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Original poster

SPAG marks for GCSE

30 replies

OhCrumbsWhereNow · 01/01/2023 19:08

Looking for some advice on how many marks are at stake here.

Y9 DD is clever but has pretty severe dyslexia and has hypermobile finger joints that makes writing by hand extremely slow and painful. Her major issues are working memory and spelling, her reading is okay but she wouldn't ever find it 'fun'. Her target grades for GCSE are 8/9 across the board.

She's used a laptop with editing software since Y6.

The SENCO has been in touch to check that DD wants a laptop for all exams, and has asked me if she wants spell check enabled or not - with the proviso that if it's enabled she can't get the SPAG marks. Unfortunately SENCO did not provide any info on what that means...

Without spell check I suspect the examiner would need to be something of a cryptanalyst as everything is written phonetically and the same word is often spelt four different ways in a single paragraph (no intervention has made the slightest difference to DD's spelling so we gave up and just let software solve the problem).

If we opt to keep the spell check enabled, would that rule out any chance of getting top grades? Are there SPAG marks in all subjects and do they carry the same weight?

OP posts:
Original poster
OhCrumbsWhereNow · 01/01/2023 21:48

Yikes 20%... that pretty much puts paid to any chance of a top grade.

English language is definitely her stronger area compared with the literature - as long as she has the spell check enabled, which she always does.

I think it's probably going to be a case of seeing whether she is just completely freaked out by not having it on and if that makes things worse.

She uses voice to text most of the time if she's send me text messages etc. The few times she's actually written something herself it takes me quite a long time to read it as everything will be spelt phonetically but with multiple variations.

If her spelling is that bad, would she even get any marks for it in the first place, or is it just going to drive the examiner mad trying to interpret it?

It does seem a bit crazy that such a high percentage is allocated to spelling - given that there is no need to ever write anything these days without using technology. Surely the actual content is more important?

OP posts:
Michaelmonstera · 01/01/2023 19:33

This school explains it clearly www.stgeorges.herts.sch.uk/attachments/download.asp?file=361&type=docx

Michaelmonstera · 01/01/2023 19:27

PotteringAlonggotkickedoutandhadtoreregister · 01/01/2023 19:23

Spag is 4% of RE AQA GCSE (9 marks out of 201).

16/40 marks for writing on AQA English Language

PotteringAlonggotkickedoutandhadtoreregister · 01/01/2023 19:23

Spag is 4% of RE AQA GCSE (9 marks out of 201).

Michaelmonstera · 01/01/2023 19:20

20% of English Language is SPaG; however, if you can read what she has written, even if misspelled, I would opt to have the autocorrect disabled. She will still get marks for punctuation and grammar. Most subjects have a small amount of SPaG marks for some questions (indicated next to marks on exam paper. It is important that she practises on a laptop without autocorrect e.g. on Wordpad, as this is very different from using Word.