High-achieving ds feels teachers have turned against him in Y13

Congrats to him. Did she have the other student’s permission to share info about their mark?

Just thought I would update this following results day. DS got the 3 A stars very comfortably and that is the main thing. (No one else got A star in history). Weirdly though one of the teachers who had seemed to be putting him down a bit came up to him when he was collecting his results and congratulated him but also made a point of telling him that one of the other students got a higher mark than him in one of the papers. Why she felt the need to do that I don't know but it leaves a nasty tase and I'm glad that ds2, who is going into Y12 this year, isn't doing that subject.

Just thought I would update this following results day. DS got the 3 A stars very comfortably and that is the main thing. (No one else got A star in history). Weirdly though one of the teachers who had seemed to be putting him down a bit came up to him when he was collecting his results and congratulated him but also made a point of telling him that one of the other students got a higher mark than him in one of the papers. Why she felt the need to do that I don't know but it leaves a nasty tase and I'm glad that ds2, who is going into Y12 this year, isn't doing that subject.

The threshold is not high to get a PGCE. The quality of the degree (class and institution) is often a little suspect, and often teachers are not teaching the subject they have a degree in. A massive problem. A french teacher should not be teaching biology at GCSE level, for example.

If you are a bright student it's not difficult to be better informed than a significant number of teachers.
I am not knocking teachers, there are some brilliant, very bright ones. But not all. I know many that quite frankly scare me with their lack of subject knowledge. The requirements have been getting steadily lower with the continuing problem to recruit. This has been over decades. The reality is that unless this really is your vocation (which there are some amazing teachers) if you have a decent degree from a decent university you have more options and you don't choose education.

(he doesn't actually need A stars, but he'll feel a failure if he doesn't get them, especially in this subject @stripycats

He's objectively not a failure for not getting A star so he needs to work on his resilience before going to university.

It's a common problem especially with naturally gifted and talented children or children praised for their results rather than effort, is that they get their confidence from their results, an external source of confidence, rather from their own effort, an internal source of confidence.

Using language like thinking teachers are wanting to put him in his place shows that your ds's identity is rooted in being the best in the class.
When teachers might be trying to stretch and challenge him, he perceives it as a test and his identity feels threatened, he assumes teachers are intentionally trying to expose his "weakness."

Make sure you praise his effort and help shift his sense of identity and confidence from his results to the effort he makes.

What a silly comment you sound like someone who believes the ‘system is fair’ teachers will have their own reasons as to why they purposely mark some students down. Think about it. Tick box exercises

But you have no idea of the experience of the marker on these anonymous sites.

What a silly comment you sound like someone who believes the ‘system is fair’ teachers will have their own reasons as to why they purposely mark some students down. Think about it. Tick box exercises

A teacher marking an internal essay down a mark or two (it’d that even what’s happened) doesn’t hold a student back. How could it? Also why would a teacher want to, given their entire reason for doing a very difficult job is to help students advance - plus student performance is part of their professional evaluation…

This happened back in my day the teachers would overly praise high achievers then stop them from going so far to keep them in their place or the school simply didn’t know what to do with overly bright students! Have also seen many marked down on purpose by teacher to hold them back

But if you go with an organisation like MarkMyPapers then the examiners grading the essays have no idea what the teachers thought of them to begin with - so maybe that's a better option.

This is a bit of a weird one and I'm not sure how best to handle it. DS is a high achieving very driven student in an average comp. He's head boy, only one to get all 9s at GCSE, is predicted 3 A stars, got that in his mocks and has an Oxbridge offer. I'm not bragging but obviously this is relevant to the post. He absolutely loves school and his teachers and parents' evenings are always glowing - as much in terms of his attitude as his achievements. He is always being praised for his contributions to discussions (does hums/arts subjects) and his questions as well as the way he asks for and responds to feedback. It has never so much as been hinted at that he is arrogant and I really don't think he is. He has a wide range of friends and helps out at revision sessions for younger pupils, open evenings etc.

Lately he has been commenting that in one subject he is being marked down by teachers and disagreed with in class, he feels, for the sake of it. To give an example, essays are marked out of 25 and he has scored between 22-25 throughout the course, usually only dropping a mark or two for the last year. However, now he is getting 21 or 22 most of the time and it's knocking his confidence. As the final exams approach it seems he is getting slightly worse which is worrying him. This is the subject he is doing for a degree as well. He also feels the teachers are disagreeing with him a lot in class and feels like he is being 'put in his place' so to speak, and he finds it hurtful, especially for it to start quite suddenly at this point.

I am trying to put it in perspective for him and saying they just expect so much from him and want to be sure they have done everything they can to help him meet his offer (he doesn't actually need A stars, but he'll feel a failure if he doesn't get them, especially in this subject) and that could be why they seem 'picky'. The discussion-based stuff could just be a perception, which I have said to him. I realise this probably sounds ridiculous but it's getting to him and it's not nice to see. He has loved school but puts so much pressure on himself and now he's not sure what's going on. What, if anything, should I do?

I don't have an answer for you with the teacher issue, but just a thought on the essay responses. Can he upload the task, his response and the marking guide to Chat GPT and ask for feedback on how he could have improved?

If he's not getting targeted feedback from the teachers, at least this might help him to see how he could more fully answer essay questions in the future.