3 year GCSE courses

Ofsted said our ds' school had a broad and balanced curriculum - and it does 3-year GCSEs. So stuff that in your pipes and smoke it, naysayers! As I say, it is not what you do, it's the way that you do it. Ofsted has not said all schools doing 3-year GCSEs are doing it wrong. It all depends on the school and whether or not it can convince Ofsted it is catering well for its community, rather than just attempting to game the statistics. Schools which second guess Ofsted and make changes they think will please Ofsted regardless of the actual opinions of the people running the place, the students and the parents, are not superior to schools which take a more considered approach.

Interesting @Teachermaths - looks like there are a few opinions out there amongst teachers. From the article it seems that ofsted are concerned about schools narrowing the curriculum. So if you can offer "a broad range of subjects" in Y9, you can also start teaching gcse in Y9 (definition of broad is key then - presumably there is a number of subjects that they want to be taught in Y9 but it might be ok if it's fewer than in Y7?).
I am not a teacher so probably missing lots of nuance here. Also not in England so no Ofsted, but DC's school might be ok under these rules as they do 3 yr GCSEs but in more than 9 or 10 subjects.

An Ofsted spokesperson said: "Ofsted does not intend to dictate the length of key stages in schools. Inspectors will be particularly alert, however, to signs of narrowing in the key stage 3 curriculums. If a school has shortened key stage 3, inspectors will look to see that the school has made provision to ensure that pupils still have the opportunity to study a broad range of subjects in Years 7 to 9.
School leaders and teachers should not make decisions about the curriculum based on a sense of what Ofsted wants to see. Rather, our new inspection framework will reward those schools that provide a broad and rich curriculum for their pupils at all of the key stages of primary and secondary school.

community.tes.com/threads/ofsted-to-penalise-schools-for-3-year-gcse-courses.785323/

www.google.com/amp/s/schoolsweek.co.uk/ofsted-criticises-3-year-gcses-and-low-ebacc-entry-in-new-inspection-report/amp/

Why don't Ofsted like it?
It works well in my DC's school - they get to drop a couple of subjects they have zero interest in a year early and spend the time doing subjects they do like in more depth. Mine are Y11 and Y9 and there was no stress involved in choosing subjects in Y8. I guess doing more than the standard 9 or 10 GCSEs helps in that respect, they are not closing as many doors as people who do fewer subjects in 2 years.

I'm a school Governor. I'm very glad our school don't do it. I agree with pp's that say it's not favoured in the New Ofsted framework. Broad curriculum and developing the whole child is what I'm getting (our school is due for Ofsted around February so we've had lots of training sessions on this). Ofsted are very keen to spot 'gaming' where certain GCSE's are not offered to certain students or options are arranged in a way to restrict choices in order to gain on Progress 8 (I'm not saying your school are doing this).

Our school do 2 year GCSE and have good attainment. I'm very glad of it as my dd has the most appalling Y9 - heath-wise, mentally, academically. She's taken to Y10 with a new lease of life and feels energised. She's excelling in subjects she would probably have dropped at the end of Y8. It seems to be suiting her. I'm also glad she had that extra time to choice her options.

Our school need to improve their Progress 8 but that's another story.

I know schools that do 3 years, taking a couple of GCSE's early (English Lit etc). Historically they were schools with low attainment. They are improving slowly but I believe this from a vast array of measures and not just down to the 3 year GCSE.

If your DD is considering medicine Sheffield medical school specifically states that "the relevant GCSEs should have been studied for no longer than two years;" and I suspect that others will follow.

Are they checking the curriculum of the relevant school for every applicant? If it’s referring to schools doing a 3 year ks4 I don’t see how else they would know.

Schools around here have been doing it for a long while too. My son is only just y7 and I'm really hoping that his school change back to 2 year GCSEs before he get to y9. He's currently quite immature in his attitude to some things and I think having an additional year to 'grow up a bit' before making choices and actually starting his course work will benefit him.

That's interesting cricketballs, I can see how an extra year would be great for business or sociology, not thought of it that way.

When we first introduced it as a teacher I was torn between the students being too young to make such a huge decision and the thrill of having 3 years (my main subject is not studied in KS3).

The first cohort of 3 year KS4 has just left and for my subject we covered some general learning in yr9 that was not exam specific which allowed us to look further and deeper into the different areas in the later years.

Overall their results were the highest we have had, their mental health was also better (imo) and the current yr11s look to be also following this pattern. However as a PP pointed out under the new regime OFSTED are not judging schools well if they have a 3 yr KS4 and I know my school is looking to go back to 2 years.

