Year 11 support thread - keep on keeping on!

Feedback from this morning;
DD1: exam was good
DD2: so hard and worded weirdly!

Quad - it's so annoying when they do that. What's 'okay' supposed to mean?

AQA chemistry C2 and C3 alright but apparently he was short of time on C2.

Me (via text): How was Chemistry?
DD: Okay

Edexcel Chemistry OK apparently. DS says he felt it went well, one of the 6 marks was a bit weird but he figured it out in the end. No more details available! Revision day tomorrow, 2 exams on Friday and then Finished!

ds has a couple of friends who were going to do Maths A Level & have now changed their minds. I suspect that grade boundaries will be lowered and they will get similar marks anyway but by that time the damage to their self confidence will have been done.

I think the powers that be were trying to add harder questions to stretch the top 3% but it has backfired a bit. Maybe they could have achieved this with tweaking the Further maths GCSE instead.

I'm very confused about where the grade boundaries will end up especially at the top.

Completely agree. What is the point of exams where a positive result is out of reach for so many no matter how hard they work? We have a girl living with us during the week who is in that position. She needs solid basic maths and English for her chosen career and has struggled so hard with these exams. It just puts young people off trying. Meanwhile you get people like DD saying how hard these exams are - and she is in the top 2% in her year . That tells me these exams are just putting achievement out of reach for the majority.

Absolutely. It's a bloody disaster in a school like ours with around 90% low and middle ability- there have been so many tears. And not just from the kids

And don't get me started on the English!

"Instead they've just scared people silly who probably would have coped just fine with A Level maths or Physics but who won't now consider it since they feel they are far better at other subjects by comparison"

And completely screwed over the ones who just needed a basic grade to get through to the next bit of their lives.

Were not we're, dyac

I agree noble. The amount of girls in tears at dds school - and these are set 1 girls. Many who were getting A/A* and we're thinking about maths A Level but have now given up on the idea because they don't feel good enough. There's a lot of despondency which is so sad, and very very frustrating.

The thing I find depressing about the maths -if I've understood properly- is that there is now a much higher level of reading comprehension needed. Which puts lower ability kids at a huge disadvantage, and with the English syllabus being much more demanding at all levels is a real bummer. Both for the kids and for schools which have a high % of lower ability pupils.

Agree with you Noble. Maths education should be about encouraging 'can do ' for the many, and ' stretch' for the most able

Fleur so funny we've 'snapped' again!
Woodlands I was thinking the same, he can have his party in the garden, I want a yoga break in Sri Lanka with mindfulness, meditation & mixology anyone coming?

Thought paper 1 for foundation was horrid, paper 2 much better and paper 3 OK first half but some tricky questions at end

I thought the whole thing was a bunch of wank from start to finish. So totally unnecessary. The only aim that has been achieved has been to make nearly the entire cohort think that they are bad at maths. I'm very angry.

AQA higher here - DS says it went Ok. Seeing that he was getting the equivalent of Us and Fs in year 10, the fact that he's been confident after all 3 papers is a bloody miracle and all thanks to his marvellous maths tutor. Revision for the Wild West history paper was distinctly dodgy last night - it's an A level choice, so bit anxious, as he reckons he messed up the cavalry question on paper 1. Tomorrow, with two exams, is a real hump to get over, then a day to revise physics and a whole three days for history of surgery. And then.... prosecco!

Edexcel higher here. DD texted IMMEDIATELY saying it was really hard. That sent me into panic! I then saw paper (Maths teacher same board) and really panicked as it seemed fine with topics on she could do.
After tonight's dissection I think she thought she would find it 'easy' as she felt very well prepared - she has revised loads and we had done lots of work on predicting what would come up. She did many of the questions I thought she could and even attempted some that I wouldn't have expected her to. I'm confident she has done fine and I think I have re-assured her.
For the higher set of papers I think those students targeting grade 7 and above have had a tough time in that end of paper questions really stretched them - I think for these students paper 1 and 2 were hardest, paper 3 seemed more 'do-able' at the end. For middle ground (my higher group - 'aspirational' targets of 7 - ) I think papers were generally more accessible than they could have been - I thought second half of paper 2 was particularly difficult for these students, although my DD disagreed.
Very interesting teaching the same set as my DD (in different schools) - stress level as a parent 100% more.

I also had a foundation group! Thought paper 1 for foundation was horrid, paper 2 much better and paper 3 OK first half but some tricky questions at end. Interestingly, tricky because of wording and lack of labelled diagrams rather than the Maths.

Never mind the teenage party in the garden on Friday - I'm having a party of my own!

On the home straight now ... Chemistry and history tomorrow, day off on Thurs to cram for physics on Fri... then FSMQ maths next Tuesday.

This time next week, it'll all be over for us. Celebrating with another gig for the band!

Chemistry and History (Germany) here tomorrow. Fortunately ds is home from uni in time to help with History revision. Good luck to everyone for the final push.

Ready snap, DS said paper 2 the easiest, today's one middle (hard but doable) and first one the hardest. That's Edexcel higher. We'll know soon enough.

EdExcel here, Ds thought it was fine, most of his maths-y friends thought it was easier than the calculator paper.

Sorry DD Edexcel not AQA.

DD back from Edexcel Higher. She thought it was the hardest paper, but answered every question "with something, but not the full answer"
Still providing she gets a pass, no more maths ever! Needs to focus on tomorrow's History paper now.