GCSE summer 2020 thread 6 - Carry on Corona Cohort, Further adventures aboard the Corona Charabanc.

Just had an email from school with a link to a video saying goodbye to year 11 from the senior management team. Today would have been the leavers assembly and prom. Made me feel a bit emotional watching it with the teachers all in their zoom windows.

DS is at his dads house but will be asleep I should think...

The end of the exams made DS a bit flat. Not to a worrying level, but he said that whilst he "wasn't doing exams" he could enjoy the freedom, but now that he wouldn't be doing exams anyway he was conscious of missing out on better times. It is difficult to persuade him that he should now be doing the transition work.

Like others, both my DSs and DS1's GF getting up early afternoon, going to bed around 2am. Working out and gaming and not a lot else although both have tidied their rooms (DS2 for the first time in about 3 years) and DS1 even hoovered his!

The most constructive thing we have started is a cooking rota and everybody is doing 1 day a week, mainly for DS1 to lean to cook before going to university. DS2 started with scrambled eggs on toast or pancakes, but can now cook fish, macaroni cheese, veggie lasagne.

@comefromaway dd has transition work for all three of her sixth form options. The thought of having to do all three because she's so indecisive has forced her to make a decision on where she's going!

Now that she only has the one lot of work to do, she says there's no urgency and it can be left till August! It's not like she has anything else to do....

Thank you Monkey for that tip. I will definitely talk to Dh about that as an option. I actually hadn't heard of that idea.

Ds has this week been sent a list of tasks by his future college to be completed and uploaded by mid August. He has sort of made a start, but is procrastinating in favour of programming his keyboard sounds.

FoolsAssassin it was Dominic Cummings that was behind changing the GCSEs - Gove apparently said Cummings was his ‘daemon’ and gave him the push to do more.

@Oblomov20 re car insurance a friend recommended those ones which let you buy a stand alone month in their own name which lets them use a car without affecting the no claims of the other if anything happens. However, I discovered that Direct Line would add DS1 on for £2/day on the policy we have with them. I think we can add 7 periods of an extra person added on. Last time I added him for a few days it was free! So may be worth checking with your insurer.

That's worth finding out now @Silverhill. Dd is doing Psychology and I hope she likes it.

Does your daughter have any possible alternatives to Sociology?

@FoolsAssassin
No, she is finding the Psychology textbook quite interesting. It's Sociology that she is having doubts about.

A few weeks ago, DD asked me to buy her the textbooks for the three subjects she had applied for, and has been reading through them.

Having read a fair amount of the first year content, she has discovered that she really dislikes one of the subjects. I suppose it's better to find out now, rather than in September. We've emailed the head of sixth form to ask which other subjects are in that timetable slot and might have space.

I hope so @FoolsAssassin.

@ProggyMat I definitely won't be cool about it on the inside if DD gets a grade lower than what she deserves, but I'm trying not to show DD as she will just get annoyed and worried about it all now when in reality all may be well come results day. But at the same time I need her to be aware of the situation so she isn't totally blindsided.

On results day, I will TRY to agree it's not fair and that she does deserve a certain grade, BUT this is the system and it's the same for everyone etc. What would have been a 8 last year is now a 7, kind of thing.

I am more worried about her reaction to Maths and Chemistry grades to be honest. Bottom line is that she didn't revise enough for certain subjects (started too late) so her Mock results were lower than expected, whilst subjects she started first or the exams were later (she had 2.5 weeks all subjects 2 past paper mocks) she did really well with. Unfortunately a case of lesson learnt that Mocks are more important than she realised.

@KingscoteStaff - DD loves her massive whiteboard. It has worked really well for her and I hope she carries on using it as gives her more structure during lockdown - although most things seem to get done from 11.00pm - 2.00am!

@FoolsAssassin - fingers crossed! a mixture of the 2 would be great. (speaking as a Mum with no knowledge of the practicalities of the education system etc)..

No mention of Hoodies, but we are having Lockdown Rainbow badges across the school. A Mum has organised this, and there has been a massive take up (school is nursery to Y13). DD scoffed at the idea but I ordered 10 anyway (for all her friendship group) and apparently they all want one so am sure DD will too. They are allowed to put them on their uniform next year but I am pretty sure DD won't be doing that..

Ds is going minimal work, but at least some of his bridging work for the 4 A'levels they ask (they drop 1 pre Xmas).

He's playing x box for an amount of hours that is seriously unhealthy.

He's been meeting mates, which I'm pleased about.

I'm on another thread trying to sort out car insurance, or get an idea at least, in preparation for his birthday.

Thank you OP for new thread.

@ProggyMat isn’t that the point of the rankings though? Because it’s hard for teachers to predict where the boundaries will be but if they rank accurately the exam boards can then make sure the ‘right’ % gets a 9/8/7 etc, they might just have to move some students down a grade.

Yes, my DD’s school usually gets majority 7 plus grades (well remembered!) but I’m not sure that makes much difference. Like others have said, there are often big surprises with exams - at least this year, we roughly know what to expect.

To second what Monkey2001 says - DD1's GCSE results were a flip of what she expected. She was the first year of the full 9-1 system and had no idea what to expect, but even what she got was unexpected! 9s in geography and biology (her two most hated subjects, and got a 6 in her geography mock!) and a 7 in English language (after consistent 8s/9s throughout year 10 and 11) were the big shockers. I think if she'd been doing this year's system she'd have got the English Language 8/9 and 7/8 in geography and biology so it would balance out. She's A levels now but I've not really peaked at the A level thread.

Ah yes so it was. Perhaps in some ways I have more faith in this system. Not sure we are in the 7/8/9 categories across the board .

College have written today to let us know they will be scheduling enrolment interviews via letter at the beginning of August. Not sure when these will start presume after results day...when we know when that is.

English Language is notorious!

@OrangeCinanon I think it was the English Language grades?

Was it last year that there were many surprised at their GCSE English lit mark? I seem to remember something but can't trawl through the thread. I already had it in my head that there will be some unexpected results...was it always like that or the last three years?

I get so annoyed when they blether on in the press about exams not being as hard 'these days' if there us that kind of analysis this year I shall be so annoyed.

@crazycrofter Surely though, if it’s hard to grade work and mock exams over Yr10 and Yr11 how certain can we be that the assessed grades given to the Corona Cohort are what they would have achieved had they’d sat the exams this year?
DDs school applied 5% to last years Biology papers when grading January mocks (they used 2019 papers)
If I remember correctly and please correct me if I’m wrong, your DD attends a school that gets 90% plus results at grades at 7-9
I would think it would be harder to finely differentiate that cohort into grades 7,8 and 9.

Just be careful about the Plague stuff. Not to be a killjoy but this would not go down well at our school - we had a child whose mum died in hospital and they couldn’t say goodbye to her properly. If it’s a big year group it’s difficult to know who has been affected.

On a lighter note, humanities results in particular have always been suspect at GCSE and A Level. Our local school is very set up for remarks - with a ‘remark station’ in place with the forms etc on results day. Many go up which is good for this years cohort but unfair for other schools who have fewer parents who pay for this ‘service’.