About Red Pen Tool for Learning Platforms
Intuitive on-screen marking, annotation and assessment tool for teachers.
The Red Pen Tool provides an intuitive means for teachers to mark, annotate and add assessment notes to student work digitally – just like teachers are used to doing on paper!
No need to install any special software - Until now, when assessing student work electronically, teachers had to install on their computer the actual software application that the student used to create the work in order to actually view the work. All teachers need to use the Red Pen Tool is a Flash plug-in. The Red Pen Tool then automatically converts the student coursework into a Flash readable file format which teachers can access automatically.
Teachers can add notes or comments, indicate where in the work that a learning/assessment objective has been met, assign marks in the margin, highlight sections of the student coursework – just like teachers already do now on paper.
The original student coursework is not altered – All teacher comments, notes and annotations appear on a separate transparent layer that sits on top of the original student work.
Teachers can share their comments and the marked work with their students electronically via the Red Pen Tool.
How does this work within a Learning Platform?
The Red Pen Tool has been designed as a web service and implements a simple API or Application Programming Interface. This means that the Red Pen Tool can easily be integrated into any web application. Files can be sent to the service for conversion and instances of the Red Pen Tool can then be created to provide a means to annotate and assess the work. XML configuration files and simple XML based output can then be stored in your own web application and manipulated as you wish.
Our Red Pen Tool includes the following functionality:
- Flash-based file conversion of any work that is going to be marked;
- Only requires a PC or Macintosh computer with a standard browser, internet connection and a Flash plug-in;;
- Teachers can annotate the work, add comments at specific points, add notes anywhere, and highlight sections;
- Teachers can drag and drop assessment objectives/learning outcome statements onto the exact place in the coursework where this has been evidenced;
- Instances of the Red Pen Tool can be created such that the view defaults to a specific assessment objective;
- All annotations/comments/notes/marks appear on separate transparent layers over the top of the original work.
