Year 10 wobbles

[sheep73]

Ds1 is in year 10. Bright and has always been in top 10-25% of year.
Last week with no warning we were told ds is being moved from set 1 to set 2 sciences as his scores are not high enough. Half term report was glowing do this has come out of the blue.
Ds says he is working hard and does not know why he did not do better in the half term tests, which apparently were not in time to be reported in the reports..
School is non selective day independent so the year is a broad academic range.
He does homework every week in each subject but there is minimal marking and seldom a score. So it's hard to see how he is doing.
We've had no target GCSE grades yet.. we were hoping for 8s and 9s..
What should we expect in terms of progress tracking, target grades etc. I feel as though we have very little information and nothing is being done to guide him on how to improve.
He's our eldest child so we are not sure what to expect.

Have you asked the school? That’s your first point of call tbh. No one one on Mumsnet can tell you what’s happened except his teachers. I would start from there. I with his GCSE grades I don’t know how his school work, our DD’s school included them in their
report.

My dc go to a state school, but moving sets is very common at the end of term. Your son may still be learning at the same rate he always has, but those who were in set 2 have really picked up the effort and earned their place in set 1 recently.
RE GCSE targets, or lack of, this has surprised me. DC were given targets in year 7 based on their SATs results and every report shows their expected result too so you can see if they are likely to meet target if they continue learning at the same rate. I would probably enquire with the school when this information will be made available so you can see if there are any subjects you should consider intervening.

Have you seen the test paper? It might be anything from silly mistakes in calcs/ not reading the question properly, to poor exam technique ( waffling and not making clear markable points) or not actually understanding the concepts. Able students can be bad at exam technique and it often needs work separate from homework. but yes, the school should be prepared to help him understand what the issue is.

State schools do progress tracking based on sats results.

It's a fairly blunt instrument and many teachers, parents and students don't like it.

Independents where the children have not done sats don't usually use it.

They should be giving you a report on where he is. At the end of year 10 most schools have an end of year 10 exam which will give you a good idea of gcse grades to be expected.

If he's top 25% nationally that would be about grade 6 or 7.

ffteducationdatalab.org.uk/2024/08/gcse-results-2024-the-main-trends-in-grades-and-entries/

Is he doing double science or triple? Most students who do triple get high results (largely because students who struggle with it are directed to combined).

They have told you that he was moved because his test results were not as good as those in set 2. So if you want him moved back up then look at what he is learning now and make sure he understands it and does well in the next topic test.

I've requested a meeting and to see the test papers to get an idea of what's going on.
I've sent a follow up request for target GCSE grades which were promised in October...

I'm just curious what other schools provide in terms of marked homework, feedback and targets. I feel as though we've not had much..

In terms of feedback and targets - Y10 state school here. They have had targets set in all subjects, and a (simple 1pager) report is provided each half term showing current performance (high/middle/low within each grade, how this maps against targets, and attitude to learning).

Marking of work/honework tasks is a bit more mixed between subjects.

Thankyou cheerypip that's helpful.

Ex state school teacher

Targets were generated for y7s within a term of them arriving at school,

For ks3 they were expressed as five bands - excelling, mastering, securing, developing, emerging.

For ks4 the actual target grades were given except that after a while an edict came out that all target grades shared with parents to be a minimum 4 (a parent got very upset her child had a target of a 2). Following that there were two systems, actual target grade and target grade shared with parents.

A report was sent home every term with either on/above/below target based on topics tests in each subject.

If a child was likely to move down sets we sent a warning letter home. So parents got advance notice that their child was not doing well.

However target grades are a very blunt instrument. In something like PE or music gcse how a child did in their maths and English sats is pretty irrelevant. Students were regularly significantly above or below their target grades.

Don't get hung up on target grades. Worry about how he is actually doing.

Yr10 state selective I don’t think we have been given any target grades yet, didn't do SATs due to covid so not sure if that makes a difference. I would try to find out what moving down a set means practically. Do they do combined rather than triple? Can they go up again? Do they do foundation rather than higher?

Ds moved down a maths set and it has been fantastic for his confidence. He is now getting top marks and enjoying maths again. The difference is that he will no longer sit maths a year early and not do further maths. This doesn't bother him because he isn't planning on taking maths further but hopefully it means that he will be able to get a high grade when he takes it in yr11.

Moving down a set is only bad if it limits his options for GCSE and if he cares about those options. If as a result he can now only do combined or only the foundation level I would be more concerned. If alternatively it just means he is in a slightly slower paced class he might just enjoy it more.

tw2013 it's not the moving set that bothers me it's that he's not doing very well and that communication seems poor.