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What is an Assignment Pack?
An assignment pack is a complete exam paper you build inside Top Marks. It looks like a real exam paper - questions laid out clearly, marks listed, and lined answer sheets for students to write on. You build it and print it, students complete it, you scan it, and upload it. The system automatically identifies which response belongs to which question and which student.
Schools have used assignment packs to mark 250+ mock exam papers in a single upload, with every single student receiving detailed feedback for every single question answered.
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When to Use an Assignment Pack vs a Standalone Tool
Use a standalone tool when you're marking a single question.
Use an assignment pack when:
- You're running a full mock exam
- You want students to sit multiple questions at once
- You want everything submitted and marked in a single workflow
Building an Assignment Pack
Step 1: Create the pack
Go to Tools → Assignment Packs → Create Assignment Pack.
Step 2: Determine how you will use your Assignment Pack
Build & print on Top Marks: as described above, this allows you to create a mock paper from scratch within the software, and then download and distribute to students to sit the paper before uploading back to Top Marks. This function works using the QR code system.
Exam Decoder: this is a feature that allows you to upload previously sat mock/exam papers, or any paper that has not been built on the Top Marks website. This function does not use the QR code system, and instead uses our intelligent AI software to intuitively split the uploaded papers by student and question.
Step 3: Give your pack a name.
Step 4: Add your tools
Select the qualification, subject, and exam board.
You'll see a list of available tools based on your selection. One at a time, select the ones you want to include. For each question, enter the context - the question title, any extract, and any other details students were responding to. You can adjust the font style too, to make it look exactly as you want it.
You can also choose how many lined answer sheets to include per question. If students are using their own paper, set this to zero. You can also mix and match Top Marks lined paper and your own, if students write lengthy essays - simply scan the mix of paper in the correct order.
Note: If you are using the Exam Decoder, you will not need to add any lined paper. Simply set this to 0 for each question.
Top Top: You're not limited to replicating a real exam paper. You can build entirely bespoke papers - different question combinations, repeated questions for practice, or structures that don't match any published paper.
Step 5: Select which questions to AI mark
You can choose which questions you want the AI to mark. If your pack contains six questions but you only want AI feedback on two, simply deselect the others.
Note: if you wish to apply a moderation rule, you can do so here using the moderation drop down. Simply select a saved rule from a previous moderation session that applies to the tool and the platform will mark to that rule from the outset, meaning you won’t need to run a moderation session for the same rule twice. More on our moderation feature here.
Step 6: Add a cover page (optional) - skip this step for the Exam Decoder
You will then have the option to add a cover page to your paper, to enable you to create a complete replica of a paper so it feels as real as possible for your students.
You can do things like:
- Add your school’s logo
- Give your paper a name
- Edit exam instructions (default instructions will automatically apply)
Step 7: Add your students
At this stage, you will need to add in the students who will be sitting/have sat the paper. This gives the AI software the information needed to tag up student feedback to the correct individual once work has been marked.
You can add students by class, year group or name.
Step 8: Share the pack (optional)
This step allows you to share the built assignment pack with teachers. This is especially helpful if one individual is building the packs to be distributed to the teachers or staff responsible for collecting/uploading student work.
What this means is that the assignment pack will be visible for those teachers or staff members, and they will be able to upload student work to the pack for marking.
Note: This differs from the split function, which will be explained later in the article.
Step 9: Print and distribute
Once your pack is built, download and print it. The system generates a complete paper ready to hand to students.
Step 10: Scan and upload
After students have completed the paper, scan all responses (with QR codes attached) into a single PDF and upload. The system handles the rest.
The Split Function
This functionality allows you to split the assignment pack up by teacher/class. Although similar to the ‘share’ step detailed above, this feature differs as it allows you to split up the workload by class, meaning that each ‘group’ is responsible for uploading a portion of the student work.
Simply navigate to the Assignment Pack area, and click the three horizontal dots on the far right next to the relevant pack, and select ‘Split’.
From there, you can type in and select the first teacher and corresponding class, and click ‘Add Group’ each time you wish to add another teacher/class to the split.
The result of this is that for each created ‘group’, the specified teacher will be responsible for uploading work for their class.
This is especially useful for larger cohorts, where you may not want one individual teacher to be responsible for uploading 250+ papers.
Multiple Choice Questions
Multiple choice questions are available within assignment packs and standalone tools. When adding a question, look for the toggle to switch to multiple choice mode.
Still unsure? The support chat in the bottom-right corner of the website connects you directly to a real person on the Top Marks team – not an AI bot, ironically! Don't hesitate to reach out at any point.