To think GCSE are wrong for many kids

[Mountainsuccess]

I see the level of parental involvement and stress many parents go through when the kids are doing GCSES.

I think if there is so much parental involvement needed surely GCSES are not the right thing for many kids. The number of exams and pressure is completely crazy for a 15/16 year old. Do they actually remember anything after the exams? Or is the UK education system just an exam factory?

The government put so much pressure on schools and schools on teachers, parents, kids. It is just all about results. I feel there is so much micromanaging from the government. Why is this? Why the Government doesn’t trust teachers and parents? Is this ever going to change? Isn’t this supposed to be an advanced country?

Please enlighten me. I am not English but raising kids here.

To be fair, this is no different in a continuous assessment type system either; basically study something, do a lower pressure test / exam / assignment on it and then move on and forget what you learnt.

Actually, in a GCSE setting one could argue it forces the student to go back over / relearn the material they’ve forgotten so there’s two chances for it to be imbedded in their brain so to speak.

Oh wow. Aren’t they amazing and clever. Why don’t all DC find them the same 🙄

Then those who ‘can’t’ then don’t pass and they can go on and , open their own business, resit GCSEs, BTEC, get a job and move jobs or work their way up there are so many options

Yes but in those days far fewer kids went to university anyway they were really only for the very academically able
These days far more kids go to University

Japan and SG's maths scores and numeracy blow us apart.

I do agree with having a wide range of subjects.

The barrier to that is so many jobs want a grade 4 or eqivalent at maths and English.

"open their own business" - most of them fail.

Employers want people who have passed maths and English. The basic skills.

@Mountainsuccess a lot of kids would hate to have to stay at school till age 18!

I remember ‘O’ levels and CSE’s. ‘A’ levels. University for the few. Not the majority.

Employers knew what they were getting educational attainment wise.

There was nothing really wrong with them that I could tell. If you were not academic to do the O level you took a CSE. A grade 1 CSE was the same as a grade C at O level.
I am not sure employers know what to expect these days.

Schools used to be able to put students on different courses but they stopped being counted fully in the schools results.

GCSEs have never been fit for purpose and even less so these days. My dd is highly able and doing 11 GCSEs and I can’t help feeling it’s such an immense waste of her talents. GCSE has always been too focused on drilling exam technique and memorising, and not enough thinking and creating and no process of educational discovery.

The syllabus content of computer science, business studies and English literature are especially depressing in my experience so far.

@Shinyredbicycle agreed. And when they made education until 18 mandatory I assumed the next step was to reform GCSEs and cut it right back to basics so anyone who wanted an academic route would have a broad assessment at the end of y12 only. Just seems so much more sensible to test kids when theyr are past the worst of puberty.

I do think my dad’s generation had the best of it: he sat O’levels in the 1950s. It was pass/fail. He only did a handful because that’s all the school deemed necessary. He then moved to a grammar school and did A levels, passed those and got an apprenticeship as an engineer. His A level maths was rock hard - because they didn’t faff around there was ample time to actually teach. And outside school that left time to live . Now y10 and y11 are endless homework and revision if you want to bag your 8s and 9s. Got knows how the lower ability sets cope with it all, I feel for them!

My dad later did an OU degree and became highly successful in his field, working in industrial research for 35 years he then spent the last part of his career in research at Imperial College London where he was derisive about the mathematical skills of the youngsters coming through the university - which is crazy when Imperial awards such a highly regarded degree.

I wouldn’t mind the madness of the current system if it really worked. But I don’t think it’s delivering a healthy, fit-for-work generation.

They absolutely do. We have fallen behind far more than we realise.

I like lots of exams. I’d rather do 3 very short maths exams and know if I messed one up then I still have 2 more than either do one exam that misses a load of content (maybe the bits I’m best at) or is hours long. There may be quite a few exams but lots are only about 75 minutes.

Continuous assessment doesn’t work. Coursework was binned off because it lacked rigour and was too easy to cheat on. Peoples mums and elder siblings were doing it, teachers were practically dictating it, an art teacher got done for slipping drawings she’d done into her kids sketchbooks (tbf, art without coursework is a different ball game to maths). Now we have AI in the mix. Not everyone finds continuous assessment the picnic people seem to think it is. Lots of people like the level playing field of exams. I’ve just finished a taught MSc that I’ve dragged out over 4 years. About 50:50 exam and coursework - the coursework has been a time thief even though it’s partly completed at work. The exams have been a breeze.

It’s perfectly reasonable to want the population to have a basic standard of maths and English. Science is adequately dealt with by having the triple, combined and single award system. I think there is an arguement for less able pupils dropping to 5-7 subjects and having extra maths and English support instead but funnelling huge numbers of kids down a non academic “cse” pathway because they are late bloomers of had a shit y6 teacher or because Shakespeare and poetry is only for clever kids is a crappy thing to do and hugely stressful.