So despite my concerns over being young having had the experience of the massive positives I am not happy at going back to 2 years.

Dd is doing 11 GCSE courses, 7 of which are compulsory and then they chose 4 from a list. Over three years. She is taking her first age 14 ( summer born) in Y10 the rest she will take in Y11 age 15. Pupils don't have a choice about the length of course.

Lots of secondary schools in Wales do this and it seems to work well. They study more subjects to gcse than schools opting for the 2 year course, so the curriculum doesn't narrow too much in Y9.

If your DD is considering medicine Sheffield medical school specifically states that "the relevant GCSEs should have been studied for no longer than two years;" and I suspect that others will follow.

DD2's school does 3 year GCSE, but held a meeting with year 8 parents to say that they are switching to a 2 year GCSE from this year onwards, so current year 9s are on 3 years, but current year 8s won't be choosing options until the end of year 9.

It's not what you do, it's the way that you do it. Ofsted had no problem whatsoever with my ds' school doing 3-year GCSEs. In any event, it has enabled a broader curriculum for longer - 2 extra years of more subjects, because there's more time to teach them all. So on that basis (and, admittedly, given that my children already knew which subjects they would never in a month of Sundays want to continue with), I'm not seeing one measly year doing more subjects over which you have no choice whatsoever followed by having to give more subjects up for the next two years as being a superior option.

Ah ok oreomum, I took it that schools were doing it as a reaction to the increased content of the new GCSEs and the inability of students to cope with it/teachers to get through it (the reason usually given) so there would be no way of knowing that was an issue until the first cohort (exams 2018) had gone through the whole process - or at least were in yr 11 and struggling.

So that would mean the then yr 8s switched to 3 yrs - and they are only now in yr 10 actually.

But a school that started 3yr KS4 in 2014 with yr9 wouldn't be doing the new exams apart from maths and English.

Fair enough then, clearly they had other reasons. So they do have three lots of data to draw on, how does it compare out of interest?

Our school has been doing 3 year GCSEs since at least 2014 as I have an older child who was y9 then and so did the other 2 nearest secondaries.
Don't forget that while some subjects are dropped, new ones might be taken up- for example Business Studies or Psychology. Our school did some taster lessons of these sorts of lessons because it's not easy to pick Sociology if you don't know what that means.

Yeah I'm not sure what research either, very few schools will have gone through a three-year KS4 yet unless they decided to do it at once - last year's cohort were the first possible ones.

Most schools I know that have done this made the move a year or so ago so have maybe this year's yr 11 having done three yrs.

I have grave reservations as it is so limiting so early. Ds2 would have done tech and food instead of CS and history and his later choices were better for him.

But yes op, you don't have any choice, so maybe look at what yr dd may like and talk to her about the importance of subjects rather than what your friends are doing or what teachers you like!

Apparently research shows that 3 year courses are better all round

Hmm, given that this is a very recent development, I seriously doubt that.

Agree Ofsted have slated it and schools are quietly abandoning it. Kids should have the broad KS3 entitlement over 3 years and it’s unlikely schools are squeezing this into 2.

re O level comparison. I did O levels too and my DD2 is in y10 (DD1 did the old style GCSEs with more coursework).
I don't think the new GCSEs seem particularly harder than the old O levels (though obviously question styles and content are very different for some subjects), however the GCSEs have to be done by everyone, and for the less academic they really seem quite a challenge. Some have a lot of content.

re 3 year. DD is doing a mix.

• Maths doesn't count as it's a 12 year course really.
• Eng lang they've been doing questions in the style since y8
• Eng Lit they did a bit of the poems in y9 but I think they'll be re-covering them
• Science they officially started at the start of y9
• RE they do short course end y10 as standard, but DD is doing full course as an option so she's effectively doing a 3 year course
• other options are 2 year

DD1 & DD2 would probably both have made different choices if they had picked mid y8 rather than waiting until mid y9.

But you don't have a choice, so you just have to go for it and be positive with your DC.

Teachers on here often say that new GCSEs have 30% more content than the old style so an extra year probably ensures finishing on time without rushing.

Rosie you've explained it well. 3 year courses have gone out of favour with OFSTED and there's no evidence they are better.

Schools doing early entry for any courses will be hauled over the coals when inspected. That is considered bad practise now.

Minty, i think the thing that would worry me most about this is the introduction at this point when ofsted have made it very clear under the new framework that they do not consider it to be acceptable. You could have some sympathy for schools that have been doing it for a few years and need to reorganise but for a school to be considering introducing this now tells me they really have their eye off the ball in terms of what is considered to be good practice.