How to Grade Students Efficiently & Get off the Grading Hamster Wheel

Grading students can take a big chunk of your time. And while it's certainly worth it to provide students with valuable feedback, there's no denying that it can be stressful and tiring. If you've ever stared at a stack of essays and wished they would just grade themselves, you're not alone. The good news is that learning how to grade students efficiently can help you reduce the time and stress spent on grading while still providing meaningful and accurate feedback to students, freeing up more time for impactful teaching and personal well-being. In this article, we'll share tips and tricks to help you streamline your grading process by utilizing AI in the Classroom.

One tool that can help you learn how to grade students faster is EssayGrader. This grading software for teachers will allow you to tackle those essays and written assignments easily. Instead of starting from scratch on each paper, you can use EssayGrader's customizable templates to jumpstart your grading. Then, you can provide personalized feedback to help your students improve their writing while saving time and effort.

What Purposes Do Grades Serve?

Grading systems are often as varied as they are complex. The traditional grading system uses letter grades to indicate student performance:

• A representing excellent work
• B indicating good work
• C signifying average work
• D showing below-average work
• F denoting failing work

Each letter corresponds to a specific range of percentages (for example, a B is typically between 80 and 89%). Grades can also be assigned using a numerical system, such as a 4.0 scale. In this case:

• A is equivalent to 4.0
• B to 3.0
• C to 2.0
• D to 1.0
• F to 0

Grades are typically calculated based on a weighted average of scores on assignments, tests, and exams. Most educators from elementary through higher education use the traditional grading system. 

The Role of Grades in Education: Helping Students, Instructors, and Institutions

Grades serve multiple roles in education. Barbara Walvoord and Virginia Anderson identify the multiple roles that grades serve:

• As an evaluation of student work.
• As a communication to students, parents, graduate schools, professional schools, and future employers about a student’s performance in college and potential for further success.
• It is a source of motivation for students to continue learning and improvement.
• Grades are a means of organizing a lesson, a unit, or a semester, in which grades mark transitions in a course and bring closure to it.
  

Grading provides students with feedback on their own learning, clarifying for them what they understand, what they don’t understand, and where they can improve. Grading also provides feedback to instructors on their students’ learning, information that can inform future teaching decisions. 

Why Grading Can Be Difficult: The Challenges of Grading

Why is grading often a challenge? Because grades are used to evaluate student work, it’s important that grades accurately reflect the quality of student work and that student work is graded fairly. Grading with accuracy and fairness can take a lot of time, which is often in short supply for college instructors.

Students who aren’t satisfied with their grades can sometimes protest them in ways that cause headaches for instructors. Also, some instructors find that their students’ or even their own focus on assigning numbers to student work gets in the way of promoting actual learning. Given all that grades do and represent, it’s no surprise that they are a source of anxiety for students and that grading is often a stressful process for instructors.

Related Reading

• Different Grading Systems
• How Do Teachers Grade
• LMS Gradebook
• Evidence Based Grading
• Technology In The Classroom
• Constructive Criticism Examples For Students
• Digital Gradebook
• Education Workflow Automation
• Grading Software For Teachers

The Problem with Grading

Think about the last time you received a letter grade. Whether it was in school or on a work project, that grade likely didn’t give you an accurate picture of your level of understanding or performance. It probably just made you feel good or bad. Grades are abstract and often arbitrary. In school, students virtually always regard them as more important than the actual learning they’re meant to reflect.

“Nobody wants to be ‘graded’ on their performance or getting a ‘C’ on ‘understanding’ the plague,” says Denise Pope, a senior lecturer at Stanford and co-founder of an organization that helps schools improve their focus on student health and learning. “What we want is feedback that helps us understand our strengths and weaknesses so we can improve. The problem is that in schools today, the feedback has a name, and it’s called a grade.” 

The Confusion Starts with Inconsistency

Even if we could all agree on what grades mean, the reality is that they differ radically from classroom to classroom and teacher to teacher, even within the same school. “Grade inconsistency can be so radical that it confuses students and their parents, and can lead to serious academic detriment,” explains A.J. Stitch, founding principal of the Greater Dayton School, a private school in Ohio for kids from low-income backgrounds that doesn’t use traditional grades. “It’s radically inconsistent from teacher to teacher.” 

At public schools where he has worked in the past, “most teachers had different approaches to weighting homework, classwork, quizzes, and tests.” For example, he says, “a student may demonstrate mastery of content on a test, quiz, and classwork, yet still fails a course because the teacher decides to weigh homework 40%, and the student, for one reason or another, struggles in that regard. Obviously, that’s inequitable, and it illustrates the variation of weighted grade scales and how it impacts a student’s success or failure, regardless of whether they mastered the standards taught in the course.” 

Grades Can Lead to Stress and Anxiety

Grades are an incredible source of stress and anxiety for students. “Grading in general is tough because of the expectations for students with college applications,” says Robin Loewald, an English teacher at Melrose High. “There tends to be a lot of stress around grades and the minute difference between a 93 and 94. In truth, it’s hard to really delineate the difference between those two numbers in terms of student understanding and mastery of the subject.”

Pope focuses her work extensively on the stress students take on trying to chase “good” grades and the extrinsic motivation, driven by external rewards that takes over. “We have this real system of you need to get the grades and the test scores in order to please your parents, go to college, get the merit scholarship, get a good job, whatever it is,” she says. “There’s this extrinsic motivation that’s tied to grades, which adds to student stress, and in some cases can lead to really unhealthy practices like perfectionism or great anxiety, paralysis. And it could also really turn kids off. ‘Well, I got a C so I’m bad at math. I’m not a math person so clearly, I shouldn’t try anymore.’” 

