the Plains.
• this is not proper citation format.
• please write clearly.
• what do you mean?
• WHY did pottery develop in the Neolithic?
• this does not answer the question.
• this assignment was due ____ days ago.
• this word does not mean what you think it does.
• please use blue or black ink.
• please expand this answer.
• I believe you mean stone, not stoned.
• “Why” does not mean “how”.
• your spelling makes excessive use of the letter “y”.
• “How” does not mean “why”.
• I believe this is babbling.
• does the phrase “utter tripe” ring a bell?
• WHY??? Explain.
• just what do you mean, “relationship”?

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