Year 11 GCSE exam support thread 3 - the exam weeks

Woolly, hope you both managed to sleep last night and that your DD feels a bit better today x

2 more today here Drama and Geography, drama should be fine he knows he's done well on the actual acting and apparently the questions are always about the piece they performed. Geography is the bug bear, he's started saying "well if I fail it's the teachers fault and we'll all fail Coz I always get the best mark anyway." I m hoping he doesn't fail and all the extra work he's done pays off, despite agreeing with I'm that if the whole class fail school might deal with the useless teacher, I'd rather he didn't fail after these 2 today we've done 8/24!

Woolley hope you and DD got home and got plenty of sleep.

Woolly, your poor DD. How are you doing with it all? I really hope they find the root of the problem soon.

Ooh, think I'll have a little count up too Soup and see how many we can tick off now! Something to do after have dropped ds at school. dd has an afternoon exam today - physical geography which could be good for her I think if she can get the timing right, and not get too carried away with any of her answers!
Hope Woolley's dd feeling better today x
And good luck to all

DS has his single Geography paper this afternoon. That will be 8/19 done.

???? ???? (not Ancient but may still help )

and Good Luck ?? to the rest of your DC

DD only has Physics revision today.

Hope you and DD have slept Woolly

No children to take in this morning as DS away and DD not going in until 1pm, feels a little strange . Physical Geography this afternoon which is one DD has been dreading.

Soupy, DD's exam was Drama and Prose. Last night I was chatting to a mum with a DD at another school who is doing IGCSE and has done lots of CA's so I think your DS must be doing the same!

Sorry to hear about your poor daughter Woolly. I wish her (and you ) well.

Twirly DS is doing Latin (and Greek, so he has a clash between them). plus 3 hours of geography this afternoon - he'll find it exhausting, poor lamb.

Sorry to hear about your DD, Woolly. Hope things are better today.

One for Latin, one for drama here.

Both seem quite chilled.

DD spent last night watching the DVD of the school play that she will write some essays on. Two of which are to explain why ' you were successful' . DD has been told to leave humility at the door .

Poor woolly and dd,hope they're getting some sleep now. Puts it all into perspective for the rest of us.

The idea of doing any paid work doesn't seem to have entered my dd's thought processes but tbh I'm not sure what there would be hereabouts.

Woolly, so sorry to hear about your DD Really pleased Schooll are being good, definitely agree health comes first.

DD is doing AQA and has poetry on Friday. Judging from bit of Geography I tested her on tonight, tomorrow's paper will not be going very well but I did pretty much know that before.

So sorry to hear about your DD being ill again today Woolley. What awful timing for her to be ill.I know there would never be a good time but its seems so unfair that its right at the start of her exams. Like others have said, I do believe they may take results based on coursework and mocks if she misses any. I hope you get some answers too, it must be a very worrying time for you all.

My DD has only text today something about never having to read another word of TKAMB ever again! . Thinks it went OK.

She has Latin Language paper 1 tomorrow. Anyone elses DC doing this? DD regrets taking Latin now (although I think that is down to her teacher rather than subject). I think she is fairly worked up about this one.

My ds had very little to put on a cv so he wrote a letter talking about his interests, his good reports from school, his attendance awards and he attached a reference from the person who took him on for work experience.

He had also done some volunteering a couple of years ago so he had a certificate for that and another reference. He put that he had enjoyed trying different sports (not sporty at all but willing to try different things). Any new experience, even a school trip that inspired them, is worth mentioning.

It was quite a short letter

But he was only going for a job as a washer upper and they took him on for a trial. He's been there a whole year now, has the very important title of 'kitchen assistant' and, most importantly, will actually have something genuine to put on his cv now.

What they really want to know is; are they going to be reliable, are they going to be presentable, are they going to be well mannered, are they going to be flexible, are they going to be punctual, etc. If you can get that across in a letter or cv it will really help ime.

DS1 needs to do that Ash, what sort of thing do you put on? No exam results yet and Ds1 didn't do the DofE.

My DD had AQA English today. Good questions apparently on TKAM and the Crucible, so all perky for now.

Just spent the evening helping her write CV for part time jobs. Let's just say my career in sales spin now extends to selling my own daughter, who is, it seems, 'a higly motivated, mature student' bla Bla. And so the bullshit required to get and keep a job, skips to the next generation. Is this what it's all for? Profound, if badly timed (rhetorical?) question

Lol. Yes, 40% is coursework. I didn't think that his school would have made a mistake.

Why is it so complicated now??

AQA English lit here one exam today and anotheranother, poetry, on Friday..... Dd found one question easy (the crucible) the other was a complete curve ball. Tears have been shed!!

x-post re Soup's DS. Sounds like it's all sorted. Panic over!

Hugs and to your dd Woolly.She was immensely brave to even go in today.Maybe she should try and rest for a bit.
Dd also had Eng Lit today.One question had been predicted by her teacher and they were well prepared.The other one was totally unexpected so dd had to wing it!Overall verdict was it could have been worse.I introduced her to the Student Room thinking this would help but she thought most of the comments were idiotic - not impressed.

Soup - DS is also doing Edexcel igcse. He did 2 papers back-to-back today and on Friday has a 45 mins exam called Drama (Open Text). His school has studied The Tempest for this exam, but other schools may have done different plays. Has your DS not studied a play? Perhaps he doesn't need to do this paper if his school has done a controlled assessment...? It's complicated, isn't it!

Woolly - So sorry your DD is still feeling ill. Very glad her school is being supportive at least and it sounds like they are on the ball re getting her the adjustments she deserves. She is a star coping with all this.

Doh, read back and I see he has. Then there is just one Lit paper. It's over. Coursework worth 40%.

I think you are correct SoupDragon.

"The International GCSE in English Literature comprises two assessment routes.
? Route one — 100% written examination paper (Paper 1 and Paper 2).
? Route two — 60% written examination paper and 40% internally assessed coursework
(Paper 1 and Paper 3)."

It sounds like he is doing route 2.

exam specification on edexcel website