To doubt my DP over exam claims?

[Wonderrwall]

Ok, not a major issue but I'd love some help resolving a dispute. My DP took GCSEs in early 1990s. Says he had to write between 30 and 70 essays to submit for English coursework (100 percent coursework). Mine were half coursework and we submitted 5 essays per English GCSE. I think he probably did 10 per GCSE but did any of you do 100 percent coursework exams in the 1990s and do you remember how many essays/pieces of coursework you submitted?

He probably submitted assignments for his coursework, but they almost certainly had them set weekly as homework as well when they weren't working on an official one - either as 'practice', or so that the teacher could choose the best ones to use as coursework. Ours did that in 2007, we got given our various choices for coursework, completed all of the essays, then they told us which our best ones were.

So if his school worked like that, I imagine he could have written the number of essays he claims to have done.

What a weird thing to argue about though, exams that happened 30 years ago. Does it really matter?

Jeez, you've all got good memories. I can't even remember my GCSEs

Maybe it's a getting old thing, I can remember lots of my school days, but remembering what I had for dinner last night is a challenge.

@SusannaSpider

Jeez, you've all got good memories. I can't even remember my GCSEs

Maybe it's a getting old thing, I can remember lots of my school days, but remembering what I had for dinner last night is a challenge.

😂 Dunno, I'm 47 so not a spring chicken!

I went to a university reunion, couldn't remember anyone!

I ended up just pretending that I knew people and some guy attached himself to us/ me and I was too embarrassed to keep saying I don't know who you are so played along. At the end of the night my friends asked me who he was - turns out he was nothing to do with us 🙄

I did 100% coursework for eng lit and eng lang. 10 pieces of work counted towards my final grade. This would have been 1993.

@Mitzak my two boys are better with coursework so think often just depends in the child

I did O levels in 13. We probably wrote 2/3 essays a week over the 2 English subjects - one in class in timed conditions every other week and 1 for each (lang and lit) for homework. That plus 3 lots of school exams would have added up to more than 100 essays over the 2 years so he may well be telling the truth assuming that he then submitted the best so many?

I did them. English Lit and English Lang. So c20 pieces of work for each and they picked the top 10 for each to submit. But that was a crap comp so maybe at other schools they'd have done more.

70 essays?! 32 kids in the class x 70 essays is a lot of marking. Does he mean pieces of writing rather than essays? Even at degree level l never did 70 essays

100% English Lit and I definitely remember spending virtually every weekend writing English coursework. Could easily have been 40ish essays with picking the best ones. 1990.

I did O’level English Language that was 100% coursework in the 80s and we did one piece a week, most weeks. So probably close to 40 pieces over the two year course. But (IIRC) Only some of them were submitted for the grade.

I did 100% coursework for both Lang and Lit in 1988 (Year 1). I think it was probably 10 for each?? Some were done in exam conditions.

Our English Department used to take coursework in, correct it and offer further suggestions, then have the student rewrite it, this predated word processors being common so if he is including a lot of rewrites etc it may well be near 70!
In fact they were often kept back at the end of the English lesson to complete/repeat/rewrite work, missing half of their Maths lesson with me. When I complained I was told I was being unreasonable because I was jeopordising their chance of a good Enmglish grade!

I did - 20 essays, 10 for English, 10 for English lit

Oh but we wrote more, the school submitted the best ones

I did my English GCSE early 99's. it was 100% coursework, changed to 30% coursework 70% exam in 1994.
It was only 10 pieces of coursework, I still have mine. One was a poem, one was an essay, one was a story, etc etc

Sorry that last post should have said 90's not 99s

I did mine in ‘92 I thought I did exams for everything!

@ElizabethinherGermanGarden

I did 40 essays for 100% coursework in '93

You may have. They weren’t all assessed. I’ve been teaching since September 1988 so I taught 100% coursework GCSE Lang and Lit. I can’t quite remember, but I think it was 14 essays, some of which counted for both Lang and Lit.

And actually, they weren’t all essays. Some were fiction or non-fiction writing (story, newspaper, letter etc).

1988 - first year of GCSEs.
English Literature - a mix of coursework & exams - I remember my parents were appalled that we were allowed to take set texts into the exam hall....
English Language - 100% exam
1990 - A levels
English - 50% exam. 50% coursework.
For the coursework our teacher selected the best of our essays to put forward plus we had to do a mini-'dissertation' on an author & their works.

He thinks he wrote three essays a month, starting in September of his first GCSE year and including every half term and full term break until June of his second year, for only one of ten or eleven subjects he took? Of course he bloody didn't!