GCSEs in the 1980s - how many exams

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As my DS is currently sitting his exams I was trying to remember how many exams per subject I had.

I took them in 1989 and I certainly don't remember having three geography papers.

I know we had some coursework in Geography and Music but can't remember if we had any in other subjects?

Did GCSEs in 1988

We had no English exams it was 100% coursework.

There was one maths exam and you had a calculator. There was also coursework.

There was one science exam per science. I can’t remember coursework in science.

For languages there was a speaking exam which I think included a role play and a conversation. There was a listening exam and you did the “basic” first and then it went into the “higher” afterwards. There was a reading exam - lots of signs and things. Really easy and again you did the basic first then the higher. There must have been a writing section but I don’t remember it. Writing a letter to your pen friend Pierre was normally included.

They were nothing like as stressful as they are now. And there was no internet and looking up old papers and learning markschemes and all the intense panic over everything. We just did them. The end.

sorry, meant I did GCSEs in 1991.

changed school in 1988!

GCSE English was such a gift. Just 2 folders of essays you did in class and at home.

That’s how I remember it in 1992 @Cauliflowersqueeze . Except we were the first year to trial the double science award and I remember we had 2 (I think) papers with the sciences all mixed up, which was hard to revise for - we had no past papers, and no idea which topics would be on which paper. I feel like we had some coursework in science too? There was definitely coursework in history, geography, maths, Englishes. None in RE - that was two papers. They didn’t seem too hard though!

No it was all pretty straightforward. I remember labelling a heart in biology gcse. Oh

no internet and looking up old papers

The teachers saved old papers for 4th year exams and mocks.

I travelled by bus into town to the library where they had copies of past papers.

Where I was overseas, past papers were a prized posession! if you had older siblings you might be lucky to have some, then everyone hand copied it as much as possible to revise. No libraries with past papers! I'd never seen a marking scheme before. The whole premise for exams was for the teachers to finally 'Catch you out', sobbing students were shown no pity. God, it was a hard life!

I did 11 subjects and overall had 22 exams plus 4 practical exams.

1988 Maths 2 papers and coursework, possibly one to grade C and one to take you further up the grades
1989 English lang 1 or 2 papers
English lit 100% coursework or 1paper I think (my class did the coursework option, the others did exams and coursework)
Computer Science 1 paper with about 20 marks per grade from G to A and all you had to do was get 75% on the section you were aiming for. I did the A, B and C sections in a few mins and read a book for the rest of the exam.
Food Tech 1 plus coursework
Geography - I think 2, maybe just one, and coursework
Sciences - I did seperate Sciences and each had a C-G paper and an extended paper for the top grades
French - reading, Writing, listening and an oral

I did six (yes, 6) French papers in 1988. Two each for reading, writing and listening. Plus an oral exam. So seven exams in total.

I think everything else was maybe two or three.

I think we had to do both the foundation level and higher level papers for languages when I did my GCSEs in 1992.

I was thinking about this the other day and comparing my experience with my DD who is taking her Year 10 exams at the moment. She is completely overwhelmed by the amount of content she has to learn and I’m worried how she’ll cope for the actual GCSEs.

She will have exams in Physics, Chemistry, Biology, Maths, Economics, Geography, Eng Lang, Eng Lit, Drama and DT

Coursework in DT and Drama

I had exams in Maths, French, Spanish, Chemistry, Physics, Geog (counted for 50%). Just one for geography I think, can’t remember about the others but do remember lots of short exams for the languages. I don’t remember finding it v stressful. I took my GCSEs in 1988.

I had coursework in Eng Lang and Eng Lit (100%), Art (100%), Geog (50%)

I think the amount they have to cope with is too much.If you’re not blessed with a great memory it seems like a huge task. Why do they have to learn Shakespeare quotes for example? What is that actually testing? My son has a v good memory and the experience was quite different for him even though in terms of actually understanding the content they seemed quite similar. Also, it’s not just the volume but the depth. I’m sure she’s covering things that we didn’t do until A Level (Chemistry and Maths). I’m seriously thinking of asking the school if she can drop one subject.