How to Mark Student Work Using ChatGPT

How to Mark Student Work Using ChatGPT

As a teacher, I understand the eternal struggle with marking. We love the chance to engage with our students’ thoughts and ideas, but let’s be honest - it’s exhausting. Piles of essays, endless rubrics, and late-night or weekend grading marathons can leave even the most passionate educators burnt out. That’s where AI tools like ChatGPT come in, offering a smart way to handle at least some of the workload.

In this guide, I’ll share my experience using ChatGPT for marking student work, provide some handy tips and prompts, and address the common concerns we all have about security, GDPR, and AI's reliability. By the end, you’ll have a clear idea of how to incorporate this tool into your workflow and maybe a little extra time in your week.

What Is ChatGPT and Why Should You Use It?

ChatGPT is an AI tool designed to mimic human language and thought processes. It can analyze text, identify patterns, and even suggest improvements. This means that with the right setup, it can help grade assignments, provide feedback, or summarize trends in your students’ responses.

But here’s the thing, ChatGPT doesn’t replace us as teachers. Instead, it acts as an assistant. It can cut down repetitive tasks, letting us focus more on teaching and connecting with our students.

Getting Started with ChatGPT for Marking

Using ChatGPT to mark isn’t rocket science. Here's a simple way to get started:

1. Access ChatGPT: Visit OpenAI's  ChatGPT page 
2. Familiarize Yourself: Spend a little time experimenting with it. Try a few simple tasks to see how it responds as perfecting your instructions (or prompt) is the key to efficient and accurate marking. Try this prompt if you like

“You are an expert high school teacher. Below is a question, marking guide and student answer. Your job is to give the student a mark, mark breakdown and student feedback:

Question text: Explain how animal cells and plant cells differ (4 marks)

Marking guide: A plant cell is rectangular, has cell wall, chloroplasts, and one large vacuole but animal cell is circular (1 mark), doesn’t have a cell wall (1 mark) or chloroplasts (1 mark) and has many small vacuoles (1 mark).

Student answer: Plant cells are usually rectangular and have a cell wall, as well as one large vacuole, which helps store water. Animal cells are more round in shape and do not have a cell wall. However, animal cells also have chloroplasts, just like plant cells, to help them produce energy from sunlight. They typically have only one small vacuole instead of many.”

1. Prepare Your Materials: Collect grading/marking criteria or rubrics, and your student submissions or specific instructions for ChatGPT to follow.

For instance, if you’re marking essays, input your rubric into ChatGPT as part of your instructions. This ensures the AI understands your expectations.

Crafting Prompts That Work

Let me emphasize this: the key to getting good results with ChatGPT is in how you prompt it. Here are some tips:

• Be specific: Include the marking guide making it clear where the student will get their marks, anything you’d like it to focus on in the feedback length of responses, tone of voice and anything else that matters.
• Use examples: Show ChatGPT what good and bad responses look like.
• Check the results: If the feedback feels off, tweak your prompt and try again.

Here’s an example for grading a student essay:

Role: You are an experienced high school English teacher tasked with grading a student’s essay.

Task:

1. Read the essay and apply the given rubric to assign a total mark and breakdown of marks across the specified criteria.
2. Provide clear, constructive feedback for the student, referencing specific parts of their essay.
3. The feedback should be:
   • Specific: Identify which parts of the essay are strong or need improvement, and why.
   • Encouraging and Positive in Tone: Highlight strengths before critiquing weaknesses, and offer suggestions in a supportive manner.
   • Actionable: Suggest concrete strategies or steps the student can take to improve their writing in future assignments.

Rubric (Total: 20 marks):

• Structure (5 marks): Clear introduction, well-organized body paragraphs, and a coherent conclusion.
• Content Accuracy & Relevance (10 marks): Accurate information, relevant examples, and a thorough response to the essay prompt.
• Grammar & Mechanics (5 marks): Correct spelling, punctuation, sentence structure, and overall readability.

Student’s Essay:
[Insert the student’s essay text here]

Good Example of a Teacher Response:
Mark Allocation:

• Structure: 4/5 – The introduction and conclusion are clear, and the body paragraphs follow a logical order, but one paragraph lacks a clear topic sentence.
• Content Accuracy & Relevance: 7/10 – The essay addresses the prompt well and provides relevant examples. However, a few historical details are slightly off, and one example isn’t fully explained.
• Grammar & Mechanics: 4/5 – Generally well-written with a few minor punctuation errors.

Total: 15/20

Feedback:
“You’ve written a strong essay that stays on topic and flows well from introduction to conclusion. Your introduction clearly states your thesis, and most paragraphs support that thesis effectively. To improve, consider adding a more focused topic sentence to your second body paragraph so it’s clear what the main idea is. Also, double-check your historical facts—making sure each example is accurate will strengthen your argument. Finally, watch out for small punctuation errors; reading your essay out loud can help you catch those. Overall, great job! With a bit more attention to detail in your evidence and polishing your mechanics, you’ll do even better next time.”

Poor Example of a Teacher Response:
Marks: 15/20
Feedback: “The essay is okay. You made some good points but some are wrong. You should fix grammar too.”

(This poor example lacks specificity, encouragement, and concrete advice.)

Now produce your final teacher response using the Good Example style.

Best Practices for AI Marking

While ChatGPT is powerful, it’s not foolproof. Here’s how to ensure quality:

• Always Review the Output: ChatGPT can miss nuances, especially in subjective areas like creative writing or open-ended responses.
• Blend Human and AI Feedback: Use ChatGPT’s suggestions as a base but personalize feedback with your unique teaching perspective.
• Encourage Student Engagement: Share AI feedback with students as part of a dialogue, not a final verdict.

For example, if ChatGPT identifies that a student’s argument lacks evidence, you can expand on it:

"ChatGPT suggests adding more data to support your thesis. I’d recommend looking at Chapter 3 for specific examples that could strengthen your points."

Addressing Security and GDPR Concerns for Educators

One of the biggest hurdles for educators considering ChatGPT is data security. The good news? Platforms like OpenAI are designed with privacy in mind and your data is encrypted. That said, here’s how to use it responsibility and stay compliant:

• Avoid sharing personal data: Never input students’ names, IDs, or other identifiers into the system.
• Use pseudonyms: If needed, replace student names with placeholders.
• Check your institution’s guidelines: Always align your use of AI tools with school policies.

ChatGPT vs. Marking.ai for Marking Student Work

ChatGPT is a versatile, multi-purpose AI tool that can be adapted for marking with careful guidance. It’s ideal for tech-savvy educators looking for a flexible and cost-effective solution. However, it requires significant manual effort to align with specific teaching needs, and privacy concerns demand vigilance. There are a few great tools specifically built for the marking use case. Below is a table comparing ChatGPT and a marking tool, specifically Marking.ai:

Final thoughts

You got into this profession to make an impact in the lives of of students while doing what you love - teaching. Unfortunately teachers have to do a lot of inefficient administrative tasks, one of the main culprits being marking. With the invention of AI, large language models like ChatGPT (or purpose built tools like Marking.ai) can lighten those tasks that used to take hours. 

By freeing up your time from tedious administrative work, these AI tools let you focus on what truly matters: inspiring, educating, and supporting your students. While no technology can replace the human insight and empathy that teachers bring to their classrooms, AI can be a powerful assistant, streamlining repetitive tasks and enhancing the feedback process for your students.

Embrace these tools to allow you to do what you do best - nurturing the next generation of learners.