will GCSEs be harder from 2016?

Because academic qualifications and vocational qualifications are different. Because schools should not be judged as poor because they don't get high percentages of pupils through the Ebac when they are equipping their pupils for worthwhile lives with worthwhile skills.

What's wrong with all pupils taking five Ebac subjects and some taking academic GCSEs in addition and others taking vocational subjects instead of those academic subjects.

Perhaps there needs to be a foundation Ebac?

How can you say that you want vocational qualifications to be valued, but also discounted from the figures? If they are discounted from the figures then they definitely won't be valued.

The Tories definitely think one size fits all, they want every student to take the Ebacc.

I can't claim to know all the ins and outs of all the educational arguments on here. All I do know is that my dd was regarded throughout primary as top average. She didn't get into selective schools at 11. She scraped into the top sets. She got 6A* and 5A at GCSE last year. I did O'levels in 1976 at grammar school and the girls who achieved that were in single figures and breathtakingly clever.

I am very very proud of my daughter and accept that through diligence and a bit of late blossoming she has done incredibly well.

There are a few other things is there. I think she was better taught than I was at grammar school in the 1970's (although we paid after Year 8), there is far more emphasis across the board on the importance of exams nowadays and for her personally we wanted her to do the very best she could and facilitated it. She had the run of the house: languages in the study, science in the dining room, everything else in the kitchen.

But, at the end of the day and even with all of that I do not think she would have brought home 11 A+ GCSEs in 1976. And now for the interesting bit - I think my son would have but he was never ever described as top average - rather G&T across the board.

I do think the current system is deeply broken and needs sorting out. We also need a bit of honesty coming back into it. Two tiers have reappeared by stealth with BTECs and Foundation, etc., and ought really to be discounted from the figures. One size does not fit all and the sooner governments and teachers and parents understand that the better for all children.

Finally, there needs to be much more emphasis on vocational qualifications in the UK. Not everyone will be an academic or a professional but we all desperately need plumbers, electricians, nurses, childminders, mechanics, decorators, builders, hairdressers, chefs, cooks, etc. Valuing those jobs and careers starts, in my opinion, at school and at present I just don't see it. There is always a bit of a snooty "you'll end up working in a nail bar" jibe that comes from teachers as far as I have ever seen and this needs to be replaced with "if you train in that, and continue to be as good with people and organised as you are, you may end up with your own successful business - now I know you hate maths, but let's focus on the skills you will need to run that business".

It is a total fucking omnishambles.

A like iGCSE then?

The oral involves a picture (student chooses) and then any question of five topics.

The picture can be prepared in advance though. The student gives a short presentation on it...this is a family having a picnic etc...then is asked questions. Obviously you can do some prep for that as there are a limited number of questions that could come up; what's the weather like? What is that person wearing? What did that person do before this photo was taken etc.

The unseen questions can be anything but based around 5 topics. So you need to know your vocab for those topics. But you need to know your way around the tenses as the examiner will dot around.

I particularly think the MFL GCSE is unfair - some schools appear to play by the rules and make the pupils work on their controlled assessments in lessons. Some teachers, however, as good as write the CAs for the pupils and, like DorothyL says, the pupils just have to be arsed to learn it off by heart. The speaking exam is a joke, too - all it is is reciting what possibly someone else has written. And as others have noted, the unpredictable question is often anything but.

Controlled assessments were only ridiculous if they could take them home and where teachers had to spend hours marking and moderating them. If they had to do them in controlled conditions in school and sent off, they would not be ridiculous.

That's what we used to do for maths coursework before it was scrapped in 2009. The booklets couldn't be taken home, it had to be done in school and teachers didn't mark it, the exam board did. It was still a massive pain in the arse taking up way more than the 'recommended' allocated time and was way open to cheating. The kids couldn't actually do the tasks on their own and needed their hands held every step of the way. Still, it was an easy way to boost grades.

I had so many parents ask me to check their DCs MFL CAs that I could have set up a business.

Ditto the learn in advance oral questions.

But you can't be sure that that's not what happens, Camel, if you allow CAs

When something is worth 25% of the mark, say, what parent in their right mind is not going to seize hold of it and give it a good going over?

Of course, just because a parent has given it a good going over doesn't mean it'll be better for the experience.

There's an interesting set of assumptions about parental help. At GCSE there's huge amounts of pearl clutching over take-home work, parents getting involved, etc. The concern is that some large proportion of parents can provide guidance on a GCSE history (say) assessment which will improve it over the child's unaided work, hence the need to move continuous assessment to exam-condition (yeah, right) CAs. In MN land, it might be true that all parents can read and make helpful comments about a history submission; for a lot of kids, it won't be.

But the same concern isn't present for A Level, where take-home coursework is still a large part of some history (in particular) syllabuses and the EPQ is nothing but. It's as though there's an assumption that the only people with post-16 qualifications are the teachers. We read and commented on drafts, and provided some technical help on referencing and so on; nothing that a teacher wouldn't do, but available on tap rather than once a week. A large portion of children won't have effective parental help in constructing an A Level assessment, but for those that do, it will be extremely useful.

Controlled assessments are ridiculous when many lessons are spent on drafting and redrafting them, with extensive help from parents/teachers, so that in the end all the pupil has to do is learn it by heart and regurgitate it

But the problem is, Camel, is that the year group following the multiple goes at GCSE cohort were not able to avail themselves of this - so a student may well have got an A* too had he/she been able to have several bashes at the exam.

Controlled assessments are ridiculous: obviously some candidates are going to have far more help - from teachers or parents - than others. When something is worth 25% of the mark, say, what parent in their right mind is not going to seize hold of it and give it a good going over? I have seen some parents on here dissing parents getting involved and saying they trust the school: I would say in 100% of cases these parents are paying to be able to say they are hands-off and have the moral highground.

I thoroughly agree with WordFactory - just get on with the teaching. And then with one final exam at the end - "hell yeah" it often wasn't fair, but a lot fairer than what we have had in recent years.

I love how the government is so against resits to boost your score except in maths and English where if you don't get a C it's government policy that you have to resit till you get a C or turn 18.

And now they want kids to resit their KS2 SATs as well.

I think modules have the same impact as CAs though camel in terms of constant exams, breaking up teaching time.

It makes exams, marking schemes, revision and results the constant focus of years 9/10/11.

I'd much rather teachers be allowed to just teach their subject with plenty of time and space to ski off piste.

Sorry; arsiness was not intended. The child in question has had two years of chronic ill health and has had to work harder than most to try to catch up; the idea that he has been studying the wrong syllabus for the past year did not bring out the best in me. Sorry.

First why so arsey? Lots of posts on the thread re: years.

Oh dear dd1 is in year 8