To wonder why dd has to do a formal qualification in PE?

[Frouby]

Just had y8 dds parents eveing. I was pretty surprised to learn she will be doing a GCSE in RE and a formal qualification in PE, either a Btec or a GCSE.

She only has 2 option blocks, one of which must be a language. Then maths, english, science, a computer technology, she will be doing french and drama as her option. Then RE as a GCSE and PE probably as a btec.

I understand the importance of physical activity in school and don't doubt that it has benefits but fail to see why a compulsory qualification is necessary. She is pretty bright and doing well and predicted to do well at GCSE. But think she would be better concentrating on her academic subjects rather than a sports qualification. It absolutely should be available for students who wish to study it but don't know why it's compulsory.

I am a bit unsure about the RE. I again understand why it is taught in school but not sure about whether it should be compulsory to get a formal qualification. Although I can see more benefit academically for RE than PE.

Is it compulsory at all schools that PE has to be formally studied or is it just dds school? Aibu to be a bit about it all?

No not a general rule, nor RS. They need to be in the timetable but not studied as a formal qualification. Is it a school with religious and/or sports status?

My DD is doing PE Btec. There is actually quite a lot of written coursework, more than GCSE apparently. She gets frustrated because she does not want to do a PE qualification, has no real aptitude for PE and finds doing the course work takes up a lot of time that she would rather give to other subjects. So I am with you, it should be an option to do the qualification if you want, but not compulsory.

No neither. It's a language academy so I understand why they have to do a foreign language. Just not the PE or RE.

Dd is quite academic and I think the RE will be of benefit to her critical writing, persuasive writing and she is also doing history so RE does play a part in those subjects so I can understand that.

She hates PE though. And having met her PE teacher can understand why. We have ponies so it's not the physical side of things she hates. And she loves dance. She just hates the lessons and team sports etc. I completely agree it should be included in the timetable but I assume there will be coursework etc and would rather she concentrated on her academic qualifications.

She will hopefully get 9/10 gcses at a-c or whatever they will be so a btec in pe won't make any difference to her cv etc. And wants to do maths, french and English at a level. I know things can change drastically by the time they come around but I can not see a situation where she would be relying on a pe btec for anything.

When I was at school (over 10 years ago) we did PE up until end of school but didn't work towards a qualification unless we specifically picked the GCSE option. I think it sounds quite good, it's not much extra work and your daughter gets another 'tick' on her CV :)

Eustace that's what I am worried about. Dd is the sort of child who will do her very best in everything so I can see the btec being problematic. She is very keen to do well in the 3 subjects she wants to do at a level so I don't want her taking up time on a bloody pe qualification when it's not necessary.

RE can be very interesting. One of my DDs - an academic high achiever, now at Oxford - found it so interesting she took it at A level. It's really more like philosophy and ethics, so I wouldn't downplay its significance - though maybe it depends on the exam board. I don't know about PE, though - none of mine took it at GCSE - not compulsory at their school.

This is the situation in a original high school I had in mind as a option for DS. I read the choices document about 5 times, convinced that I'd misunderstood. But no. I wonder if it's the same school.

I agree with you,. it sounds like they are trying to boost their results.

I agree the qualification is unnecessary, there should be PE lessons so they remain active but there's no need for the formal qualification for those that don't want it. I don't think RS should be compulsory either - nothing against it as a subject but some students might prefer to take both geography and history for example and might run out of options.

We've just been to a yr 8 options evening too. At our school PE is compulsory as an activity for everyone but GCSE only for those who choose it.

Daisy I did philosophy at A level and then at degree level via ou so I don't mind it so much as I understand that it's not all about learning about various Gods and etc. I think it will help DD in her other subjects.

But if she was going to do another qualification she would much rather do art. She only has 1 non strictly academic subject and really wants to do art and drama but is swaying more towards drama. But in choice between PE and Art or Pe and geography for instance she would rather do anything other than PE.

And without being snobby about btecs it absolutely won't add any value to her qualifications. She might study some horsey qualifications while she is doing her a levels for a bit of light relief and to add a bit of interest to her university applications and for future job applications but once she leaves school she won't formally study pe ever again.

And I hated PE at school so can understand how she feels.

Can you ask the school not to enter her for the exam? It sounds pointless for her to do it and waste homework time on the coursework when she could be focusing on the exams that will be important for what she wants to do.

Are there any other parents who feel as you do? Perhaps you could round them up and go and see the head.

Am going to Lumela. If I can get a couple more parents so dd isn't the only 1 not doing it or she will feel odd being the only 1.

I only know a couple of the other parents though. We moved area halfway through yr 6. We have some options meetings coming up this month so will discuss it more with the school then.

Of the other parents I do know their dds are quite sporty so I can't see it being a problem for them. Her other friend is like my dd and quite academic and I know they are quite keen for her to do well so will try and catch them at some point for a chat.

Really your DD is only getting one "free" option - Drama - as the other has to be a language, which is very unreasonable considering she is being forced to do two subjects she doesn't want to do, has no option to drop and aren't core subjects.

When I did my GCSEs we had 5 options as well as our core subjects of English Language/Literature, Maths and double science.

One of the option blocks was "science and tech" and had the choice to do seperate sciences/Design Tech/Food tech; one was a language - French/German/Latin; Two were humanities - Geography/Art/History/RE/Classics and iirc the other one was a combination of all of the most popular subjects. So if the Humanities options were 1) Geography/Art/History and 2) History/RE/Classics you could do History and RE (as History was in both blocks) but you couldn't do RE and Classics (as both were only in block 2)

We also had PE and ICT sessions at least once a week in our schedule but PE was just for fun and for exercise and ICT was basically a study session where we could work on any coursework/projects, neither of them were for a qualification.

Forgot to add the most important point in my previous post that my school insisted on us doing a wide range of subjects so that we weren't limiting ourselves as to our A-Level choices and then Uni choices by doing incompatible GCSEs - he wider the range of GCSEs you do, the more A-Level options you have.

I have a CSE in PE which was non optional

I'd be more concerned that she only has two choices - more so as my child is not particularly good at languages.

Both PE and RS have to be taught in secondary schools. therefore many schools take the view if they have to be in the timetable then the child may as well get a qualification out of it too.

I think RE is worth doing, it was compulsory when I was at school and was really interesting. I think whatever job you do you will always be working with people of different faiths and an awareness of those, whatever you believe, is useful.

PE I must admit I don't see the benefit of as much, yes to doing exercise but I think I would have been frustrated at spending time on a qualification too.

I am not particularly worried about the language choice as it's a language school so fair enough. Plus language is pretty useful anyway.

Her options are more limited than other students as she is in the 'bright' block and they steer them to the more academic subjects. I think in the tech block she could chose to do a few different techs in theory but because she is in that options group she has to chose computer tech rather than food tech or design tech.

Then the 'free' block is the arts block. So art, drama and various btecs like childcare.

Some of the other blocks of students can chose techs instead of gcses.

I don't particularly mind that she only has a couple of choices as she would chose to do the subjects anyway. Perhaps not RE but I don't think she minds doing it. Would probably chose art over RE but it's not a major problem as I can see the benefit of RE.

It's just the PE btec. She apparently isn't competent enough in the physical side to do a gcse which is fair enough. But I really can't see the point in doing PE coursework when she could be doing extra work on the academic stuff.