All in good time: Influences on team leaders’ communication choices when giving feedback to examiners

Abstract

During the standardisation and live marking phases of an examination session it is increasingly common for team leaders and examiners to interact via a digital marking environment. This environment supports a number of quality assurance functions. Team leaders can see examiners' real time scripts and mark submissions, and they can compare examiners' marks with preordained definitive marks on special monitoring scripts to check marking accuracy. The digital marking system also allows team leaders to give examiners feedback on their marking. This article focuses on feedback practices, using observation, interview and survey data from 22 team leaders and six examiners to explore the rationales and communication choices involved in such practices. The analyses suggest that the objective of giving feedback is to construct messages that allow examiners insights into a team leader's thinking, and this interaction is central to the development of an examiner's understanding of how to interpret and apply mark schemes in accordance with their team leader's views. This article discusses how the concept of synchrony underpins the feedback practices of team leaders and examiners, ensuring that the participants develop a shared focus so that both feedback message intention and reception are aligned.