Starting Year 11 GCSE 2021 Thread 2

Dogatetheleftovers my daughter is also incredibly stressed. It is awful to witness.

My DD is so stressed out by the uncertainty over exams. Life for a teenager is hard at the best of times but in the time of a pandemic, it’s overwhelming, isolating, scary and depressing. The government are letting down our kids, they should make a decision so schools, students and families can start to prepare properly instead of at the last minute!

[quote Stormer]@indy69 probably because the government still wants the exam boards to play a role, i.e. providing tests (which are not exams, oh definitely not ) and providing guidance to teachers about how to assess grades.[/quote]

1. The Government don’t understand it is taxpayer money
2. the teachers don’t want parents harrying them so need another body do refer to
3. our children are being given the least information I know about changes to exams in several generations; cancelling exams is massive but the new scenario of browsing some inane comments every few weeks is risible.. but moving the goalposts every month or so is bonkers, damaging and not thought through. DD now ignores.

@indy69 probably because the government still wants the exam boards to play a role, i.e. providing tests (which are not exams, oh definitely not ) and providing guidance to teachers about how to assess grades.

@NotDonna our parents’ evening went well too - I’d be quite happy for them to continue on Teams after all this is over, it’s so much more efficient!
All teachers are expecting the year 11’s to return to class in March and all are fairly certain there will be set exams in all subjects in May. Now they’ve got their heads around online lessons, things seem to be working smoothly currently, it’s certainly a lot better than lockdown #1!

Parents Eve went well. Not a lot for them to say other than ‘keep plugging away’. They’ve no mocks so are hoping to gather evidence when they do return to school. The emphasis was very much on keeping up the high effort, consolidating and perfecting everything that’s submitted. Ensuring knowledge consolidated & fully prepped for any mini exams. And maybe breath? It does feel like more pressure for DD2 this year than DD1 a couple of years ago. She seems to be taking it in her stride though.
She also submitted her A level choices this evening so it was good to have teachers confirm her potential and have those signed off.
How’s everyone else’s DC getting along.

We had a parents’ evening on Teams in November before the December mocks and have another this week. We have had all mocks results and predicted grades given a couple of weeks ago, but also a request here not to discuss exams or predicted grades at the next parents’ evening.
A couple of teachers have asked not to see us as they would rather have the time to speak to parents of those that aren’t doing as well, so I’m ok with that, some teachers have 2 or 3 classes, so seeing 60/90 parents in one night is a lot!

We had ours a few weeks ago, 4 minute slot, a bit like speed dating. No discussion just the teacher telling us where she is and what improvements could be made. We received the mock results just before but were told not to discuss grades. I'm actually finding it a bit difficult as we had no parents evening in Y10, no written reports for the whole two years, all we've received is target grades and 1-4 grades for behaviour, homework etc. Feel so out of the loop.

Got an email as well to say they have decided to enter her for the foundation tier for science so I've asked for an explanation on the reasons for this as we can't quite see where this has come from. She's very low at the moment, very demotivated, I really hope we get the plan soon.

We have ours this week. Given this guidance
Teachers will be able to discuss how well your child is covering the content of the qualifications they
are studying, plus any recent assessments. Teachers will also discuss targets for your child so that your child
• is aware of strengths in the subject;
• continues to make good progress against the current assessment criteria for the qualification;
• continues to address any gaps in knowledge in order to make good progress. You can appreciate, teachers are not able to discuss how the qualifications will be
awarded this year, as all schools and academies are awaiting official confirmation from the DfE
(Department for Education) and Ofqual (Office of Qualifications and Examinations Regulation). As the
consultation period is ongoing, it is unlikely we will receive any official updates until mid-February.
Parents evening will be interesting as usual. All this within a 6mins slot!

Have any of you had a recent parents’ evening? Did they discuss potential grades? Ours have said they won’t, probably because they’re concerned parents will put too much emphasis on these and expect them to be the CAGs. I’m just wondering what other schools are doing at the moment.

