BLOODY A * TARGETS!!!!!

[Northernlurker]

Apologies for shouting but I am so pissed off. My poor dd1 was given all A targets for all 12 of her GCSEs. She's done pretty well so far in keeping on track for that but has always felt very pressured by this. She is extremely bright and works ferociously hard. Having the A as a target has not boosted this. What it's done is made her feel like anything less than A* represents failure. Today she did her second French speaking assessment. She worked hard, I worked hard checking it with her. She got 27 out of 30 which she is told is an A. This means she has 2 As for the speaking element. She is upset by this, she feels she has failed. In what sort of screwed up world is an A grade a failure?

Overall she got As in her mocks (which I think is damn good). I am dreading results day because every A grade will be seen as a failure by her and every A* as only what she expected. How the heck to I help with this? I told the Head at target setting parents evening I thought this was a crappy thing to do and I am even more sure now.

No chance of her doing the IB and keeping her subject options a bit more open than with A-levels?

I loved maths A-level: did it with arts subjects and it was lovely to have a non-essay subject. If you're good at maths, it's quite easy - much less revision than the other subjects I did.

Her school was the only one in the city to offer the IB but they aren't anymore. The deputy head who led on it has left and anecdotally I heard the results/uni offers weren't working out as well as they felt they should. it would have been a good solution for her. Aaaargh!

As things stand she would be doing biology, chemistry, history and English lit which I think is a really nice balance for her. It's looking increasingly likely she will do GCSE Further Maths so perhaps we'll see how that goes.

She's at a science quiz tonight, desperately hoping she's having a good time. Can't be doing with anymore disappointment for her.

Oh and rabbitstew thank you for continuing to post after I snarled at you yesterday I think I'm feeling the parental stress a bit. Had one nightmare that dd3 was being stole by social services (that's how it was in my dream, I know they don't actually steal kids) then last night dreamt I forgot to take dd to quiz OR pick up dd3 from after school club and it was about 3 hours too late.....

rabbitstew, I did maths for the same reasons! And French as I was/am pretty fluent. Made a mistake taking chemistry instead of English though - it was waaaayyyy too too much learning of facts for me

That's OK, Northernlurker. I once had a nightmare that I was having a lovely day chatting with my parents in the garden when I suddenly remembered I had children and I'd left them locked in a room all day, because I'd forgotten!

I HATE those dreams!

Ok so looks like she had an ok time.

I'm glad she enjoyed the science quiz!

You dd's A-level choices sound fantastic, although quite hard work. I honestly think maths is a great option for someone good at maths, as it really saves time for you to concentrate on the other essay and fact-heavy subjects, but nevertheless looks great on your CV and is helpful for any science subject at university. The problem is choosing between English and history, I guess, if she opts for maths. My opinion would be that maths is less work for the perfectionist (who can always think that an essay could be improved upon), but for the same amount of credit.

Yup, my dd1 is doing Maths along with arts A levels, and finding it pretty easy and far less time-consuming than the others. Also, no coursework :)

Northernlurker I have a DC at Oxford reading Medicine and he had a mix of sciences and humanities and didn't take maths at A2. In fact he's a scholar. Sometimes the schools give pretty workaday advice. Go to the university websites instead.

I can't see that Theatre Studies is a problem either. I know a number of students who have got an Oxbridge offer with Theatre Studies (especially for English), or Art and Design. I have a DC who was an Oxford undergrad and is still there doing postgrad who had Art and Design as one of her three A2s. Doing one of those sort of subjects is obviously not a reason in itself not to get an offer, even these days, when there are so many more applications than there were even a decade ago.

Your DD sounds like mine OP. All through secondary she set herself targets to get to the top of each class in each subject (after failing to get into the Grammar school). The pressure they give themselves gets fuelled by the teachers and goes mad!

I remember in floods of tears before her AS exams because "I'm the A* girl so now I'm expected to get 5 A's!".

Having a laid back DS was quite a relief throughout his exam periods.

Good luck with her exams, I'm sure they are worse for the parents :)

bigTillyMint - I did the A-levels you should have done!

OP my DD1 is looking to do a science/engineering subject at university too, although not a 'life' science as she dropped biology post GCSE. She is considering Oxford, not Cambridge as she doesn't like the course plus other RG Unis.
Her 4 AS options include a non science subject which was so she could keep her options open and possibly study economics/law/politics, when she was choosing last year she could not make the final decision. 6 months into the subjects she has now almost certainly decided to pursue the science route and will drop that subject for her A2 year unless both her and her teachers agree that she will be able to achieve top grades in her other subjects plus a good grade in this. For her preferred course she is likely to get offers based on 3 A2s at A/A* I just hope that her nerves can hold out.
Yes it is narrowing down her subjects but she wants to follow this path so she needs to start to specialise.