Traditional Grading Practices Are Biased

Traditional grading practices invite bias, especially around behavior. “When we include a student’s behavior in a grade, we’re imposing on all of our students a narrow idea of what a ‘successful’ student is,” Feldman says, and “you start to misrepresent and warp the accuracy.” 

Example of Grading Bias

For example, a student who participates in discussions and always brings their pencil to class earns five points, but they get a C on the test. Adding the five behavior points lifts that C test grade to something in the low B range. Although students and parents are happy the grade is a B and that the student’s all-important GPA remains intact, this warping can create longer-term problems.

“You’re telling the student that they’re at a B level in content, and they’re actually at a C,” Feldman says. “They don’t think there’s a problem, the counselors don’t think there’s a problem, and the student goes to the next grade level and gets crushed by the content. They had no idea that they weren’t prepared for the rigor of that class because they kept getting the message that they were getting B’s.”

How to Make Grading More Meaningful in Higher Education

Set Clear Expectations Before Assignments to Reduce Complaints

Despite what some students believe, grading student work is more than just routine. 

• The better students understand what instructors expect them to take away from the course, the more meaningful the grading structure will be. 
• Meaningful grading strategies reflect effective assignments, which have distinct goals and evaluation criteria. 
• They also help avoid letting the grading process take priority over teaching and mentoring. 

Provide Meaningful Feedback to Help Students Improve

Leaving thoughtful and thorough comments does more than rationalize a grade. Providing feedback is another form of teaching and helps students better understand the nuances behind the grade. 

Specific and Actionable Feedback in Grading

Suppose a student earns a ‘C’ on a paper. If the introduction was outstanding, but the body needed improvement, comments explaining this distinction will give a clearer picture of what the ‘C’ grade represents as opposed to ‘A-level’ work. 

Encouraging and Constructive Feedback to Students

Instructors should limit comments to elements of their work that students can actually improve or build upon. Comments should pertain to the original goal of the assignment. Excessive comments that knit-pick a student’s work are often discouraging and overwhelming, leaving the student less able or willing to improve their effort on future projects. Instead, instructors should provide comments that point to patterns of strengths and areas needing improvement. It’s also helpful to leave a summary comment at the end of the assignment or paper.

Maintain a Complaint-Free Grading System

In many instances, an appropriate response to a grade complaint might simply be, It’s in the syllabus. Nevertheless, one of the best strategies to curtail grade complaints is to limit or prohibit discussions of grades during class time. Inform students that they can discuss grades outside of class or during office hours.

Instructors can do many things before the semester or term begins to reduce grade complaints. This includes:

• Detailed explanations in the grading system’s syllabus
• The criteria for earning a particular letter grade
• Policies on late work
• Other standards that inform grading

It also doesn’t hurt to remind students of each assignment’s specific grading criteria before it comes due. Instructors should avoid changing their grading policies; doing so will likely lead to grade complaints.

Assign Grades Based on Clear and Consistent Criteria

Since not all assignments may count equally toward a final course grade, instructors should figure out which grading scales are appropriate for each assignment. They should also consider that various assignments assess student work differently; therefore, their grading structure should reflect those differences. 

For example, some exams might warrant a 100-point scale rather than a pass/fail grade. Requirements like attendance or class participation might be used to reward effort; therefore, merely completing that day’s requirement is sufficient. 

Use a Rubric to Grade Subjective Assignments

Some writing projects require more subjective grading standards than multiple-choice tests. Instructors can implement objective standards to maintain consistency while acknowledging students’ individual approaches to the project.

Instructors should create a rubric or chart against which they evaluate each assignment. A rubric contains specific grading criteria and the point value for each. For example, out of 100 points, a rubric specifies that a maximum of 10 points are given to the introduction. An instructor can include even more detailed elements that an introduction should include, such as:

• Thesis statement
• Attention-getter
• Preview of the paper’s main points

Consider Creative Approaches to Grading Creative Work

While exams, research papers, and math problems tend to have more finite grading criteria, creative works like short films, poetry, or sculptures seem more difficult to grade. Instructors might apply technical evaluations that adhere to disciplinary standards. The challenge is grading how students apply their subject talent and judgment to a finished product.

For more visual creative projects, instructors might ask students to submit a written statement along with their assignment. This statement can provide a reflection or analysis of the finished product or describe the theory or concept the student used. This supplement can add insight that informs the grade.

Ensure Consistent Grading Standards for Multi-Section Courses

Professors or course coordinators who oversee several sections of a course have the added responsibility of managing other instructors or graduate student teaching assistants (TAs) in addition to their own grading. Course directors need to communicate regularly and consistently with all teaching staff about the grading standards and criteria to ensure they are applied consistently across all sections.

If possible, the course director should address students from all sections in one gathering to:

• Explain the criteria
• Expectations
• Assignments
• Other policies

TAs should continue to communicate grading-related information to the students in their classes. They should also maintain contact with each other and the course director to:

• Address inconsistencies
• Monitor changes
• Bring attention to problems
  

To maintain consistency and objectivity across all sections, the course director might consider assigning TAs to grade other sections besides their own. Another strategy that can save time and maintain consistency is to have each TA grade only one exam portion. It’s also vital to compare average grades and test scores across sections to see if certain groups of students are falling behind or if some classes need changes in their teaching strategies.

Understand Different Types of Grading Systems

There are various types of grading systems, each with its own benefits and drawbacks. Understanding these systems can help instructors determine which method best suits their specific course or classroom needs. 

