Year 11 GCSE support thread 4 - more exams

Lynette I can relate to your post...DD sent me a video of her and her class in Hyde park this afternoon acting out a David Attenborough type scene where he discovers a herd of Year 11 students.... it was very funny, and although I wished they were revising (especially as she's only ever done three days a week...) it was very funny and they were making me erodes and marking their last proper day at school.

DS will be doing no revision...he doesn't revise or do homework. He does however retain everything which he has ever read/heard. So I figure if he's been taught properly, it will all have gone in...and he can just spew it out.

This of course doesn't work too well with subjects like English Lit and RE....the exams he's had so far.

Or maybe Biology, which had questions about things which they hadn't been taught...Which go me thinking. The average ability kids, who have worked really hard revising would do worse with an exam like this than a bright but lazy kid who could blag their way through the exam. I'm not sure if that's fair, or not. DS is definitely in the bright but lazy camp, but I'm not sure if he can think outside the box presented with something he hasn't been fed in class. How can an exam, such as Biology have questions on stuff which hasn't been taught? Should I be really cross with the school? Or the exam board?

Mine seems to be at the other extreme, has apparently planned revision all through the 'holiday', which I'm not sure is entirely a good thing. Wish they could all hit a happy medium! She was doing some biology this afternoon (but I think got fed up somewhere in neurons) and after dinner while I was clearing up DH was testing her on German vocab (sounded a bit hit and miss). But then we had three episodes of Enterprise and she's away to bed. Hopefully we can all get some lie-ins now.

DD also exhausted. She has at least two solid weeks of exams after half term and is talking about not wanting to do any more revision.

She slept this afternoon. Maybe watch Eurovision tomorrow and hope she perks up a bit. She could walk into Music and Maths and be fine without doing anything else, but that isn't the case for subjects like History.

Wow..DS has had it easy so far...after half term he has two solid weeks.

This afternoon he and his fellow prefects had nothing to do...no lessons on, and most people had gone home or not come in, but they had to wait for the school bus....so they practiced their "free running" in school, and took photos of each other doing it. These are supposed to be the bright, reliable kids in a nice suburban, high achieving comprehensive. The photos tell me otherwise.

DD did AQA, My Last Duchess came up which she doesn't like ( but I and surprisingly DS like) came up, but she liked the other poem. The unseen was a love poem and okay.
We now have only 4 papers left, she finishes the same day one of her friends start A2s!
She's exhausted.

Which exam board, homework ?

DS1 did the Wjec higher paper (after much deliberation with his teacher, and advice from MN).

Eng Lit was one of my strongest subjects and GCSE - Where as DS is much stronger in Maths & Science....I would have no interest what so ever in what his Maths questions were! because I simply wouldn't understand

Exactly T&T - I can't bear the stress of worrying about her answers!

homework Generally we're not meant to be too specific on questions in case a) anyone is in isolation and doing it tomorrow (though unlikely) and also b) the 2015 papers will be used as mocks for the current y10s so they don't want too much information findable.
Is there a reason why you can't ask your child?

Sorry wondered if anyone else could help . Did anyone else's child do foundation paper today , what was the poem the character and voice theme on , and what was the unseen poem .
Thanks for any help on these .

I don't mind if they tell me about the questions but as they are twins it tends to be their asking each other after the seeing what one put, rather than telling me.That's fine.

No tilly you're not.

I'm not asking anything apart from 'how was it?' and getting answers from terrible to OK.

If I know the questions, she might say what she put, and then I'd stress if it wasn't right.

I think I am the only person who doesn't give a stuff what the questions were or what they wrote for answers - I am just glad that they are done and one less thing to stress about

Haven't been to Southport in ages, AuntP

Woolley this game is at Southport. So they get to miss the 3 Queens caos that I'm expecting here. I have no intention of going out in the car Sunday or monday or I might get blocked out of my drive .

Apparently 12 pages was written by my offspring, I couldn't write that much about blood brothers or Lord of the flies.

Well, English Lit (Wjec) was "OK" - said with a smile. That is as much as I will get out of DS1!

But at least it's done. I would love to know what he's written...he can be quite able when he puts his mind to it, but has never completed a full exam paper before, claiming he couldn't. But on the other hand, because I get so little information from him, I can't stress.

Glad it went well for him Fairenuff. Sorry you were talking to yourself before !

BTM, the idea of a week with no exams, chip shop supper and watching something with DH has definitely taken the edge off it for her !

Hi all, I was still posting on the old thread like Billy No Mates until Errol give me a nudge, so will just repeat what I said there.

Ds is back and happy with the poetry paper. The comparison was something to do with how bravery is portrayed which he said was fine because he's studied conflict and the unseen he was able to write 'loads' about and was writing for the whole 75 minutes. Nothing about sex though.

He's out at work tonight then going to have a lie in and bit of relax before ramping the revision up again.

Good to hear things seem to have gone okay for most today, I agree that marks can be picked up all over the place for saying some of the things they're looking for.

Good on her for moving on so quickly - DDs not at all good at that.

Thank you all, I will relay that to DD as you are backing up what I said and she trusts MN - she asked me to run it by you and says thank you very much.

It was just one of those oh shit moments at the end of a long week, she's moving on.

Lucky boy auntp

My brothers saw Lancashire vs West Indies at Aigburth in the 80's and I was most put out that they wouldn't take me.

SugarPlum I agree with Wooly and the others - they will surely find lots of relevant points. Anyway, there's absolutely no point in worrying now. Thank God its half - term and she can put it behind her.

I am putting off going into the house as DD has her mates and they apparently made mac cheese for lunch.... planning a chippy tea too, though there may be a few extra teens there for it!

I certainly encourage mine not to worry about what has gone and just think about the rest. None of it is as important in a few years as it feels at the time anyway. English is usually okay for my twins. It was the maths which they are still cross about (the paper).

Sugar, on another thread where an eng. lit paper is being discussed an examiner is assuring people that they 'mark positively' - ie credit what is there. Your DD may have done better than she thinks.

Mine said that for the 'damaged relationships' question on the aqa for which the given poem was 'Manhunt', the one she'd chosen to compare it with was 'Paris' which she thought probably wasn't the most obvious (not sure she's right about that) but she wasn't sure which other would have worked. I unhelpfully said 'maybe The Farmer's Bride' - the only one she'd told me she absolutely couldn't write about (no idea what most of the others were TBH).