I want to help my sons, but I have NO IDEA what they're doing

I would try talking to your son to get his perspective on how his work is going and just listen to his thoughts and ideas. Sometimes children find GCSEs and the thought of exams overwhelming and so decide to avoid even thinking about them, let alone doing any work. Just having someone to listen and guide them is better than telling them what they need to do.
There is still plenty of time before his exams. My dd is in year 11 and I got her the CGP complete revision guides and workbooks for most of her subjects.
Lastly, the school website often tell you what exam boards they use for each subject. If not, speak to his school. Teachers tend to be very welcoming of parents who are trying to encourage their children's learning.
You seem to be coping with so much, with working away, in a different country and your husband not being mentally in the best of health.

And there are no textbooks. Your DS really needs to be taking notes in class. The notes he takes are everything! Don't despair if he hasn't been! It's not too late. Get the books online, the ones I've shown in the link in my last post.

DS's teachers offered lots of study techniques. Mind maps. Flash cards. Look online for GCSE study techniques. Also, invite other students to your home for group study. We did this once in a blue moon, not often, but enough for it to be encouraging.

Every weekend needs to be about revision, OP. Revise. Revise. Revise.
It is an exhausting year but if he can just pull his finger out and dedicate the next few months to just pouring all of his effort into doing well (not A*s across the board- aim realistically, otherwise it's just too much pressure), if he can just get into 'the zone' of giving this year his all, he'll get there.

Go onto the school's website and read the newsletters, OP.
And talk to his form tutor, as of Monday the 25th, I'd be making an urgent appointment.

Don't panic. Just plug in. It's worth it. You'll 'get it' very quickly and a lot of your own anxiety will dissipate. Good luck!

OP, Hi! I'm a fellow American parent here (married to a Brit). Our eldest is in year 12, so we went through all of this last year and I found myself way out of my comfort zone. It's very different than at home however, once you get through this year, you'll have a good understanding for your next DC.

Is the school not offereing interventions at lunch time/after school? Intervention classes are offered as additional support for all students, especially struggling students. They take place at lunch and after school. Find out from your DC's form tutor or Head of Year if this is on offer and if it is, make sure your DC is taken to the right classroom for intervention (he may not take the initiative to go on his own initially, so if a teacher can guide him, this will encourage him- and yes, enforce attendance- not a bad thing).

Find out which exams are AQA and which are OCR- DS's school did both. You will want to get the current workbooks for those (ASK the teachers! They should have told you at the most recent parent-teacher consultations. If you don't know, ask). The books you want to buy will look like this: tinyurl.com/y2w9ftax
Some will be AQA, others OCR.

Check your child's school's weekly newsletter. Go onto the school's website to find them if they're not coming to your inbox. You will find really helpful information in them. I found out about meetings at the school, specific teachers offering interventions, lots of tidbits of guidance for the GCSE pupils and parents. It was really helpful.

So if I were you, I'd get the right books (but you need to find out from his form tutor which ones he'll need). Find out about interventions.
Above all, talk to your DS. What does he want out of all this: Sixth form? College? If he has a vague idea of what subjects he'll enjoy in Sixth Form or college, this will give him a sense of purpose. And if you can connect with him by talking to him about his favourite subjects, this really, really helps. Believe me, I have a cave dweller for a teen. But once I connected with him about the Russian Revolution or Chamberlain's appeasement, basically ANYTHING to do with history, english, or art- his favourite subjects- we had so much more to talk about and I'd steal 30 minutes with him (and get him away from Rainbow Six Siege for a nanosecond) just chatting in the kitchen over tea and brownies or something, just a casual conversation about Stalin's invasion of Berlin.
I feel like I could sit the GCSEs now. It was an education, for sure!

I think these huge exams are given at the worst time of our lives developmentally, but that's a whole other thread.

“As a teacher, I hope you don't mind my saying but you seem remarkably ill -informed about the GCSEs.”

I was ill informed because I sat O levels 44 years ago, so when DD had to choose her GCSE options and started her GCSE courses I made it my business to understand how it all worked. I made a point of attending all the parents evenings and talked to DD. I also found this forum very helpful.

If your husband won’t step up you will need to make sure you talk to the HOY and/or the heads of department for each subject. Is your husband getting the help he requires? I find it rather depressing that he failed so he thinks his children should.