• Absolute grading: A grading system where instructors explain performance standards before the assignment is completed. Grades are given based on predetermined cutoff levels. Here, each point value is assigned a letter grade. Most schools adopt this system, where it’s possible for all students to receive an A.
• Relative grading: An assessment system where higher education instructors determine student grades by comparing them against those of their peers.
• Weighted grades: A method in higher education to determine how different assessments should count towards the final grade. An instructor may choose to make the results of an exam worth 50 percent of a student’s total class grade, while assignments account for 25 percent and participation marks are worth another 25 percent.
• Grading on a curve: This system adjusts student grades to ensure that a test or assignment has the proper distribution throughout the class (for example, only 20% of students receive As, 30% receive Bs, and so on) and a desired total average (for example, a C grade average for a given test). We’ve covered this type of grading in more detail in the blog post The Ultimate Guide to Grading on a Curve. 

Ungrading: A New Approach to Assessing Student Learning

Ungrading is an education model that prioritizes giving feedback and encouraging learning through self-reflection rather than a letter grade. Some instructors argue that grades cannot objectively assess a student’s work. Even when calculated down to the hundredth of a percentage point, a “B+” on an English paper doesn’t paint a complete picture about what a student can do, what they understand or where they need help. 

Alfie Kohn, lecturer on human behavior, education, and parenting, says the basis for grades is often subjective and uninformative. Even the final grade on a STEM assignment is more of a reflection of how the assignment was written, rather than the student’s mastery of the subject matter. So what are educators who have adopted ungrading actually doing? Here are some practices and strategies that decentralize the role of assessments in the higher ed classroom.

Frequent Feedback

Rather than a final paper or exam, encourage students to write letters reflecting on their progress and learning throughout the term. Students are encouraged to reflect on and learn from their successes and failures, both individually and with their peers. In this way, conversations and commentary become the primary form of feedback rather than a letter grade.

Opportunities for Self-reflection

Open-ended questions help students to think critically about their learning experiences. 

• Which course concepts have you mastered? 
• What have you learned that I am most excited about? 

Simple questions like these help guide students towards a more insightful understanding of themselves and their progress in the course.

Increasing Transparency

Consider informal drop-in sessions or office hours to answer student questions about navigating a new style of teaching and learning. The ungrading process has to begin from a place of transparency and openness in order to build trust. Listening to and responding to student concerns is vital to getting students on board. But just as important is the quality of feedback provided, ensuring both instructors and students remain on the same page.

Use Technology Tools to Streamline Grading

EssayGrader is the most accurate AI grading platform, trusted by 60,000+ educators worldwide. On average, a teacher takes 10 minutes to grade a single essay. EssayGrader can cut down the time to 30 seconds. That's a 95% reduction in the time it takes to grade an essay, with the same results. 

With EssayGrader, teachers can:

• Replicate their grading rubrics (so AI doesn't have to do the guesswork to set the grading criteria)
• Setup fully custom rubrics
• Grade essays by class
• Bulk upload of essays
• Use our AI detector to catch essays written by AI
• Summarize essays with our Essay summarizer.

Primary school, high school, and even college professors grade their students' essays with the help of our AI tool. Over half a million essays were graded by 60,000+ teachers on our platform. Save 95% of your time for grading school work with our tool to get high quality, specific and accurate writing feedback for essays in seconds with EssayGrader's grading software for teachers. Get started for free today!

Developing a Personal Grading Philosophy

Educators should clarify what each grade symbol means before they start grading. To do this, explain what each letter grade means for students in plain language. For example, rather than simply awarding a grade of “C” on a student’s assignment, provide a detailed description of what this grade means. A “C” indicates that the student’s performance meets the basic requirements for the assignment.

While this grade is acceptable, it reflects that the student’s work has numerous errors and lacks organization. A “C” demonstrates that the student is likely not prepared for more advanced work and will need to review feedback and implement suggestions for improvement before moving on to the next level. 

What Should “Failure” Mean?  

Grades tend to have a universal meaning, but failure can be perceived differently by different people. It’s important to provide an array of failure scenarios before starting to grade. 

• Does it mean that the student didn’t learn anything? 
• Did the student perform differently than others did in the group? 
• Did the student receive a failing mark because they cheated on the test or plagiarized on a major research paper? 

Defining failure before students receive any grades can help remove anxiety and clarify what happens if they do fail. In addition, it’s important to consider how to turn failure into a teachable moment to help the student learn from the situation. 

What Elements of Performance Should Be Incorporated Into a Grade?  

Grading involves a number of elements that vary from course to course. Instructors should identify what elements will be included in a grading scheme and how much weight each component will carry. 

For example, will writing skills, attitude, and motivation be included for each project or just for the final project? Clearly defining the elements that will be incorporated into a grade and their significance will help students understand what is expected of them and help remove unwanted anxiety about performance. Rubrics are useful tools to help organize the elements of a project into discrete sections that are assessed separately yet contribute to the whole. 

How Should Grades in a Class Be Distributed? 

Another important consideration is how grades will be distributed. 

• Will the instructor plan to curve the final grade or distribute an equal number of grades? 
• Will everyone receive the same grade if they satisfy certain course competencies?

Outlining a grading plan at the beginning of the course will help students understand how their performance will be evaluated. 

What Should the Components of a Final Grade Be Like?  

Instructors should consider the components that will make up a final grade in a course. 

• If students are allowed to submit draft material, will that count toward the final grade? 
• How will the instructor handle test items that the majority of the students missed? 
• How will the instructor combine all grades earned in the class? 

