Replay plays a submission back the way it was written: from empty page to hand-in, with every pause, deletion and moved paragraph where it actually happened. It’s the evidence a human can read, and it’s usually all a conversation with a student needs.
Starting a replay
Open the submission from your class’s assignment view and press play. The document rebuilds itself in front of you in the order it was typed.
The controls
- Speed. Real-time is rarely what you want. Most teachers watch at a higher speed and slow down where something interesting happens.
- Skip pauses. Turn on “Skip pauses > 3s” and thinking time collapses to a beat instead of playing out in full. Long gaps are announced on screen rather than leaving the replay looking frozen: a 20-minute dinner break shows up as exactly that.
- Scrubbing. Jump along the timeline to any point in the session rather than watching from the start.
Reading what you see
There is no score here, on purpose. What experienced markers look at: does the writing grow the way writing grows: messy first sentences, mid-thought deletions, a paragraph that gets moved once the argument finds its shape? Long steady runs of flawless prose with no revisions can be a strong typist on a good day, or transcription from another screen; the replay can’t tell you which, and we won’t pretend it can. It gives you the honest record; the judgement (and the conversation with the student) stays yours.
For the yes/no question (is this record intact, unedited and anchored to real time?) use verificationalongside the replay. The two answer different questions: verify proves the record is genuine, replay shows you what’s in it.
Replay in a portable PDF
Loam’s planned author-issued portable format has three cumulative disclosure levels. Full replay is Level 3: it includes document verification, the session-specific writing evidence, and the complete event record needed for replay. It may expose deleted and replaced text, false starts, timestamps and other personal information.
Replay never starts automatically in the public verifier. Anyone holding a Level 3 file may be able to extract its complete history, and that disclosure cannot be withdrawn from copies already shared. The author must choose that level; it is not a reviewer or teacher setting.