Yes @Stormer, my thoughts exactly, especially if the government wants to roll out these mini exams - which I actually hope they do. I know those results will only be a part of their overall result, but it is an essential part as it gives them a bit of focus to continue studying and doesn’t rely totally on continued assessment.

I meant to say earlier that I agree @Toobuktim that it would be great if Yr 11 and 13s could go in at same time as primary school kids if not before.

If they don’t get them in by April at the latest they are going to be even more disadvantaged when it comes to assessing GCSEs/A Levels and their general learning in advance of moving to A Levels/university/equivalent.

Hi,
Has anyone's children done the IGCSE in Philosophy and Religion? How have they found it? My youngest is now deciding her choices and wants to do Geography and Philosophy& RE as well as others, but I am worried these two combined might be too much work.

She's not picking anything creative despite being quite creative, she says shes not going to be an artist so what is the point......

The consultation’s closed, now we wait. DH and I both submitted our responses and made use of the comments sections.

With talk of primary schools possibly returning from 8th March, I wonder if years 11&13 will also be allowed to return earlier than other years. March would be fantastic, but I’m thinking it’ll more realistically be after the Easter hols. DS has had his 6th form options meeting this week and will be having his 2nd parents’ evening on Teams again next week, this year seems to be hurtling by already.

Lynette
I'm having the same issue with my DD
She is treating every piece of set work as a GCSE assessment (the school has said they may well be assessed on work produced)

She's really worried about getting a poor result and it affecting her GCSE result

But she's also been told to revise (bearing in mind she's working till 10 ish most nights desperately trying to keep up)

Honestly the whole thing is inexcusable

For context she was on course for 7/8 and the occasional 9 for all subjects

Ofqual consultation period ends tonight. I wonder how long it will take to for them to decide and tell us all the assessment plan for this years exam cohort.

Well done Titsywoo and all DC still doing/worrying about mocks.
DD was due to write her Btec exam early January and the evening before the school emailed to cancel. She had worked hard revising and the late notice was a bit of a blow. I know that things are up in the air but I still feel the need to rant!
Her motivation took a dive but she seems to have handled the situation well, and I'm aware that I should not project my negative emotions, so trying to staycalm. I'm in awe of her quiet resilience. On a good note she received a good report and great predicted grades. Parent's evening next week. Need to finish the consultation by tomorrow.
Sorry for the rant and negativeness! But do hope that you are all copying well.

I think mocks will be used as part of teacher assessment, which is why DD hasn't been given the results of hers.

She's now getting worked up about every online test- she came running into the kitchen yesterday holding her laptop in a mad panic because she couldn't read/understand a written maths question. Once I calmly read it out to her and slowly repeated it, she was perfectly able to to the maths. At that moment in time she seemed to think the whole of her maths GCSE result hung on that test.

DD got her mock results back and she did so well! 3 6's, 4 7's an 8 and a 9! SO proud of her - shame they aren't going to use them for the results but if there is a teacher assessment I hope it will have some impact.

On the plus side DD has finally started live registration and some live lessons this week.

I was able to hear her form tutor taking the register one morning (DD usually wears AirPods) and it was interesting to hear how the teacher interacts with the class - she sounded a bit drill Sargent, but they're a crazy bunch of individuals and that must be the style that keeps them engaged.

@Neversaygoodbye It's not even a joke, it's a horrendous mess. There was to make contingency plans, but just Gavin Williamson seemed to stick his head in the sand and pretend everything will be OK.

Well it's not OK.

They damn we'll need to put their thinking caps on and have a contingency plan in place for next year.

Sounds reasonable to me. Why England a)didn't have a contingency in place before announcing exams was cancelled is beyond comprehension and b) considering Wales & Scotland had already decided on this months previously why can't we just go along with whatever alternative they've decided to use. But oh no, let's just reinvent the wheel with just a few months to go. It's a joke.

what does everyone think of what Wales has announced yesterday that they are again reviewing the assessment for this year article