Year 11 22/23 support thread.

This is good news: GCSE pupils to have extra help with exams next year www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-63820126

My DD is exactly half way through. maths was a pleasant surprise - in Y10 exams they gave top two maths groups an extra hard paper. So the standard Maths higher level paper came as a nice surprise

Does anyone have recommendations for any authors for ds who has just turned 16? He's hundreds of books and an avid reader but I'm after new releases of something that could become a series.

DD’s mocks finished on Friday. They will get the results for those by the end of the term. We are going to wait for those before filling out applications for 6th form. There are four she would like to apply to and they all have January deadlines.

Oh ffs so not only is it practically impossible to get DS to focus on school work even though he has a conditional offer from college requiring 5 GCSE passes he has now admitted being addicted to vaping and has decided he wants to live with his girlfriend when he turns 16 in April!!!!!

@ColouringPencils I'm afraid it varies from school to school, so you'd have to ask! Probably the Head of Sixth is the right person to email.

Sympathy to those with DC doing mocks at the moment, DS has three left to go in the first half of next week. He's generally happy with how they've gone. He certainly wants to stay at his current school for A levels!

I wanted to ask what happens after results day. Would it be okay to go on holiday the following day or is it likely they would need to go into school to enrol? She is planning to stay on at current school, if that makes a difference

Can I join? I have a year 11 DD, currently half way through her mocks. She seems to have calmed down since they actually started and the only one so far she felt went badly is English. We haven't looked at any other sixth forms as she only wants to stay at her school. It took her a long time to settle and make friends, and moving again would be a lot of upheaval.

@W0tnow I am not sure about dropping subjects in general, but if she wants to do Spanish A-level, I would think it would be good to keep French GCSE. They are so grammatically similar, that learning one will support the other. I did French A-level and was able to do Spanish GCSE from scratch in Y12 as it is such a similar language.

DD’s mocks start tomorrow. She was away over half-term on a course and was home ill from school at the end of last week with a temperature and a cough. Am not holding out much hope for these mocks.

DS has been doing a bit of revision, and my take is that anything is better than nothing. The only tip I'd pass on from my own experience as a teacher and as a perpetual student is that "sitting and reading your notes" is generally rubbish; encourage him to have short bursts of writing out summaries of important things. Also, it's easy to revise the subjects you enjoy/are good at... so tell him to forget about those and focus on the ones he doesn't like!

DS has got mocks next week but really struggling to revise. I can't remember what I used to do. Any advice appreciated!

Some university courses she wants to consider require maths gcse, if not taken at A level. Business degrees for example. They don’t stipulate 8. More 6-7. She’s keen to come across as numerate.

Why does she need a high grade in maths GCSE if she’s not taking it for A-Level?

Is a high maths grade needs for one of her A-Level choices? If not the really all she needs is a 5 or up.

@Hellocatshome Sorry I wasn’t clear, I meant to say she won’t take maths for A levels, which is why she wants a high mark for GCSE math as this will give her more tertiary options. So far she is working super hard in Math, and pulling a 7. Just. It doesn’t come as naturally to her like it does her siblings. She thinks she may scrape through an 8 if she has the extra study time. She has the idea that if she drops French now, she will use the extra time to study maths.

It’s an independent school.

I guess that is option B then? Dropping it by not studying for it and not sitting the exam?

Unless its an independent school they are not very keen on dropping subjects. My son is dropping a subjects in that he is not revising for it and won't sit the exam (we will have to pay £40 fee to the school for not sitting the exam) but we feel its worth it for his mental health.

I dont really understand what you mean about maths though. Are you saying she's not doing it because she won't get a 7 or 8? You really need to do maths GCSE.

Hi all. I’m currently getting pushback from our school as I want my year 11 to drop one of their GCSEs. So from 9 subjects down to 8. I’m a relative newbie to the British system, how common is it to drop a subject? It’s French by the way. She’s not failing, but only just passing, she takes Spanish and will continue that to A levels. She won’t take maths as she has to work really hard to pull in decent marks and she really wants to achieve a 7 or 8 as we know that a solid mark for math is important if she’s not doing it at A level.

This is common advice now, I know. But the Engineers we know all said they were glad to have Further Maths when they actually got to university.

Hi @ Lannielou!

Has your son considered Further Maths, too? Good to have for Engineering. Will open up some more opportunities.

Yes my DD is being seduced by the Dance teacher to do Alevel even though when we looked at alternate colleges she has no interest in doing Dance at them and would prefer psychology. She’s only interested because the teacher likes her which is frustrating for us as she’s just not an ‘Artsy’ kid yes super sporty so v.fit interested in physio careers so PE & Biology & Psychology is a better fit based on the university stuff we’ve seen.

😂

Neither of which describes my ds in English.
I did ask if they were teasing him. He was certain they weren't.

This is the time of year where we refer to the "pick me" dance at school! Any student who looks like they work hard and will do well are fair game :-)

Ds went to his school 6th form open evening, as the only one he's considering. Apparently the English department were very keen to speak to him about doing A-level English. Rather strangely it seemed to be a teacher who knew him well... or at least I thought did.
English is probably at the bottom of his list of his current subjects. He's been counting the days until he can give it up from about day 2 of school!
He's currently looking at Maths (possibly further maths), Computer Science and Product Design.

DS