By addressing these questions ahead of time, instructors can help students understand how their performance will be evaluated and reduce anxiety about grades. 

How Should Components of a Grade Be Combined?  

Another important consideration is how components of grades will be combined. 

• Will the instructor weight grades for individual projects? 
• Do regular examinations count less than the final exam? 
• Are written papers worth more than a regular exam? 

Outlining a grading plan at the beginning of the course will help students understand how their performance will be evaluated. 

What Method Should Be Used to Assign Final Grades?  

After all assignments and exams have been graded, how will the instructor determine the final grade? If the grading policy for each project is based on a ten percent scale (90%=A, 80%=B, etc.), then the final grade should follow the same standard. Providing a clear description of how final grades will be determined will help again remove anxiety for students. 

Should Borderline Cases Be Reviewed?  

Reviewing a policy for borderline cases with students at the beginning of class could prevent students from contesting their final grade. 

• If the instructor does consider borderline cases, will he or she consider every student who is borderline? 
• What is the absolute cut-off and what will be factored in when considering these cases (extra credit, attendance, attitude, motivation, overall improvement)? 

Having clear policies for borderline cases will also help promote fairness in grading. 

What Other Factors Can Influence the Philosophy of Grading? 

Instructors should also consider other factors that can influence the philosophy of grading. Does the university or department have written and approved policies that dictate how grading should be conducted? In addition, instructors should consider how they have graded in the past and determine if they plan to follow the same principles.

Related Reading

• How To Grade In Google Classroom
• Automation In Education
• Magic School AI
• Grading Writing
• Teacher Apps
• Apps For Teachers
• AI Tools For Education
• Technology Tools For The Classroom
• Google Classroom Alternatives
• Standards Based Grading Systems

How to Grade Students Efficiently & Get off the Grading Hamster Wheel

Grading Tests and Assignments Faster With Rubrics

You can speed up your grading process by using rubrics. 

• Set your intention for each assignment. 
• Decide what are the critical components you want to grade. 
• Begin with the end in mind. 

You can find rubrics online, and your textbooks or teacher manuals include them. I usually find those more general than what I like to use. Therefore, I create my own rubrics and tailor them to the specific one or two skills that I want the students to master. 

• Do I want them to practice using transition words in their writing? I have a rubric that only focuses on that. 
• Do I want them to master that difficult hook at the beginning of a narrative? I write a rubric specifically for that. 

When you assign something to your students, you can go over the rubric with them. Since they know exactly what’s expected of them, they’re more likely to hit the mark. When you grade their work, it goes super quickly. One more thing I discovered by using rubrics. When I graded student writing, using the specific skills noted, they often outperformed my expectations. Now that’s something every teacher would like to see. 

Grade Student Work With Multiples of 10

As much as possible, make all your tests and assignments total up to points that are multiples of ten. The reason for this comes from the good old days when teachers had to calculate all the student grades by hand. It was faster and easier to calculate based on tens. Even though today we have grading systems that do all the calculations for us, it’s still mentally easier if the possible points are based on tens. It’s also an easy way to weight assignments. 

If it’s an everyday routine item, give it ten points. If it’s a quiz, give it 50. If you want to grade a test and weight it even higher, you can make it worth 100 points. Whichever way you choose, the consistency of tens across the gradebook makes the weighting and calculating much easier.

Use a Grading Sheet for Each Assignment

I know, this sounds like extra work, but it’s actually a strategy that will save you hours of time. At the beginning of the year, I entered all the students’ names on the sheet. Each term, I printed the sheets in a different color. I used:

• Blue for term 1
• Green for term 2
• Yellow for term 3

It’s just my way of color coordinating. It’s really handy to have the sheets printed and ready for anything:

• Grading
• Tallying votes in class
• Marking informal small group work

You’ll probably think of plenty more ways to use it. This is part of a larger system for grading that uses color coded folders. If you use this system, you’ll never have random piles of paper on your desk again. The grades were recorded on this half sheet. Students got their papers back right away, whether they were digital or physical. I could enter the grades later when I had the time. It may not sound like much, but this one small thing was a game changer. 

Grade Writing F.A.S.T.

I have a system that makes grading writing fly by. Literally. You can get all of your grading for writing assignments done before you leave the classroom. In fact, most of the grading happens during class time. 

Consider Weekly Formative Assessments Instead of Homework

I’ll never forget when my son was very little and in his first swim class. A math teacher’s daughter was in the same class. While the children were splashing and laughing, this poor woman would sit in the bleachers with a cardboard box full of math papers to grade. (Literally, a cardboard box full!) 

The Burden of Homework for Teachers and Students

I always thought about how sad it was that she had to spend so much time grading homework papers that she couldn’t relax and enjoy her sweet little daughter’s swim time. It’s something many teachers never talk about. But Juliana of the CollaboratEd blog has written a raw and honest post about the truth behind homework. 

Transforming Homework into a Meaningful and Manageable Experience

Let’s face the truth about homework. Some students do it, some don’t, and some have their parents or siblings do it for them. Am I right? Juliana writes about how she mindfully transformed homework in her upper grade math class to something manageable and enjoyable. I love how she made homework more meaningful. She turned the concept on its head by making it into a formative assessment that took less time to grade than traditional homework. 

If You Must Have Homework, Don’t Grade It

Instead of grading it, just check if it’s done or not. Students who do their homework will do better in class because of the extra practice. You’ll know who is doing homework and who isn’t by their performance. I have a homework choice page that gives students the ability to choose how and when they practice core skills. 

