Tell me about Citizenship GCSE. Which is apparently compulsory at my DD's school. She doesn't want to do it.

If she's anything like my teen dds, she'll make an almighty fuss, insist you contact the school about it. Reluctantly you do this, then your dd decides actually it might be interesting after all and you end up looking like a twat.

I agree, its really irritating but not important in the long run.

I think what all of our experiences show is that forcing pupils to do GCSEs they really don't want to do for no good reason when this has the knock on effect of cutting them off from a subject they really do want to do and feel passionate about is a bad thing

I agree. My mum made me do history O level when I wanted to do geography. Even the geography teacher told her I should be doing geography because I was good at it. I failed history, so did my sister. As a result, although I would have preferred DD to do French, I didn’t make her.

The difference is that geography and history were optional, not compulsory.

But I'm seeing a missed opportunity to build on her academic ability by forcing her to do a less valuable GCSE

It won’t be considered less valuable to any university unless she is taking MFL, and an employer won’t care what GCSEs an employee has, as long as they have maths and English. If Citizenship is an easy A it doesn’t make is less valuable to anyone other than you from the sound of it. And if the school is saying it is compulsory then your DD will have to suck it up or move schools.

I was you when DD was in year 9, but with the benefit of hindsight I realsied that it really isn't that important.

Sorry but I agree. It's a good chance for your DD to learn the difficult lesson that life isn't all about what we 'want' to do

This old chestnut. Of course dcs should choose subjects that they WANT to do. That is allowed at gcse and a level

@HelloDulling and @TeenPlusTwenties I think what all of our experiences show is that forcing pupils to do GCSEs they really don't want to do for no good reason* when this has the knock on effect of cutting them off from a subject they really do want to do and feel passionate about is a bad thing (copyright Sellars and Yeatman ).

*Good reason for forcing say, the mathematically inept to do GCSE maths would be that we all need to be able to balance our weekly budget, or forcing those who find English dull beyond words would be that we all need to be able to read and write.

I would have much preferred to have a subject like citizenship than boring old science. I hated the fact that science was compulsory.

You could argue that most people don't use what they learn in science at GCSE but it doesn't mean they don't have to do them, even if they really don't enjoy them.

I did a subject at school back in the 90s called 'parentcraft'. It was non GCSE. It took the slot where I could have chosen a different GCSE but I liked the sound of it more than doing GCSE PE or an extra language or more science (which was basically the choices).
There were 4 girls in that class who had actually became pregnant before we finished our GCSEs. Tbh having done 'parentcraft' and therefore having one less GCSE was probably actually better really in what they actually needed in life.
I don't understand this 'waste of a GCSE' thing. It's knowledge that's the important thing surely?

Is it an academy school? If so, they can say it is compulsory but they can't enforce it. As my dd's school found out when I told them so about a subject they told her she had to take. We disagreed, and they backed down in the end.

Expected to read or listen to the news every day at dds school and discuss once or twice a week. Seems to cover it.

Just checked in with DD...she does 5 hours per fortnight timetabled Citizenship.

It covers a really wide of issues that are relevant in every day life and encourage debate. If your daughter can go into it with an open mind she might find she really enjoys it.

This ^^.

I don't know why I am sticking up for Citizenship because I would rather DD had studied French than Citizenship, but her school was very poor at teaching French, and DD hated the lessons. I have French A level so it was obvious to me how badly taught it was. I also think that we are generally poor at foreign languages in this country, but that is really for another thread.

I did find that DD was taught a lot of things that were useful though. It was more like general knowledge than anything else. They covered moral issues, politics, the electoral system, Brexit and anything that was useful about modern day living. I think maybe the answer is to have an hour a week so they can learn something useful about life in general, but use it as downtime because it is a non examined subject.

Citizenship is a much less rigorous GCSE than RS which is extremely interesting

I don't know how accurate this is but I think Citizenship can be what you make it. Certainly in DDs school the girls that study it are a wide mix of the less academic and the very highly academic who aspire to careers in law, politics, social science etc.

I think it’s compulsory at KS3. I’m not sure about KS4 but all kids will definitely have done it through KS3

I have a Y11 daughter. She’s also having to study Citizenship but although it’s compulsory, they’re not doing a GCSE in it. It’s just an hour a week running alongside their GCSEs.

I've just asked Dd2( year 11 state comp) and she has never heard of citizenship,or a GCSE in the subject,none of her friends are doing it and it wasn't offered when she took her options.
Her school is classed as deprived,but has a fantastic head who has dragged then out of special measures and has been over subscribed the past two years.

It's a pain in the arse when they're obliged to do a subject they're not interested, my DD (Yr11) feels much the same about French.

She chose Citizenship over RE - faith school so they had to do one or the other, it was the lesser of two evils as far as she was concerned.

She loves it and is on target for a 9 in her GCSE, has joined the local Youth Council and having been keen to be a photographer is now planning to take A Levels in Law and Politics with a view to taking a law degree.

It covers a really wide of issues that are relevant in every day life and encourage debate. If your daughter can go into it with an open mind she might find she really enjoys it.