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Education

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Original poster

would you let your children make their own GCSE choices

81 replies

zippitippitoes · 25/06/2006 10:09

...it never occurrred to me to interfere at all with what mine chose but in this article about happiness it makes it sound like it's normal for parents to choose them?

it's actually about children and mental well being..a bit woolly to be honest

OP posts:

edam · 25/06/2006 10:20

How strange. Wouldn't dream of insisting ds did something he didn't want to do - and neither did my parents with me. Ds is not quite three, though, may feel differently in 12 years time if he chooses needlework instead of science!

JanH · 25/06/2006 10:20

Why would it ever to occur to anybody that it would be a good idea not to let them decide on their own subjects? I will be interested to see if anybody here knows anybody who has made the choices for them (possibly in a "my son the doctor" way?)

Agree about the wooliness, zippi!

Miaou · 25/06/2006 10:25

Not read the article zippi but I was at school with a girl whose father dictated which subject she would take at O and A level - she was monumentally unhappy and we all said then that we would never do that to our own kids.

fattiemumma · 25/06/2006 10:25

bizaar. my parents never involved themselves with what lesons i was taking...just that i was doing well in the subjects i HAD chosen.

My younger sister is about to take her options and we have all sat down and spoke...in a normall chatty way, not a lets discuss what your going to do kind of way....about what sort of job she wants and therefore what sort of subjects do we think are going to offer the best basis for that sort of employment.

she wants to be a flight attendant like my other sister and so we have advised a language and as her school is one of these trendy new ones that now offer NVQ's she is going to do leisure and tourism as well.

the rest are completly up to her....histroy/geograpghy French/spanish etc.

only your child knows what lessons he/she enjoys ats chool and which ones he feels comfortable. no way would i want my child to feel thats studying was sa chore because it wasnt something he found interesting..simply because i had told him to.

sowoffended · 25/06/2006 10:25

I chose my own options (many many years ago) BUT my dad insisted on changing one of my options for 6th form (I had put Home Economics, along with languages and typing/commerce stuff and he thought that was ludicrous).

Can't remember what his choice was, lol, but I ended up going to the college of FE instead anyway.

My eldest will be facing this in a couple of years time and he will be making his own choices, with advice from me and his dad.

Cam · 25/06/2006 10:26

I think its really important for children to make their own choices (presumably in conjunction with their school)in subjects.

threebob · 25/06/2006 10:32

I think that some parental input is required to make sure that the choices don't close doors to things the child has previously said they want to do.

Looking back I think I chose my own subjects, but I'm sure I chose with my mum and dad "helping" me choose.

My brother was super organised and contacted a few universities - said what he wanted to do and asked for their advice.

roisin · 25/06/2006 10:32

I had complete free choice to choose my GCSEs and A levels; tbh I wish I'd had more advice and guidance from well-informed people - not necessarily my parents.

tamum · 25/06/2006 10:43

My initial reaction was yes of course I would let them choose, and then I remembered how much gentle pushing my dad did to get me to choose some sciences (I was very much an arts girl at the time). Given that I am now an academic scientist, and how much I love it, I suppose a bit of guidance can be a good thing...

JanH · 25/06/2006 10:46

At our school they issue a very useful booklet with advice and they hold the Y9 parents evening in the Spring term, IIRC (although there is a strong tendency for all teachers to say "oh yes, x should definitely choose my subject"!)

There has been a change of head since DS1 chose his options, it will be interesting to see if the school offers more guidance and advice with the new one (she is much more of a people person).

FrannyandZooey · 25/06/2006 10:57

I had to fight tooth and nail to get to do even a handful of subjects I wanted, and wasn't allowed to take all the subjects that interested me. I am a creative person in a family of scientists and my parents vetoed virtually every choice I wanted. If I had not been such a strong-willed and stubborn person even then they would have chosen the whole lot without a doubt. The fighting went on for months. It still rankles with me, big time, nearly 20 years later.

southeastastra · 25/06/2006 11:16

i think yo should let them choose, and guide them as much as possible.

i hate all this option stuff i've got it coming up soon. it's a hard decision to make that will affect the rest of your life so young

motherinferior · 25/06/2006 11:42

My parents chose my O level options - I wasn't even consulted - and put a fair amount of pressure on me about my A level ones, I think; they wouldn't have countenanced my moving schools at that point either. At that time I didn't really think about it; it was part and parcel of their parenting style. My father tried to pressure me into both the subject and the university for my degree, too.

