To ask a secondary school teacher to answer this question…

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DC has completed mocks in year 10 and got the results. They are a lot lower than what the target grades they were predicted.

From yr 7 DC has had target grades on every report (these were based on MidYis scores in year 7) Always been 8’s until three were changed to 7’s and the rest stayed 8’s.

DC has always been on target for most things so would be expecting mainly 7&8’s but DC mock grades are mainly 5’s with a 6 and a 4.

I’ve tried to contact school but no luck yet. So was wondering if the mocks would be actual GCSE papers so 5’s are really good because they’ve still got a year of learning or would the mocks be questions that they would know the answers to so not an actual GCSE paper.

TIA

Not a secondary teacher, but all schools are different so not sure an actual teacher can answer this better.
What I can tell you is my kids’ school use GCSE past papers for mocks. One of mine just did the full series of 2022, and on one paper 20/80 marks were concepts not introduced yet.
You need to ask the school.

I set past paper questions but only on the topics we have covered. I find that in year 10 many students underestimate the level of preparation needed to do well in exams - lack of detailed knowledge due to last minute superficial revision and weak exam technique.

Yeah DC didn’t revise for a few of them, said they ‘didn’t need to’ as it was ‘just a mock’ much to my dismay 😧 hopefully they’ll realise that you have to put in significantly more effort to get the target grades.

Think all schools are different but from the two I've worked in, both used past GCSE papers. One used to give a full GCSE past paper (or multiple) at the end of year 10. The idea was "what would they get if they took a GCSE paper now" and the expectation of seeing the grade increase in mocks in November and February of year 11.

My new school does similar but only gives questions on topics students have covered so far (MFL). This means two papers were similar to their normal structure and difficulty but not the same as they had been Frankenstein-ed from questions on topics covered only in Y10. On a writing paper, students only had to answer one essay question and a translation, where normally there would be 3-4 sections in an entire paper. Grade boundaries were scaled to be as close to normal grade boundaries as possible.

Essentially, it's not really bad news if Y10 grades are lower than expected. I'd be asking for specific feedback on the areas your child needs to work on in order to reach target grades. It's unusual but not unheard of for students to be getting 8s and 9s at the end of Y10 but really subject-dependent.

It's a difficult one as depends on the subject. For example, in Science they might have made up an exam paper out of topics that had already been covered so the grade on the mock would be more similar to what they would achieve should they have the same understanding of all topics by the time they got to GCSE.
For English, say, its different as although they've covered the book/play/poems etc their analytical technique will develop further over the course - so a lot more room for improvement.

(Secondary school teacher here) If he didn’t revise and got a 5 that’s pretty good for year ten mocks. Now please be really careful with target grades- quite a few are wildly inflated as they are based on data from primary schools often ( if they took SATs). Personally I think ( well and my colleagues!) SAT scores can be inflated so the primary school teacher looks good- massive bug bear of mine. I’ve got kids with target grades of 9, no way will they ever reach that!

Now the target grade is not just based on ability but if your child puts in enough work- with the amount of content with these GCSE’s they need to be doing more than just a few hours a week to get 8’s or 9’s. Private schools get children to do a couple of hours a night- but up to how your kid can handle it. Lastly as he’s only in year ten - grades often go up by an average of two grades by the end of year 11, however I’ve had many kids go up more than that as many see year ten as a “ doss year” and only start trying in year 11.

Yes just seconding this great answer!! I've seen target grades based on reading age which can be wholly unrealistic by GCSE due to strengths/weaknesses across different subjects, attitude to learning, and unreliable reading age data. I have had students go up by 3+ grades between November and the real exams but it takes a lot of work. I think Y10 can be a bit of a shock as students used to getting top grades in whatever metric was used in KS3 suddenly find real exam questions and the grading system much more rigorous.

Did he do his SATs due to Covid? The target grades are generated from these. I wouldn’t panic at this point as very few students get their actual target grade at this point. We always set proper papers and find students don’t revise properly and haven’t fully consolidated exam technique so they’re usually 2-3 grades below the end of year 11 results.

@wellington77
The last thing we need in education is pitting primary and secondary teachers against each other. Please don’t blame this on primary teachers wanting to ‘look good’. Massively unhelpful. Secondary schools do not have to use primary SATS to set target grades, and if they do not trust their validity then they shouldn’t be doing so. Plenty of other assessments that could be used.

They are mocks.

Same as GCSEs but content they have covered. If your child didn’t revise then they can’t expect high grades.

Predicted grades are based on whole picture, including class work and mocks together.

For science our year tens have sat a paper one in each of chem, bio and physics. They have been taught all the content for this. We would usually expect a grades worth of improvement as they will have done lots more revision before the real things.

I’m not exactly writing an article in a national newspaper calm down! And this my opinion, tough. Trust me if I had a choice I would use something different!

Thank you 😊

Like most pps, our mocks are GCSE papers but with questions switched out if we have not yet covered the material. Our targets are FFT ones, which are extrapolated from their SATs using demographic data and cannot be changed regardless of their progress during Secondary. We find that, typically, more able students exceed their targets and there is a steady drop off until the least able are 2 grades below theirs. Most are expected to go up 1-2 grades from year 10 mocks. They will have a huge amount of practice during year 11 on exam technique and will become much more familiar with styles of question. We hope that the year 10 mocks give them a kick to take things a bit more seriously than they have done.

Year 10 grades are based on CATs (I assume) as they didn’t sit SATs due to covid. My gcse group bombed but my daughter did well-but she worked really hard. I expect my group to improve 🤞🏻

Current year 10 have no SATs which is probably a blessing

My lad has targets of 6-8 and got mostly 4/5 and a couple of 6s.

I taught for 20 years and would expect circa 2/3 grades difference between Yr10 end of year tests and the real thing. It's their first 'go' at real GCSE type questions and they take a while to get the techniques etc but it all comes together.

Putting together a realistic and doable study plan for Yr11 is where we are going next. By realistic I mean literally 10 minutes a day for 2 subjects (so 20 minutes a day) doing some GCSE workbooks or the flash question cards. Rotate the subjects. Little and often, long term is so effective and feels doable.

Hi. Similar situation with my ds. He didn't revise and was shocked at the levels of his mocks. He totally underestimated the level of revision needed (despite me doing revision plans with him, helping him organise notes, telling him he wasn't doing enough revision). Problem for ds is that he was doing some early and was literally sitting them a month later. Not looking forward to August results

The schools may be different but that doesn't mean teachers won't have some ideas as to what could have taken the grades down. Really not sure why you posted. Schools are different yes but at gcse level it' generally works in the same way.