It’s a classic settling activity: open your book, write down the date and title, and underline them. This is a routine that many classes follow at the start of a lesson, with the underlining being seen as an important part of the process.

But should it be? Does underlining really make a difference in maintaining standards of neatness and behaviour?

Here, two teachers go head-to-head to argue why underlining does - and doesn’t - matter.

Why we need to sweat the small stuff

Kat McGreal, a lead practitioner, Senco and head of nurture, says:

A month or two ago, I stumbled across a tweet that made me deeply uneasy and has stuck in my mind ever since. The tweeter insinuated that it was old-fashioned and petty-minded to insist that students underlined dates and titles with a ruler and that “real” teachers focused only on content and the curriculum. 

It really hit a nerve: when did it become wrong to require students to aim high and take pride in their work? I know the curriculum is narrowing and teachers are stretched, but does this really excuse not placing value on care and attention to detail?

• Could ‘golden lessons’ be the key to school improvement?
• Vaping in schools: how concerned should we be?
• How phonics became an education culture war

As educators, we know that students excel when they have regular routines and consistency in lessons - the very act of reaching for the ruler to underline sets the tone for the work to come and announces an intention to try hard, whatever the outcome. The idea that having high standards is somehow outdated is troubling and at odds with other values that we teach our students are important. 

What else do we drop to make life easier, quicker and more convenient? Is text-speak acceptable in essay writing? Perhaps spelling is also a hassle? Why bother with punctuation at all? Obviously, these are extremes, but the point still stands; if teachers don’t rate effort, attention to detail and high standards and instead favour immediacy, convenience and shortcuts - why on earth should our students?

I believe it’s so important to sweat the small stuff, set the standard and inspire students to aim high and do their best. As educators, our role is to motivate our students to be the best that they can be: if we start with the little step, the large leaps in progress will follow.

Besides, students need to know that appearances do matter: how you present yourself and your work can have a big impact on how you - and it - are received.

Let’s focus on teaching, not underlining

Daniel Blackburn, a head of English, says:

Once a week, my Year 11s and I write an essay under timed conditions, and, in their next lesson, all give each other feedback. I purposely make mistakes for them to pick up on and, time after time, the most common criticism I hear is: “You haven’t even underlined the title!”.

They’re correct - I haven’t. Does it somehow make the content of my essay less good? Does it detract from the detailed character analysis or carefully crafted counterargument? No, of course not.

Lots of schools have presentation policies and insist on students dutifully underlining dates and titles in their exercise books. We know, however, that the presentation of exercise books is a poor proxy for learning, so who are we presenting these books for? Parents’ evenings? Open evenings? Ofsted, perhaps? I’ve never read an Ofsted report that praised the neatness of a child’s underlining. And what if they don’t have a ruler? Is wobbly underlining really better than nothing?

We need to consider what we want our students to take pride in: if it is simply the presentation of an exercise book then, sure, underlining the title might help. But what if, instead, we prioritised students taking pride in the quality of their arguments or the breadth and depth of the knowledge they’ve acquired during their course of study?

The very act of underlining something doesn’t indicate a child has learned anything or comprehends what they’ve written. The knowledge we impart - the knowledge they remember - is what parents, visitors and inspectors should be impressed by, not the neatness of a page or presentation tricks that mask a lack of understanding. 

I understand that schools want to control the small things, but, really, teachers and leaders should spend less time worrying about whether titles are underlined and instead spend that time teaching effectively.