What marks should I give? A model of the organization of teachers’ judgments of their pupils

The present study is devoted to the empirical endeavour of showing the structural characteristics of this claimed general dimension, its longitudinal consistency, and its causal influence on the first level organization of judgments. A content analysis of school reports of 77 Italian pupils, filled out by their own five teachers over five years of compulsory school (from 6 to 10 years) show seven major topics, which are used by the teachers for their year-scheduled evaluations. A Lisrel-based two-levels model of the organization of judgments is then presented and discussed. This model is shown to be well held by teachers at the end of the first school form and it allows to predict the organization of their evaluations during third and fifth form, as well as final judgments of each form. This model is discussed in a social psychological framework, which underlines the role played by normative aims of the school programmes and the evaluative everyday practices as major professional duties for teachers.