Schools these days are so underfunded that textbooks are a thing of the past. DD only got textbooks in 6th form, and that wasn’t for all of her subjects. Her school sold the revision guides (at a reduced price) and they were invaluable. We also used online resources from the school and elsewhere. I’m afraid you are going to need to step up and be more involved in your son’s education.

OP, I may be reading too much into this. But have you made your your DS1 mental health is ok?

I suffer from depression and anxiety, and so does most people on my dad's side of the family. This started in school, and my work deteriorated just like this.

The fact your DH suffer from depression and anxiety and your DS1 spend most of his time in his room and isn't focused at school would ring alarm bells.

I hope it isn't the case and he's just being a teen and will do brilliantly in school

If the boy was in year 11, I would agree with you leerie, but he is only in year 10. There will be a large amount of syllabus not yet covered in school.
The op needs to know what has already been covered and the order in which topics will be taught so her D's can catch up on what has already been taught. She has already said that he doesn't know/remember and there is nothing in his books and very little on mathswatch.
Going forward, if she has the SoW she can make sure he is studying/ revising the stuff that has been covered in school.
The op does not want to have to teach from scratch or get her son to study syllabus material that is still to be covered.
As I said before, she does not need detailed lesson plans, just the summary of the work covered each half term. Often this makes up the first few sheets of a more detailed plan.

educating there is no reason for needing the SoW from depts if they have revision books though, is there? The Sow I've always had have been pretty detailed, and as I said, linked to dept equipment etc. OP does not need this detail. Revise what's in the revision guide - that's what will be tested. Easy.

I'm American too, and also flummoxed by the UK system. My year 10 son brought home a report card today, and I have little idea how to help (he needs to work on his spelling and show his work)

Genuine question, if you had been told he needed to work on these in an American school, what would be different?

I can’t help because I’m in Scotland, but also being. American just wanted to sympathise! It’s so different and the school assumes people understand the system. It took me ages to get my head round the fact that DS would study a bit of algebra, geometry and trig all in one year and then do a bit more of each the next... Or study multiple sciences in a year.

And the grade boundaries are way out of whack for me as well. D.C. come home and say they got X% and I have to ask them if that is good or bad and hope they are telling the truth. Thank God for Mumsnet otherwise I’d likely still feel as though I were wading through mud.

I'm American too, and also flummoxed by the UK system. My year 10 son brought home a report card today, and I have little idea how to help (he needs to work on his spelling and show his work)

I have spoken to someone at the school who is Canadian and that helped a lot because I was able to ask questions she understood.

I love most things about living in the UK, but the secondary school system is not one of them. I do wish for a liberal arts education for the DSs.

Both my sons (different secondary schools) have homework books or on-line systems I should be checking each week. Does your school have such a system so you can check weekly that they don't just stop doing work? My year 10 DS just admitted there were two weeks in January he didn't do homework. It is partly the age.

Our school is really good. It has an app. I can see everything. All revision he's supposed to be doing over this February 1/2 term.
Also a year 10 Evening meeting, after which all syllabus details emailed to us. I know you missed it, but a simple email to HoY to ask for a copy shouldn't be hard.
Did your Dh not attend parents evening?

Btw, Ds1 is the same. Very bright, lazy, bare minimum. It's common!!

For maths Edexcel, there are several excellent revision guides. Try www.mathsmadeeasy.com. It has exercises and videos per topic and sample exam questions. Edexcel also has flashcards for maths. www,my-gcsescience.com is excellent as well. CGP does flashcards for triple science AQA as well as combined science.

Look on the school’s website as they may have the GCSE information from the evening available to download etc.

Also make sure he has not internet access eg phones and tablets over night. Makes a huge difference in how much he will be engaged in lessons.

DS also in yr 10. I suggest get him to use the free www.bbc.com/bitesize/examspecs/zpgcbk7
There is one for each subject and includes a set of quick questions on topics within subjects. If he can do these questions ok on the topics he has covered since September then you both know he is listening and not taking notes but something is going in. If he struggles then explain it's a wake up call to how he'll perform in exams unless he starts working.

Yy to contacting HoY and saying you missed the I do everything evening and are not from the UK can they update you. There is probably an information booklet they gave out.

Ask in advance for the exam boards and the text books/revision guides they recommend. Text books do exist but they are often too expensive for schools to keep replacing every few years and are not liked by Ofsted.