Weekly Homework Practice System

Students all need to practice core reading, spelling, and math skills. I sent home a paper each week with the choices on it. I changed the sheet every six weeks to reflect the current classroom topics. Students practiced, parents signed, and the students returned the paper on Friday. 

Self-Accountable Homework System

The beauty of this system? I didn’t have to grade anything. I logged the completed work on my assignment cover sheet. Then I updated the gradebook to show how many weeks each student had completed their homework. Instead of a grade, it was a note on their progress reports. For example, “Juanita completed homework 5 out of 6 weeks.” It left the accountability on the students, which is where it should be. The parents were pleased with the system too, because it gave them some flexibility around work, sports schedules, and all the other things that life is full of. 

Use Teacher Gradebooks That Calculate the Grades for You

Everyone has their own preferences around gradebooks. Some schools require teachers to use a proprietary gradebook.

When you post an assignment, choose the standard from a list. Add the total points. As the students turn it in, it calculates the grades for you. This gradebook even has a progress report page that you can quickly print out before a parent meeting, an IEP meeting, or any other time you need to quickly show the current academic standing of a student. 

Curriculum Map or Make a Syllabus

Of course, making a curriculum map or a syllabus is another way of getting off the grading hamster wheel. If you have your lessons mapped out in advance, you can be mindful of what I’ll be collecting and grading. This is going to save you time as you move through the year. 

• Have you ever assigned too much work and ended up staring at mountains of grading? 
• Have you ever known of a teacher who quietly “lost” a few assignments because of the grading overwhelm? 

Your curriculum map will help you avoid that situation. On the other hand, if I mapped my year, I won’t ever look aghast at my gradebook two weeks before report cards and realize I didn’t teach a certain topic or standard. I’ll be able to sit back stress free, knowing I hit all the themes I needed to, and put them into my gradebook.

Source: https://teacherwriter.co/how-to-grade-a-test/

Can AI Help Teachers With Grading?

Grading written assignments can cost teachers upwards of 12 hours per paper! This type of writing assessment is vital to improving students’ writing skills, but educators are understandably overwhelmed by the time and stress associated with grading. 

Artificial intelligence can help alleviate this burden. When integrated into writing tools, AI can quickly assess student drafts and provide personalized feedback to help them improve their writing. This immediate feedback can reduce the need for teachers to grade, as students can use the AI comments to improve their work before a teacher ever sees it. In this way, AI helps optimize the grading process, getting students the feedback they need more quickly, and lessening the grading load for teachers.

How AI Can Reduce Grading Bias

As we noted earlier, grading writing assignments can be subjective. The use of artificial intelligence to help assess student writing can reduce that bias. In a recent study, researchers compared scores and feedback given by an AI and by middle school teachers on the same essays. 

Results showed that teachers scored essays lower than the AI, with significant differences in every dimension except for claim & focus. AI can make grading more objective. There’s no way to eliminate all bias in grading, but using AI to help assess student writing can reduce that bias, resulting in more equitable outcomes for students. 

AI Grading Is Fast

Teachers must work hard to help students become better writers. That means assigning writing tasks, assessing those assignments, and providing feedback. However, grading writing can be a time-consuming process. Artificial intelligence can help alleviate this burden by quickly assessing writing assignments and providing detailed feedback. 

For teachers, using AI to help with grading can reduce their workload and help them improve at their jobs. For students, AI feedback can help them improve their writing skills before a teacher even looks at their paper, allowing for more efficient and less stressful learning.

AI Feedback Is Actionable

While AI can help teachers save time, one of the most promising benefits of using AI for grading is that its feedback is highly actionable. AI doesn’t just give students a score; it helps them understand what they did well and what they need to work on to improve their writing. This kind of targeted feedback can help students make immediate improvements to their writing before they ever receive a grade from their teacher. The result is less stressful learning for students, and a reduced grading burden for teachers.

20+ Amazing Grading Apps That Help Teachers Save Time

1. EssayGrader: An AI Assistant That Gets It Right

EssayGrader is the most accurate AI grading platform trusted by over 60,000 educators worldwide. On average, it takes a teacher 10 minutes to grade a single essay. With EssayGrader, that time is cut down to 30 seconds. That’s a 95% reduction in the time it takes to grade an essay, with the same results. With EssayGrader, teachers can:

• Replicate their grading rubrics (so AI doesn’t have to do the guesswork to set the grading criteria)
• Set up fully custom rubrics
• Grade essays by class
• Bulk upload essays
• Use our AI detector to catch essays written by AI
• Summarize essays with our Essay Summarizer

Our AI tool helps primary school, high school, and even college professors grade their students’ essays. Over half a million essays were graded by 60,000+ teachers on our platform. 

2. Showbie: A Platform For Organizing Assignments and Feedback

Showbie is a platform that combines all essential tools for assignments, communication and feedback. Showbie has an effective gradebook with many other features. 

• You can mark and grade your student's work using the class listing within the shared folder.
• Efficiently grade student work while viewing it.
• Add grades as a value. 
• Add a meaningful text with feedback. 
• Have some room to add text comments. 
• Ability to add audio feedback: just hit record! I
• Quickly look at students grades by assignment, class or on an individual basis.
• Export grades in a CVS file, as HTML or in an email template that includes an attached CVS file. 