I am trying very hard to be a different sort of parent.

Moomin · 25/06/2006 11:46

sorry if it's already been mentioned but one problem that may occur is a child making a choice of subject based on what their mates are doing rathet than what might be best for them (in the sense of what they are good at/what they want to be when they leave school - not necessarily what their parents think they should do). 13 or 14 is quite young to be making what can be quite big decisions. i agree with post that said guidance should be encouraged but not necessarily parental guidance. our school are usually quite good with this aspect

edam · 25/06/2006 11:50

I don't know if this is the case everywhere, but the handful of teenagers who have happened to talk to me about GCSE/A level options have had some weird ideas about what they need to do my job, journalism. Schools seem to tell them 'oh, you must do English' and leave it at that. Or suggest media studies. Actually, as long as you can construct sentences and know how to get your ideas across, you can study any subject. If you do sciences, you'll stand out from the crowd. I don't know how schools get their information about what you need for different careers, but there isn't one essential subject you HAVE to have for journalism. And media studies is definitely looked down upon. We'd do well to have a few more people with an understanding of science, or economics, in the media.

edam · 25/06/2006 11:54

Actually, my mother did try to encourage me to do science A-levels, but I thought they were boring. Didn't realise it was just the way they had been taught up to that point. Odd thing is I ended up in medical journalism where I had to learn an awful lot, fast, from talking to doctors and reading peer-reviwed journals... didn't do so bad, though, I was quoted (approvingly) in the letters page of the British Medical Journal while still a rookie reporter.

GDG · 25/06/2006 12:03

I'm pretty sure I made my own choices without influence. I'm not saying this is a good thing though - I totally disregarded chemistry GCSE - did physics, biology, maths though - and then after A levels when I started to think I might quite like to do medicine, I couldn't as chemistry A level was a strict requirement (going right back to do GCSE and A level having just done it all was not really a choice I wanted to make so I did physiology/pharmacology instead).

I think I'd definitely give advice to mine - make sure they think very hard about what path they might want to take after GCSEs. At the end of the day it would be their choice though - I wouldn't inflict my choices on them.

GDG · 25/06/2006 12:04

So ditto Roisin really!

Moomin · 25/06/2006 12:06

they're more than likely to have gotten their info from some of the computer programmes desgined to sort out your career for you! the kid is asked what skills they have and it pumps out a list of jobs they should do, e.g. someone who likes meeting people should be the prime minister, etc. pretty useless. maybe a lot of info in schools is actually out of date. and maybe the teacher of that particular subject is doing the 'hard sell'. i don't know.

Piffle · 25/06/2006 12:06

Yes withing reason
My mother forced me to do Latin and refused to let me do geogrpahy instead
I went out of my way to fail Latin. Still did not fail it though but came close.My ds has a choice of spanish and german next yr - YR8 - I am letting him choose.
And I really want him to do two langauges to GCSE as well, so I would resist him giving up those, he currently does 3.
Hmmm ask me in 3 years

Original poster

zippitippitoes · 25/06/2006 12:17

Yes I'm pretty cynical about those career computer programmes..ds however was thorughly convinced, in fact his did come up pretty close to what I thought he would be able to do well [hmm emoticon]

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FlameBoo · 25/06/2006 12:28

How bizarre!!! I was allowed to choose whichever I wanted. My mum helped me find out which things would be most useful to my career choice (at the time nursing, but I changed my mind about that anyway ), but it was all down to me.

I would never occur to me to tell my children what they should do with their lives.

NotAnOtter · 25/06/2006 12:30

My eldest has just made his choices. He was only able to pick 3 out of 10!!!!! which i thought odd.

I spoke to school - we could not decide - he had no firm feelings and is easily swayed so i just said 'what are you best at' and we picked those! Make life easy for all concerned!

FlameBoo · 25/06/2006 12:30

I'll never forget my computerised career thingy at school... I put that I liked working with food, and working with animals, so it said I should be a vet or a butcher

Original poster

zippitippitoes · 25/06/2006 12:32

well that is the other side of the coin ..they are taking more gcses than ever and yet they are allowed to choose only a few..I think the specialist school bit is ridiculous too, where if an arts school you have to do two art subjects or two languages if a language school etc

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