Ask the HoY if will do a quick round robin of your son’s teachers to ask what is behaviour, effort and progress is like for the other subjects. Get them to pass on that you are keen to support your son and what to be kept updated and give them your email.

It’s going to be a lot more challenging if he only has an involved parent for half the time. Why/how is your SAHD being able to opt out of parenting?

I would highly recommend subscribing to www.mygcsescience.com

It's a one off payment for the year. My DS used is and now my DD is (current year 11). It’s excellent for consolidating what's learnt in class and extra revision. We print if the worksheets and exam questions which she does as she watches/finishes each section.

And I agree totally with @pallisers . I live it here but there and have been here over two decades but there are still things that come up where I feel totally out if my depth. Your DH should totally step up.

@JustGettingStarted I am a Yank and getting used to no textbooks and a curriculum that feels all over the place is something I am getting used to as well. The history GCSE feels like a selection of topics the examiner found interesting, for example, after a few hours on BBC4 or reading the Atlantic. Thankfully DH is a teacher...

Schemes of work are usually typed and so can be emailed and don't have to be photocopied. They aren't the same as lesson plans as they don't go into detail of each lesson, just the topics to be covered during each half term and how many hours of teaching for each. Some are quite detailed and you may only need the summary pages. Others are only about 4 or 5 A4 pages for a school year. You can always offer to help pay for photocopying if they need to do a lot.
I only know about maths and science schemes of work though. Maybe other subjects are different?
Usually schools are quite supportive when they see that a parent is trying to sort things out and help their child improve and they will help with information.

Contact his maths teacher and ask which exam board they are using. You can then go to the exam board website and download the syllabus. You can do this with his other subjects but I agree maths needs to be tackled first.

One good book I have is AQA GCSE maths for post 16.

(ISBN 978-0-00-822721-0) Obviously it sticks to the AQA syllabus but as it is designed for people with gaps in their knowledge who are resitting it covers everything.

Mat5hs is like a sport, come people are naturally very good at it, some struggle, very few people can't do it but the majority lie in the middle. It is also like a sport in that you need to practice to get better.

I recommend 15-20 mins a day on days when he doesn't have maths homework.

Also get him to explain the questions/methods to you, He will be able to do this if he has understood it.

Sorry, meant to say alongside the comments about DS taking responsibility, you said he was lazy and that's probably why you are so intent on finding out as much as possible. I don't think you will be helping him motivate himself if you have already found out what to do if he fails his GCSE s, but don't know the basics about what he's doing in class. That's kind of giving him the idea that it's OK not to put effort in this time round.
You need to get on top of him not working in class (implied by your saying there's not much in his exercise books). As a short term intervention, can you check his subject books every week, maybe ask head of year to put him on report for a few weeks, where the subject teachers will comment on his effort in each class. If work is not being completed, he should be staying behind/sitting detention to catch up. Best to nip that laziness in the bud now, before it gets close to exams. That's prob what you need to concentrate your efforts on - he should be able to identify the sections his class is working on in revision books. If he can't, he's not making the effort in class, and nothing you try and do for him will help.

I'd be very surprised if any teacher or head of year wanted to copy you their schemes of work for the whole year. A LOT of work has gone into these, they are specific to the department, depending on what resources are available. It is a LOT of paperwork which you do not need, would take up a substantial portion of the department photocopy budget, and you simply do not need it!
Your DC can tell you what he is studying in class -refer to the study guides and revision books you can buy, to help him with this. He will be told when exams are, and you will also be notified, this will also be up in the calendar section of the school website. Possibly not yet, but closer to the time. Pupils are always repeatedly told when assessments are due, when tests are, and how to revise each subject. Don't worry too much about that yet, but you need to make it clear to your DS that he needs to take some responsibility for being on top of this as it occurs. He is plenty old enough. As is your dh, who, if nothing else, should be encouraging your DS with his work. At present he sounds totally uninterested and uninvolved. Depression and social anxiety is no excuse, as much info can be found online.

Do they have any information nights or events? I think our school do at least I hope so when the time comes as the exam system has changed considerably since I did it 30 years ago!

Meant to say, it's hard to find what the exam questions will be like, but there are past papers for maths and English lit and Lang as they were first sat in 2017.

Exemplar papers should be available. Also GCSE workbooks are good.

Check if he is doing English, probably language, this summer. I'd be surprised but it could be right.