3. Viper: A Plagiarism Scanner to Share with Students

Viper is an anti-plagiarism scanner that promises to scan uploaded documents for plagiarism, a serious issue in academic, business, and publishing circles. It’s aimed at students and is handy for reducing the copying and shopping of term papers and essays. Viper is effective at:

• Identifying plagiarized passages
• Noticing potentially similar passages
• Misidentified or misattributed quotes
• Other suspicious sentences

4. ZipGrade: Grading Made Simple

ZipGrade is a grading app that helps you grade multiple-choice tests in minutes. Simply scan the tests with your smartphone, and the app does the rest. Of course, not everything is about grades. This app only gives grades, it’s up to you to know on what the students need.

5. BookWidgets: Create Interactive Assignments That Grade Themselves

BookWidgets is a learning platform allowing teachers to create interactive lessons for tablets and computers. The tool has over 40 activities, such as:

• Quizzes
• Crosswords
• Worksheets
• Other interactive teaching apps

Once the teacher has made an assignment, the student can fill it in and send it back to the teacher. By the time it gets there, the assignment or test is already graded! Through the teachers’ dashboard, you can:

• Track progress
• Give students constructive feedback
• Access the platform and download the results anytime, anywhere.

6. iTunes U: Organize Your Classroom with Grade Book Features

iTunes U makes it easy to organize your classroom. With homework hand-in, an integrated grade book, and private discussions, everything will be just fine. You can deliver lessons, grade assignments, and stay connected. Everything is just one iPad away. The integrated grade book lets you know exactly how each student is doing, it lets you see:

• When a student has viewed an assignment
• When their work is complete
• When it’s time to reach out with a reminder

7. Thinkwave: A Comprehensive Grading App

Thinkway is an app that provides several useful features for teachers and educators. Multiple options are available such as a messaging system and custom reports. So it’s a comprehensive app that simplifies administrative tasks and provides valuable insights into student performance.

8. Alma: Manage Student Grades and Progress Reports

Alma allows to:

• Record and track grades
• Calculate weighted averages
• Generate progress reports
• Give input comments
• Feedback for each assignment

9. GradeBook Pro: A Powerful Classroom Management Tool

GradeBook Pro is a powerful classroom management tool. Its many features allow teachers to:

• Categorize assignments and view grades by category
• Use either weighted or standard grade scales
• Award extra credit or deduct penalty points
• Calculate the average score for each assignment
• Evaluate overall class performance, email grade, attendance or status reports to students. 
• Create PDF reports of class grades, rosters and attendance records.

10. Flubaroo: An Easy Grading Add-On for Google Forms

Flubaroo is a free add-on to Google Forms/Sheets. It helps you grade and analyze online assignments and assessments. You can also email scores to students! With Flubaroo you’ll be able to:

• Get scores for each student
• Identify students in need of extra help
• View the average score
• Histogram of scores
• Quickly identifies questions which a majority of the students missed.

11. Formative: Get Live Results from Student Assignments

Formative lets you distribute an assignment to your students. Students make it, and you get live results. You can follow your students in their learning process of that assignment and give instant grades and feedback. It basically is the same as Google forms, but easier to use and with some other essential features that a teacher can’t miss out on. Formative is also a nice tool that you can use for formative assessments.

12. Edubirdie Plagiarism Checker: Check for Plagiarism in Student Papers

Teachers and students can use Edubirdie to check whether they used unique resources in their writings or papers. The plagiarism checker lets you upload a file or paste your text and will give your resources a percentage. This percentage illustrates the uniqueness of your text.

13. Quick Grader: Simplify Grading Tests and Quizzes

QuickGrader is an app designed to make grading tests, quizzes and homework easy for teachers, professors and anyone else responsible for grading. It is a big improvement from traditional paper grading calculators, offering a completely customizable interface that includes a variety of useful features such as:

• The ability to grade with half-point values, adjustable decimal values and plus/minus grading. 
• The interface is also user-friendly and easy on the eyes. 
• It prevents the screen from dimming, allowing users to focus on grading. 
• Point-based grading allows users to enter the maximum point value for a test or quiz.
• The app will automatically recalculate scores and directly calculate the number of points earned.

14. Groovy Grader: A Flexible Grading Calculator

Groovy Grader is an app that aims to replace the traditional paper grading calculator with more flexibility and convenience. I

• t can handle a large number of questions and display grades as a whole number or with one decimal place. 
• It also shows the number of correct and incorrect answers. 
• Its design focuses on usability. Users can view up to 50 grades at once and can turn off the auto-dim feature for ease of use. 

It aims to make the grading process more efficient and user-friendly.

15. Planbook: A Lesson Planning Tool with Grading Capabilities

Planbook is an app that helps teachers plan, organize and schedule their lessons. It can also help in grading in several ways. It allows teachers to:

• Create and manage their lesson plans, which can include assignments, quizzes and exams. 
• Allows teachers to grade assignments, quizzes, and exams and keep track of student performance. 

Planbook also allows teachers to customize the app to match their specific needs, such as:

• They are creating their own grading scales
• Weighting assignments and exams
• Adding custom categories

16. Google Classroom: A Free Learning Management System

Google Classroom is a web-based learning management system created by Google. It allows teachers to:

• Create and manage assignments
• Provide feedback
• Communicate with students

It can be used in the classroom to create and distribute assignments and quizzes to students, which can be completed and submitted online. This can help teachers to quickly and easily grade and provide feedback on student work. Google Classroom allows for easy sharing of assignments, quizzes, and other resources with students and tracking of their progress.