Yes I went to a very large comprehensive in the 80’s. Sets 1 and 2 did O levels. Sets 3, 4 and possibly 5 (set 5 not expected to pass many) did CSEs. There was a set 6 but these were the people who left at 16 without sitting any exams at all. We were streamed into different classes apart from registration and sport

Anything with a failure rate that high is not fit for purpose. That failure rate is huge something is going wrong somewhere.

In Ireland they do the junior cert at that age doesn't have a huge amount of bearing on going forward but gets them used to the state exam process. Part of the result is classroom based assessments where they complete classroom based projects. Not to be done at home which gets rid of the cheating concern.

In my ideal school, everyone would have to do functional Maths, English and IT and then have a free choice for their other subjects. This isn't very practical, however.

For many degrees or courses GCSE’s are a stepping stone, but for some degrees the offer is based on GCSE results, and A level results, and interview and work experience/extra curricular. So just putting the GCSE results certificate in the drawer to forget about, whilst doing A levels, won’t cut it. Eg medicine and dentistry.

Hmmm not sure about that. I applied to university in 88, which was before the start of the boom in university applications. I don't know what the percentage of kids going then was but most of my peer group went to university. And this was a comprehensive school.

My friends older sibling peer groups had all been strongly discouraged from sitting any CSEs if they wanted a chance at going to university. It was definitely a stigma.

There are plenty of decent vocational qualifications available for people who are certain they want to go into trades as opposed to higher education. I really don't think going back to a system which stratifies kids at age 16 as academic vs non academic is the solution.

Strongly disagree. Have you seen a functional skills maths paper?

There have been two booms in university attendance. One in the 60’s. The other the 90’s onwards.
The 60’s even then wasn’t much of a boom. It just meant working class children could get to go. And that University was not the exclusive club it had been. But the numbers comparative to today were low. Even then. The majority in a grammar school of which there were less and less may have gone. But comprehensive schools far fewer in number.

Now everyone seems to go.

Agree and New Labour tried to get around it somewhat with coursework. I read Nick Gibbs’ latest book on the curriculum reforms and the fact they largely axed the coursework element. He said teachers were marking it so over inflating grades, helping with it and there was also the issue of kids from more privileged backgrounds having mum and dad assist with it so they didn’t find it fair.

I can see their points but also some children (and adults) do not cope well in exam conditions whatsoever. People also freeze, have bad days etc and I just don’t think it’s a good indication of how capable they are compared to a more holistic method looking at work over the course of a year or two instead of that snapshot. Exams are also just basically a sign the child has memorised facts and figures, it doesn’t necessarily point toward them understanding it.

There’s also the fact that they count for almost nothing later in life. A Levels are important for uni entry rather than GCSEs but once you have a degree, neither matter.

All these countries have high pressure exam systems as well. In fact for Singapore and Germany your exam results at the age of 11 are probably the most pressured as they determine which type of school you can enter and what exams you will then be doing as a teenager. There is a massive push in Singapore to do well academically and have excellent extra curriculars as well. Lots of children expected to be grade 8 on 1 or 2 musical instruments before secondary school starts, whilst maintaining perfect academic scores.

It is pretty flexible. Most children take between 5-10 subjects at GCSE, but the only two that are compulsory are maths and English language. Students who are taking 5 and doing foundation papers in some of those will have far less content to learn than someone who is doing 10 and the higher papers.

There are foundation papers in maths, science and languages. For the sciences, students have the option to take none, one, two, three or combined sciences.

There is a functional exam in maths and English that can be taken instead of maths/English GCSE but schools tend to go for GCSE as it gives pupils more options. They are offered more in special schools.

Different schools will have different expectations for different pupils but there is actual quite a wide variety of options and levels of difficulty.

Obviously, if you want 10 high grades, it can be quite a lot of pressure.

Well if you had a very academic peer grouo it stands to reson most of them would be going to university
I lleft school in 1990 and there was far more of a mix some went straight to work , some went to college to do various coures including Alevels
Some got a YTS
I myself wen to college and did very badly in my Alevels
But had enough GCSEs to be accepted.to do nurse training which had just introduced the nursing Diploma
And whilst we were not technicslly university students the courss wss affiliated to the univeersity and we had some lectures there.

the fact they largely axed the coursework element

He said teachers were marking it so over inflating grades, helping with it and there was also the issue of kids from more privileged backgrounds having mum and dad assist with it so they didn’t find it fair.

Feels like throwing the baby out with the bathwater. There were other options, such as they're sent away to be marked, they are done in school not to be taken home so no option for parental interference. It works quite well in other countries.