At Great Sampford we believe that marking and assessment is an integral and continuous process that should inform planning to enable children to maximise their achievements. Not only should it directly provide feedback for the children through daily marking but also allow them to take ownership of their progress and targets. Wherever possible, marking and assessment needs to be both positive and informative: focusing on strengths, weaknesses, specific individualised targets and what a child must do to improve. At Great Sampford, we believe that it is the responsibility of both the learner and all adults involved in the setting and assessment of goals and targets, and it is essential that this be done frequently and conscientiously. However, we do believe that over marking can be psychologically counter productive for both the learner and adult involved and this is why we have developed a marking scheme that allows for rapid and instant feedback that is reliant on the child's engagement in order to be effective. We believe that this means our marking and assessment is motivating and encouraging rather than discouraging. We also believe that it is important to have a whole school approach to provide commonality for our children.