17. FreshGrade Classic: A Portfolio Platform with Grading Features

FreshGrade Classic is an app and web-based portfolio platform that helps teachers and students easily capture, document, and communicate student learning. A combination of a grading program, a portfolio site, and a learning management system (LMS), it enables educators to:

• Create standards-based assignments
• Monitor student progress
• Provide feedback or grades

Teachers can choose from a variety of assessment tools, including:

• Effort
• Learning progression
• Mastery
• Anecdotal notes
• Conventional grades

While working on the activities, teachers and students can use their mobile devices to capture photos, videos, audio recordings, and other notes. This data can be linked to individual students, groups, or the entire class. Students can review the teacher-collected data and comment on it, and they can assemble the information into a digital portfolio to document learning.

18. JumpRope: A Platform for Mastery-Based Grading

JumpRope is a platform to help teachers tackle the challenges of mastery-based data collection and analysis. The planning tool helps teachers set up high-level units of study and learning targets, each aligned to the common core state standards. After entering the appropriate targets, assessments can be linked to each. 

Teachers can then categorize and weight various assessment types, such as homework, quizzes, or classwork. Once the assignments are added to the system, teachers can get to work entering grades.

19. Markboard: A Free Assessment Tool for Teachers

Markboard is a free assessment and feedback tool for teachers. After setting up classes and loading rosters, teachers create assignments, add learning standards, and apply an assessment procedure: 

• Scoring
• Binary
• Rubric
• Observation

Teachers can leave feedback in the comments when returning work to students or attaching documentation. Assignments are not automatically marked "late" or "not turned in;" teachers must mark them manually in the tool. Markboard's dashboard integrates with Planboard for teachers using that lesson-planning tool.

20. Engrade: An Online Grading Tool

Engrade is an online grading tool (now part of McGraw-Hill Education) that helps teachers:

• Manage classes
• Communicate with families
• Track student performance

After signing up, teachers can get started customizing their gradebook to a specific set of standards. Engrade calls this tool the "Corebook." Once teachers create classes and enter their students' information, families and students can then register with the site, allowing for individualized communication between home and school.

21. Quizizz: An Interactive Assessment Tool

Quizizz uses generative AI to create assessments from the content you already have. The platform provides a fun and interactive environment for students, while giving educators powerful tools enhanced by AI. 

22. Khanmigo: An AI Learning Assistant from Khan Academy

Khanmigo makes tracking, planning, and teaching easier with its powerful AI platform. This tool from Khan Academy can:

• Generate overviews
• Lesson plans
• Assessments in seconds

23. Brisk Teaching: A Chrome Extension for Teachers

Brisk is an AI-powered Chrome extension that adds powerful capabilities to teachers' tools, such as articles on the internet, Google Docs, YouTube videos, and more. Brisk uses powerful features like:

• Text translation
• Writing evaluation
• Generative AI 

Benefits and Barriers of AI in Grading and Assessment

Artificial intelligence has proven to be incredibly effective at grading exams and assignments. Machines can grade exams and assignments within seconds, depending on their complexity. This saves time for teachers and students, allowing them to focus on other important activities. AI technologies can also assess assignments more accurately than humans. These technologies are programmed with various algorithms that:

• Examine assignments
• Assess their quality
• Provide feedback within seconds
• Eliminate human errors and biases

Consistency Is Key: AI Grading Provides Objective Results

AI grading and assessment give objective results because personal biases, preferences, or emotions do not influence them. As a result, scores and results derived from AI technologies are consistent and reliable. This provides a fair and transparent assessment process for students, leading to more equity and less suspicion.

The Power of Feedback: AI Grading Supports Learning

AI grading and assessment provide timely and constructive feedback to students. Instant feedback helps students to identify their strengths and weaknesses, enabling them to improve their performance. This form of feedback is personalized and supports learning as it is meant to guide the student in the right direction to improve.

AI Grading Is Scalable and Cost-Effective

AI grading and assessment solutions are scalable and cost-effective. They can grade hundreds of assignments and exams within seconds, making it possible to handle large volumes of work in less time. As schools continue to adopt remote learning, AI-assisted grading and assessment become even more scalable and cost-effective as they can be done from any location.

The Limitations of AI Grading: Lack of Emotional Intelligence

AI technologies lack the emotional intelligence that human graders possess. While they can accurately assess and grade assignments, they cannot understand the emotional and mental states of students. For example, they cannot recognize the difference between a student who is struggling with depression and another who is just lazy. This lack of empathy can limit the effectiveness of AI grading and assessment.

Creativity and Flexibility: Why AI Grading Can Fall Short

AI technologies can be too rigid to account for creativity and innovation that can be incorporated in certain topics such as:

• Art
• Creative writing
• Music

Students may lose points on essays that use unique expressions or in art that showcases a completely different concept that the AI is not programmed to consider. 

Dependence on Algorithms: AI Grading Has Its Limits

AI grading and assessment depends on the algorithms programmed into them. These algorithms may not capture all the nuances of the subject matter, leading to misleading results. The system also depends on the grading rubrics fed into the AI machines, which may not reflect the full range of student performances that could occur.

Best Practices for Using AI to Grade and Give Feedback

Start with Clear Educational Goals

When considering how to incorporate AI into grading and feedback, start by defining clear educational goals. Having well-defined objectives will help you choose the right automated grading systems for you and your institution. Are you looking to:

• Improve student engagement
• Personalize learning
• Increase efficiency in grading

Whatever the aim, narrow your focus before you start looking at AI tools to see which systems will meet your specific needs.

Do Your Homework Before You Choose an AI Tool

Research is imperative when introducing any kind of new technology to the classroom. For AI tools in particular, it helps to ask: 

• Who’s been here before? 
• Where has this tech worked well elsewhere?

