school hasn't completed the GCSE syllabus

Another quality post from charis!

Bollocks.

How does that work, then?

I don't think I agree with either bit of that, Charis, sorry.

And I also don't think it's realistic to expect her to take ownership of her own maths education.

You don't get what I'm saying.

She is required to by ofsted. Teachers are not allowed to stand up in front of the class and tell them how maths works. You would get into trouble if you were caught.

Teachers are not there to teach, they are there to "manage the learning" - mostly by assessing and recording it.

My post relates to the new GCSE not the old.

Anyway, thanks all for an eye-opening thread. I mentioned the gist of it to the various offspring and they were all equally surprised that it's common practice not to teach the whole syllabus except to the top set.

DS1 (now feeling more human, thanks, Noble) commented that it does explain how he went from C/D to A* in two weeks, once he'd actually met the rest of the syllabus!

Am I being in naive in thinking that the core skills in maths are n't changed by the way they are examined? Surely maths is n't as syllabus dependent as the humanities or even the sciences - unless at the top end where there may be uncertainty about which more advanced topics need to be taught.
Is n't the problem more of the examiners having appropriate expectations of skills for the grades?

I do realise though that teachers and pupils are very used to the security blanket of multiple past papers to practise and gauge progress.

I wouldn't recommend, but of course good 1:1 tutoring is going to be helpful! As I drove into school today to do extra revision with my year 11s, I told my year 9 son, who I'd dragged along with me, that when his time comes, he'll be going infor everything the school offers, apart from in my own subjects, where he will get the benefit of my undivided attention. He was thrilled, of course....

I don't think I agree with either bit of that, Charis, sorry. DD is learning all sorts of things at school, but I can see we need to keep a closer eye on the maths to keep her options open.

And I also don't think it's realistic to expect her to take ownership of her own maths education. All of mine have a tendency to get the wrong idea sort of ingrained, if that makes sense? DS1 thought that, say, 'xy', where x=3 and y=5, would be 35 - which would be fine if algebra actually worked that way.

I don't think teachers can be held responsible that 121 teaching is a more efficient way of teaching children than in a class of 30. It is just stating the obvious.

sort of hoping that we could leave her maths education up to the school

up to the school, not realisticat all, the school is far to busy assessing and recording your DD to actually teach her, but she should be more than capable of sorting this out for herself. It is called "taking ownership"

Blame the government and Ofqual. The introduction of the new maths GCSE is an ongoing farce. As a teacher I find it very difficult to simply smile at parents and say it's all going to be fine when the whole thing is actually a total mess.

You can absolutely leave your DD's maths education up to the school but she will get better results if you supplement with 1-1 tutoring. That's true for the vast majority of children. I'd definitely look into tutoring for kids in Y9 and Y8, the new GCSE is going to be a mess.

Sorry about your DS struggling, that must be tough.

Sorry, unjustifiably snippy answer there, as I've just been interrupted in (yes, really!) helping DD with some maths, by a nearly incoherent phone call from (autistic) DS to say he's been sent home from work because he's not functioning today.

Oh I'm definitely one of those parents -- luckily only in my spare half-hours from fretting about whether DS1 will ever cope with adult life at all.

I dunno. DD suffers from a lack of parental attention rather a lot of the time, and I was sort of hoping that we could leave her maths education up to the school.

Noble just wanted to agree whole heartedly with your take on Kitties.

I may go slightly further and say Kitties you sound a bit like one of those parents, let your dd relax and enjoy the set she is in. A B grade at gcse isn't the end of the world.

It's not that the final questions are 6 markers suitable only for A* students, it's that certain topics are pretty hard and less able children usually struggle with them. The final questions might be on transformations of trig graphs and only worth a couple of marks each but trig graphs are confusing so only taught to the top set. Or completing the square or algebraic proof.

Kitty, my DD is like that too but she has learned to make sure she checks the 'easy' questions carefully. I'd hope that when setting the teachers would be able to spot the able but careless kids.

Added it to the never-ending list, NobleGiraffe...

I still think I'm jibbing at the idea that there are questions suitable only for A children. DS2 got an A rather than A. I am fairly willing to bet that he did so by doing the final 6-marker questions very well, whilst making daft mistakes on the supposedly easier stuff. That's certainly what he did on every blooming mock paper, anyway.

I would suggest that if you think she is capable that you start tutoring her now in order to get her up to the set that you think she should be capable of being in but isn't yet achieving the results for.

I know, I get it.

It still seems a shame that children who ARE capable should never get as far as the actually interesting stuff.

Sorry, yes, level 6 in Y9.

The problem with situations like this is that the parents and pupils seem to be in the dark about what was supposed to be taught and what has n't been covered (for considered or other reasons).
IMO it would be a reasonable request to HODs that they should communicate both to DCs and parents at the beginning of Y11 spring term what won't be covered in the syllabus. If it is for reason of difficulty let that be spelt out before parents try to push their DCs to cover inappropriate material at the last moment.

If she gets a level 6 and maths hasn't clicked so she is a level 6 then what can they do apart from set her with the other level 6s?

Of course she will make more progress if you teach her yourself. 1-1 tutoring is very effective (and expensive). Teachers have to do 1-30. If a student shines, then they should move up a set to access the harder material. There's no benefit to the school in keeping a student below their actual level of ability.