GCSE '18s (19) - New Beginnings?

[whistl]

Following on from the GCSE 2018 threads as our DC enter year 12.
This the first thread in our new home in further education

Thank you, that worked.
Settings
Mates option on the menu bar at the bottom of the page (star logo).

TheThirdOfHerName I added you to mine (the 1st), but now I can't work out how to post photos! Maybe it's in our profiles?

Just tried out the mates thing experimented with whistl and it worked out of interest @whistl are you aware that I added you as a mate?

whistl would be great to have a spreadsheet, thanks!
Third grade 8 clarinet is impressive - probably better this term than later!. Good luck with the prep!
DS has been learning Japanese for the past couple of years and might possibly take a gcse in it this year or a language certificate. Possibly is the key word. His main use for it appears to be watching Japanese films and gaming in Japanese! He assured me he also has enough vocabulary to get from the airport to a hotel and to order noodles.

His main use for it appears to be watching Japanese films and gaming in Japanese
DD (Y10) is teaching herself Korean (on Duolingo) for similar reasons.

I posted on one of the early threads (before GCSEs) but never kept up with the pace once the exam season began. I’ve now found you in the new Further Ed home and I’d like another go at keeping up. (I’ve not name changed)

DS (he is actually DS3 but DS1 and 2 are young adults so I only have DS and DD in Y9 left in education) did very well in his exams and got his place at the local grammar. (He’s been at a very small independent- 150 students Y7-13!) So the move to a school with about 1000 pupils, 200 of those in each of Y12 and Y13 is quite a change. And DS has ASD which makes adapting harder. He wanted to move to have more of a peer group - he would have had A level classes of 2 or 3 for some subjects at his old school.

DS started last week - he’s doing ok and doing the right things to meet people - going to lunchtime clubs when he can but I can tell it’s all quite draining for him ATM as social stuff is tricky. Y12 has a ‘bonding’ activity day later this week - I hope that will help but he can struggle in groups.

BlueBelle123 no, I can't. I even checked email for a notification, but there's nothing. I added you back though so maybe it only works when both gave added???
I can't see where to upload the photos either.

Ha! Loose and Third quirky DS is learning Russian which is of no help in gaming!

I've created a profile page, so if you add me to Mn Mates and click on my name, it should hopefully be visible...

pannetone DS2 also has ASD and is finding the beginning of Y12 quite socially tiring. New teachers and more than a third of the year group are new joiners.

third I can see your profile! I have set up a few of you in mate's but I can't see that you can do much with it. It's not exactly a user-friendly bit of MN is it?!

Welcome panetone hopefully the bonding exercise will help, I just he has to be a little patient as it will just take a little longer to settle in, I know at DS's school the new people do seem to stick together initially....good luck!

I can see it too, TheThird, but I think it is public - you might not even need a MN account to see it, never mind be one of a specific group

Dd wants to live in Japan at some point. She's interested in languages generally and at this point it's a beginner's guide.
She's really into acting but the enrichment as in her previous school are all musical theatre which she definitely isn't into. Disappointing for me as I'm a trained classical singer.
Re grade 8 clarinet, definitely now rather than later!

I've added you as well , Terf. Still can't figure out how to use it though.

I need to do some work but I'll try searching the site later for a guide to how it works. That's how I found out about what it's supposed to do in the first place.
I'm just hoping that the functionality has not been deprecated.

I've done some googling and it looks like mumsnet disabled the thing that made mumsnet mates useful a long time ago.
You used to be able to adjust the privacy settings on your profile, but now it's public or nothing.
://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/site_stuff/1788592-Has-mumsnet-mates-gone
Sorry everyone I think the mumsnet mates way was a red herring.

Thats a shame

Welcome back pannetone! The thread doesn’t move at such a frantic pace now that GCSEs are over.

DS’s school will set for maths after half term. I know that the FM people are taught both Maths and FM separately from the DC doing single maths only, but beyond that I’m not sure how they manage the timetabling. Given that over half the year group are doing Maths A Level it’s possible that it doesn’t clash with any other subjects and the non-Maths DC have frees then?

As I said before, DS is hoping to be in one of the lower sets as he just can’t work at a fast pace. I did bump into his gcse maths teacher last night though, who said he’d developed into an excellent mathematician, so he has the ability. Just shows how important setting in maths is I think- it would be totally unfair if some of the brilliant mathmo DC on this thread (of which DS is NOT one) were forced to go at DS’s pace!

Oh I'll stop adding everyone then and get back to what I should be doing

I just emailed MN to ask about Mates. Seems silly to have a function that no longer does anything useful!

I can only see your profile through my settings though, I can't click on your name in the chat board (I am on the iPhone/iPad app)

I will stop trying to work out how to make any of you my mates then 😀

It would have been really useful to have a spreadsheet with Name, Prior Names, Number of DC and part of the country (eg S East, N West, London, Scotland). Certainly don't want those details in the wider domain though.

I am another long time poster who felt it was necessary to change my name after 'giving too much away'!!

Interesting to hear about the different ways schools arrange maths. DS has his first lessons today! Maths and history, then 3 periods of 'independent study' (compulsory, monitored and supervised). There's 17 maths teachers in the dept and about 700 Y12 students taking maths so streaming by ability must be a nightmare! But they did require a 7 to do maths and an 8 for FM so perhaps the range isn't so great?

He signed up for the debating society yesterday and also the debating enrichment (teacher-led) activity - he's hoping to learn to speak slightly more coherently and less emotionally!!

He has studied Mandarin for two years at secondary school in extracurricular time, and did private Japanese classes for a year while in Y7. He's a bit obsessed with the Far East and has a natural language aptitude (and says Mandarin is much easier than French!!)

Hmm, I’m not sure about the spreadsheet with former names actually. There’d be nothing to stop someone posting for a bit then asking to be added to mumsnet mates to check what someone they’d worked out IRL had name changed to. Unless only the ‘old guard’ were allowed the into the mumsnet mates club, and then it might get a bit cliquey?

Or have I misunderstood (entirely possible!)

@Cherryburn - I guess you are right, but it was hard enough to keep up with who is who when we hadn't changed names 😀

With any luck we will 'settle' into our new names for at least YR 12 and then do a mass change again for YR 13.