Look for robust evidence:

• Peer reviews
• Case studies
• Efficacy research

For instance, you might seek out a good example of a case study video. You could also reach out to educators who are currently using AI-powered assessment in higher education. Consider the following lines of inquiry: 

• What’s working for them? 
• What isn’t? 
• What do they wish they’d known before committing to their current system?

Look for Possible Trial Periods

Some argue for starting small, perhaps piloting implementation in a specific course or department before scaling up. This allows you to assess the tools' effectiveness and make any necessary adjustments before full-scale deployment.

Then you can put the tools to the test, see them in action, have a play while you gather insights and observations from users. Involving staff in these early trials will help with buy-in down the line, far better than imposing tech later on that no one knows very much about or really wanted in the first place.

Get Everyone On Board With the New Tech

Once you have chosen the right tech, after possibly trialing it with a smaller group of users, get everyone else on board. Explain the rationale behind choosing one AI grading tool over another. The advantages of using AI-powered assessment are undeniable. Sell the key benefits in terms of time saved on marking and admin, things which take up so much of an academic’s day. 

Our efficacy research at the University of Birmingham showed that “the median grading times were reduced by 74%, and the number of words of feedback given increased by a factor of 7.2. We estimate that a university, with 3500 STEM students, using Graide could save over £240,000 a year.” You may want to develop working parties to drive adoption of the new system, setting up tech champions and mentors to help others less confident than themselves. They can support implementation in those early stages, troubleshooting, helping colleagues, identifying common pinch points.

Provide Training and Ongoing Support

To fully leverage AI-powered assessment tools, faculty, staff, and students need training. Check out what training and support vendors provide as part of the package, in the form of in-person or online training. They might offer:

• Tutorials
• Workshops
• Webinars
• Blog content
• Documentation
• Forums
• FAQs
• Support: Email helpdesk contact person

You want someone who will quickly and enthusiastically answer your email queries or phone calls. Some companies do aftercare really well, while others fall short. 

Support Students Transitioning to AI Grading Tools

Of course, you will want to tell students about how the tools work and explain what the tech does for them. They have so much to gain. One significant advantage of AI-powered assessment is that it removes bias, ensuring fairer and more objective assessment. 

Students really value quick turnaround time and better, more detailed feedback. I know that I, as a student, wanted to learn where I’d gotten things wrong so I could quickly correct them. 

Validate the AI System

Validation is a crucial step in developing and deploying AI systems. You will want to test the tech, assessing and confirming that it performs as intended, meeting specified requirements, and operating effectively and safely within its intended context. Validation involves running the algorithm on cases where the right answer is known, to see if the AI system functions as intended. Other areas for consideration include:

• Usability
• Accuracy
• Efficiency
• Ethics

Questions to ask:

• Is student data properly protected? 
• Is the software GDPR-compliant? 
• Is it clear who the data controller is? 

Continually Review and Refine Your Approach to AI Grading

You will also want to continually monitor the performance of the AI-powered assessment tools. Regularly assess their impact and make adjustments accordingly. Are they contributing to:

• Improved learning outcomes
• Increased efficiency
• Other desired outcomes

Are students benefiting from them? The working party can examine this. Collect feedback from both instructors and students regarding their experiences with the AI tools. Use this feedback to make improvements and refine your implementation strategy over time. It is important to keep an eye on improvements: the tech evolves all the time to help educators. Stay informed about the latest developments in AI-powered assessment tools and consider how these advancements could enhance your educational practices.

Save Time While Grading Schoolwork with EssayGrader's Grading Software for Teachers

EssayGrader is the most accurate AI grading platform trusted by over 60,000 educators worldwide. On average, it takes a teacher 10 minutes to grade a single essay. With EssayGrader, that time is cut down to 30 seconds. That’s a 95% reduction in the time it takes to grade an essay, with the same results. With EssayGrader, teachers can:

• Replicate their grading rubrics (so AI doesn’t have to do the guesswork to set the grading criteria)
• Set up fully custom rubrics
• Grade essays by class
• Bulk upload essays
• Use our AI detector to catch essays written by AI
• Summarize essays with our Essay Summarizer

Our AI tool helps primary school, high school, and even college professors grade their students’ essays. Over half a million essays were graded by 60,000+ teachers on our platform. 

Use Customizable Rubrics for Accurate, Personalized Feedback 

EssayGrader lets users create and customize grading rubrics to ensure they can provide accurate and personalized feedback to each student. Educators can either upload their existing rubrics to get started or use our customizable templates to create a new rubric from scratch. This helps teachers save time and maintain their grading standards, so they don't have to worry about losing control of the process as they use AI to assist with essay grading. 

Related Reading

• Gradebook Software
• Best Online Gradebook
• Online Grading System
• Free Gradebooks For Teachers
• Automatic Grading
• Grading Software For Schools
• Grading Management Software
• How To Grade Students
• AI Sites for Teachers
• AI for Teachers Lesson Plans
• How to Use AI in the Classroom
• Digital Resources for Teachers
• How to Make a Gradebook in Google Sheets
  
• How to Grade Students Online
• School Apps for Teachers
• How Much Time Do Teachers Spend Grading
• What Are the Challenges of Using AI in a Classroom
• How to Grade Students Online
• How can Teachers Use AI in the classroom?
• What are Some Considerations Before Using AI in the Classroom?
• What are some AI-powered tools that Teachers can Use in the Classroom?
  
• Can artificial intelligence replace Teachers in the Classroom?
  
• How are School Boards using AI in the Classroom?