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

@Cherryburn - you type @ and then the user name!

I dropped DS2 off near the school this morning. All the new year 7 parents were there. They were trying to make the drop off area their new school playground, standing in huddles and trying to act like they other the place (I'm talking about the parents!). Some were even attempting to escort their DC up the street and into the playground. It's the same for the first couple of days of every year and then they realise that's not how it's done at the big school!
I feel like such an old timer now!

If you put in @ signs then the person gets an email telling them to look at the thread. It can be very useful for important posts or tagging someone into a thread but has the potential to clog up your email.

Whistl I'm shocked! Parents are a total no-no at our school. DS2 wouldn't even walk with DS1!
I've had to buy a new backpack for myself. I learned the hard way last year that carrying marking and folders by handles will lead to shoulder pain.

@Cherryburn I am doing this on the mumsnet app. When you type @ a mini screen pops up at the bottom with I guess what are the latest posters and you can then select who you want to post to. No need to type out their name. It's brill!

Last day of the week for us tomorrow, although I have to drive to the silly city for a load of rubbish. Youngest is nearly dead on her feet, but finishes around 11 on a Thursday. Will have to stay in school this week, but is planning to use that sixth form pass the next week. Don't blame her. Wish I could.

LooseAtTheSeams they are a total no-no at Ds2's school as well. We are encouraged to drop the DC at a public car park about 300 yards from the school. Its strictly a drop-and-go arrangement, but the Y7 parents are doing what so many primary school parents do: thinking that the rules don't apply to them. So they were clogging up the smallish car park, standing in the middle of the road and generally behaving like they owned the place.
It is actually sort of cute (because I know they'll soon learn).
I almost wish i was a fly on the gate to see their faces when the teachers turn them away and they finally have to drop their DCs's hands without getting the chance to walk them into the building.
By Friday, they'll have got the memo. Its the same every year.

DS2 would probably try to lock me in the car if I attempted to get out and walk him up to the school.

Laptop bag suggestion:
www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01HSZW778?tag=mumsnetforum-21

Its perhaps a bit masculine, if laptop bags have a gender identity!

Well, all dropped off. Unsurprisingly not allowed near his room just dropped the stuff in the hall and ushered out. Good to see him so happy to be there though - may all change when lessons start tomorrow.

Discovered the maths/further maths combination is now taught with maths done in a year and further maths in second year (ie double amount of maths in the first year if your doing both). So he s signed up for that and will see how he finds it and how much free time he has and with a view to dropping back in a few weeks if he wants more time.

Well, now got to remember not to go and get him at 6 !

Whistl I can just imagine!
Thanks for laptop bag link, that looks pretty good!

DS2 is back at school in Y10 but I'm kinda feeling left out with DS1 not starting at sixth form til Friday! Yours will all be old hands while he's still getting lost in the maze He's gone into town today to buy stationery after getting some money from granny.

We finally got his individual marks for the Eng Lit gcse that he got a 6 for. We were both surprised as his knowledge, ability and prediction were far higher. Turns out he did quite badly in paper 1 but well on paper 2 so it has averaged out. We're putting it down to a mis-reading or mis-interpretation of the R+J question. Sad, but a valuable lesson learned! Still waiting for the breakdown of the history marks, which he was also disappointed by. The school's exams Officer is not exactly forthcoming with helpful information, which is annoying considering it's all there on a website that he can access!! And some schools just hand the marks out to students on Results day as a matter of course.

We talked about transport a few threads ago - did everyone manage to sort out the right passes/discounts etc for their DC? Mine will be getting a £500 annual train ticket And it's only £500 because his student card gives him 50% discount!! And it's only three stops, 20 min journey. To travel to the education that's compulsory for 16-18 year olds....rant over

Didn't realise how expensive the travel is.

Thanks all for the laptop bag suggestions, DD has decided on one from Jack Wills, all others to masculine apparently!
So I have her raw grades back, we were three marks off a Grade 4 in German, it's such a weird one as she had a tutor, answered all questions confidently and got a 5 in the mock. We were convinced we were heading for a 6.
But...because its component it's going to cost me almost £200 for a remark - worth it - or not?
It's making no difference to Sixth Form - she's just really, really annoyed and I think it's completely weird. All other results were 8/7/6.

That does sound really odd Jufus. Can the school ask for copies of her papers and have a look at them before you make the decision to go for the remark or not?

£200 is a lot of money, but in this case the difference between a 3 and 4 is significant.

@Cherryburn apparently if you ask for copies of the papers you then cannot get a remark? Also she is no longer at the school so it's a bit of a mare. She didn't have a German teacher for last three months so hoping to get advice from head of MFL.

Depends on exam board. Edexcel say you can have free copy of script then later pay for review if you want. Getting info out of some schools is worse than pulling teeth!

Terf it's AQA.
£43.45 per component and £50.35 for the speaking test.

Just got my dd's raw marks. Some of them she came pretty close to the next grade boundary. 2 marks off a grade A in English Language CIE, 3 marks off a grade 6 in Chemistry AQA, 4 marks of a grade 7 in Physics AQA, 4 marks off a grade 8 in History and 4 marks off a grade 8 in maths Edexcel. Sort of wish I didn't know that now

Jufus you’re right about getting a copy of the marked paper. Just looked and for GCSE you can only get the original-and if you do that you can’t then get a remark. Copies are still available for AS and A Level, but not gcse.

I’m really shocked. That’s appalling. So basically your choice is pay (£200 ) and take your chance, or put up with it (even if you have good grounds for thinking a grade could be wrong.)

That is really unfair, especially as Edexcel make the marked papers freely available online for teachers.

Jufus, you could do one paper at a time so put in the one that looks most odd and the decide as you go along whether you want to do more

Limit remember some of the boundaries are small now with more grades so you could be bang in the middle of a grade and 4 away from the next one up

Yes I guess so Oratory

We will try to see it positively that she was comfortably within the grades that she got and didn't she do well etc

Do you think there is more chance of grades staying the same or going up than going down? Is it rare for grades to go down especially by quite a bit?

Yes I think more stay the same or go up than go down. Probably because the majority are close to grade boundaries in the first place and/or the student or teacher feels that the result is anomalous. You do occasionally hear of marks dropping though, sometimes by a lot! I think I was reading about it happening on MN recently (I think it was an A Level paper?)

The thing is they take 20 days and the deadline is 20th Sept so with four components to look at I will be cutting it fine.
Argh. This is SO wrong.