How much GCSE revision did your kids do?

OK, so i struggle with all three kids - when it comes to education - i cant engage them. Their dads been ruining them playstations from the age of 3, my kids new how to play minecraft and lego games in a advanced manner by age of 4, theyre smart kids, but i just cant engage. Anyways long story short, if your like me and cant even teach a fly to fly, i used learnaroohub.com and i was able to assign stuff to kids and let them do it on tablets on long drives, or at home for 30-minutes to an hour daily and i was able to track their learning and scores and badges etc. It really does help engage, whereas some of the other stuff I've tried has been a waste, the private tutor 12 week trial turned out be horrible with my rugrats, tutor didnt want to come back. Will keep you posted on whether there was any changes in grades.

I think because mocks are just to tell you where you are at that point, and help you identify areas where you need to focus. Because of her health she was having one to one tuition so they just focused on those areas in her sessions, which was two hours a week. That's all she did. Each mock age went up a grade and then in the final exam she went up one more to the 5. She was very pleased!

DD has a health condition and was only able to do four exams (maths, English language, English literature, and art). She did no revision and got 5, 6, 8, 6. Her first maths mock result was a 2 so she did very well!

Sometimes it’s not about kids being short sighted…it’s different circumstances for different kids. My DS1 is 21 and at a top Uni for his subject doing a degree he desperately wanted to do. He actually didn’t do GCSE’s due to Covid but worked himself into the ground during A-Levels to get where he wanted to go including teaching himself the entire Y13 Psychology syllabus as they had no teacher. He went to a very very low achieving state school, only a handful of students in 6th form even went to Uni (we are talking 4/5 kids). He knew he wanted to do and would stop at nothing to get there. Even picked the specific course and specific Uni to give him the optimal chance of a job post degree.
DS2 is 15 and in the middle of Y10 exams. He is probably far more intelligent that DS1 but has ASD (high functioning) and cannot cope with revision and exams. If I push, he will struggle even more and do nothing. Tbh I’m happy if he gets through his GCSE’s next year and passes everything. He wants to go to College and do a BTEC course in the same field as DS1’s degree and then wants to also go to Uni but a slightly different course to DS1. No he probably won’t end up at the prestigious Uni(for the subject) that DS1 is at but he will hopefully get a degree. Am I any less proud of him than I am DS1? No of course not.
The world needs all sorts of people to make it work, your GCSE results do not define you. And I would hope that as a recruiter and see past a load of numbers and look more into the sort of person they are. DS2 will never ever have the grades DS1 has but he is confident, passionate, articulate and hard working. All amazing attributes not defined by a number on a piece of paper.

It is not. But it depends what they want to do, and what their competition looks like. A non-academic route then fine, chill all you want. An academic route? Well get ready for the ride……

My DS did barely any revision and it was certainly reflected in his grades. However, he really wasn't suited to academia and at 23 almost 24, he's a builder. He did the 2 years after school at college, first year mechanics and second year construction and he hated that too. I was so glad when his education years were over, probably just as glad as he was.

I agree, never understood it really. Life is ALL a competition. It's no good thinking you "Only" need grade 6's at GCSE or grades C at A level for your chosen further education or degree course, because it's a numbers game. If the college/Uni can fill their spaces with kids who've got way over the "minimum entry requirements", they will, maybe leaving those who've just hit the minimum without a place.

People need to aim for the best they can achieve, not the minimum they think they'll need.

So six science is two for each of biology, physics and chemistry – not really that much, two per subject.

Four English again is two each for Eng lit and Eng lang, two very different subjects,

Three maths – well I guess again to show the breadth of knowledge and cover all topics. Also means that if someone has an off day they can still get a decent grade on the other papers. Genuinely I don;t see it as an issue. No way could you cover Shakespeaere, a novel, a 20th C text and 15 poems in one two-hour exam.

DS started "revising" during the February half term, not too much, just an hour or so most evenings and 2/3 hours on Sats/Sundays. Ramped up over the Easter holidays to 2/3 hours per day on average inc weekends. Then continued upon return after Easter, alongside attending normal school lessons, another couple of hours in the evenings, then maybe half days Sat and Sun. Then once exam season started, he'd do probably 5 hours per day on "days off" between exams and weekends. Got mostly 9's so the time paid off. Key is to start early and be consistent. No need for 8/10 hour days nor "overnighters" if you start soon.

But he'd also done a lot of revision in Nov/Dec for his mocks which were early January, so he'd got quite a good "recap" of the course anyway. (He got mostly 8's in the January mocks!)

Hard agree. Competition is massive now. It’s not a case of getting what you “need” for the next stage. Employer/Uni etc may want to see the full picture. Some consider GCSE a better marker of ability as you’re studying a larger number of subjects.

DS was always very academic and hard working during GCSEs. He was predicted high grades so we tended to let him to get on with it, with minimal cajoling.

I had assumed he had been doing a lot of revision but it turned out it was nowhere near as much as I thought.

He ended up getting nearly all 9s but for A levels I'm going to be a bit closer to him to ensure he doesn't slip up as he'll need very high grades for the unis he wants to apply to next year.

@Readingisgood when you say why so many exams, do you mean why do 16yos do so many subjects or why are there so many exams for each subject?

The second question – well the different skills need to be tested (eg MFL speaking, reading, listening and writing – tho some boards combine these but then it’s just longer exams); or for Eng lit, four texts are studied so that’s broken into two exams; for other subjects exams cover different topics or skills.

The first question – well a lot of ppl think that we actually specialise too soon. A 14yo in England can easily drop all of these subjects forever at the end of year 9: PE, drama, computing, history, geography, French, German, Spanish, DT, food tech, textiles, art, RS, dance, media (I have imagined a student taking triple science, health & social and business along with maths and two English, so eight GCSEs, not an unlikely number).

My DD did endless revision (too much) and got 12 x Grade 9. She is in her last A level today and thankfully has had a more relaxed approach (but she is still aiming for 4 x A*)

A lot. She was very keen. Very disciplined. Worked hard from the first day. No holidays the year she sat them. Same with A levels. My son did the minimum despite us working together to set a schedule, getting extra study books, a billion past papers, bribes… even a tutor for a couple (the ones he actually passed) and got poor results. She got top marks. I mean he could have worked as hard as she did and got decent marks (5/6/7), he would not be able to reach her level as he’s just not built that way. Unfortunately he didn’t even try.
I think my DD overdid it. She didn’t need to do as much as she did but that’s how she’s wired. And as demonstrated my son is wired the way he is and academics are not for him. I think they need to find a balance, but certainly do not wait til the end to start.

Such a pity those kids are short sighted and only thinking of the minimum you need for the next stage. I look at GCSEs results (including type of school they’ve been at) when I recruit - there are always mitigating circumstances but generally solid academics throughout is important surely (especially in a tough job market)….?

My ds has just done A levels, he did 4 subjects and had 10 exams including coursework as well. For GCSE he did 11 subjects and had 25 exams. There's normally 2-3 exams per subject.

Any language will have four exams (from memory), most other subjects have 3 exams - it is a huge amount of pressure. And the more exams you sit, the less likely you are to have much space in between the exams. So maybe exams on consecutive days, or days with multiple exams.

My DC also have no interest in trying for Med/den/Vet. They know people who got 10 grade 9s and then three A* at A levels who still didn’t get in. They didn’t want to give things up for 18mths to get 9s
So really depends what they want to do.