Thread 30 Covid Cohort, Mad March Hareing Towards Exams

[OrangeCinnamonCroissant]

This is a thread for supporting all young people post GCSEs 2020, regardless of their educational setting. It is respectfully requested that all are supportive and helpful to each other. If you want to start a debate, e.g state vs private, please don't within this thread. Please also be sensitive when responding to threads about grades.

Some of us have been here since first thread back in yr10, some will be new. Everyone has been friendly and helpful in the past. Everyone is welcome. It is hoped this will continue.

Our DS/DD may go down various paths (such as employment, apprenticeships, higher ed) We have decided for anyone interested they will most likely find us within the Further Ed board.

previous thread 29

I've made this one a little bit earlier as things are so busy, at home and on thread, so please feel free to use up previous thread first

@crazycrofter thank you, my PCR came back positive but DH is still negative by LFT so we'll see. I feel fine in myself today but am taking it easy, I am coughing a bit.

@crazycrofter Thank you.you have hit the nail on the head.I said to DH that I felt she was now identifying as autistic, she has changed how she dresses, and when she remembers to, asks if we are being funny when we make a joke. I know lots of autistic people, and they are individuals, very different from each other, it seems insulting to them to start adopting behaviours from a checklist. She does have some behaviours which are suggestive, she is very punctual, and finds it hard to adjust to new situations, she needs recovery time after socialising and struggles to see things from the other side., she can also become obsessional, and lacks self awareness. So it may be that this behaviour is a feature of autism! She’s not faking it, she passionately believes that she fits all the boxes she ticked. She’s got all sorts of tics too, hand flapping and pulling her eyebrows, and she’s very keen we should notice. But they are brand new.

@EventuallyDelighted sorry to hear you have Covid. It seems that you are allowed to go about your normal life with it now though, which is a bit confusing!

@Zebracat it can be very hard being a teenager, and yours has extra stuff to deal with. Sounds like you are doing a great job of providing stability and a listening ear. Have you seen the thread on The Student Room about the Cambridge foundation? I have not read it, just thought of you when I saw it, could be helpful or not - www.thestudentroom.co.uk/showthread.php?t=7054995&p=96832132&page=12&highlight=cambridge+foundation#post96832132

Thanks. Dm has no intention of moving closer. She's actually gone further away as her partner had a dream of retiring to the coast, so they moved down south. He's passed on since. Dm is 75 but fairly overweight, so she really struggles with mobility. She has to taxi everywhere. She has had carers to shower and dress her for the past 4 or 5 years. She won't do steps of any sort. It makes things difficult. It makes her fairly isolated as she can't get out much. I'm struggling with her hygiene in the kitchen and bathroom too. I'm actually amazed I survived childhood.

@Decorhate

Around 6 years ago we paid £40 per hour for a Maths tutor & he only did 3 hour sessions!

Yikes!

The guidance is really unclear now, I went to put my positive test code in the Covid app and it flashed up "isolate for 10 days" which hasn't been the rules for ages. Obviously we are not going to go out unless we have to but if DH catches it too one of us will have to mask up and fetch DS home from school at the end of the week.

There are officially no rules now! DS has a negative LFT yesterday (day 7) but was positive again this morning. So annoyed as he wanted to go to school and I wanted him to go! He feels fine now. I said to school if he had a negative this afternoon and again tomorrow morning then he'd be in, they replied that he needed 24hrs between the negatives. Frustrating as he was negative yesterday evening. We are now hoping he'll be back in on Thursday.

I have spent the last week keeping away from DS and making him isolate in his rooms, then went to lunch and sat face to face with a friend for 3 hours on Sunday who has now tested positive. Grrr, if I don't get it now it will be a miracle I think! Negative so far though.

Sorry about the covid ED its such a pain.

Zebra that sounds a tricky situation to manage. No advice, but I suspect the professional will be able to tell the difference.

Fonty End of April???? So open days during exam month? That's mad.

@Zebracat - good luck with the diagnosis appointment.
We went through process with a teen (ds was 14 when he got his dx) and it was noticeable that it allowed to express stuff he'd masked previously (ds suddenly said he hates eye contact, he just knows other ppl like it so he's taught himself to do it - I had no idea; likewise they asked about stuff that we'd totally normalised as a family, because it works for ds - to the extent I hadn't really realised anymore that these behaviours weren't normal...)

But I'd also say the professionals know their stuff! I was very unsure if ds would get a dx as I felt he had managed so well in mainstream school - and there was lots about his early life that I had felt was totally normal. The questioning and approach really is skilful and sensitive, in my experience, so hopefully it will be a process that works for you all.
Ds is 'lucky' that the area he is interested in is typically highly neurodiverse, so the marketplace is, hopefully, fairly well set up for him...

Dd has had her RS mock back - 97%! Crazy! She didn’t think it had gone very well either

Does anyone have any tips or know of good resources for GCSE English (Lang or Lit). Ds is really struggling. He says he just can’t concentrate in lessons because he’s not interested and the teacher doesn’t understand the adhd either really. He also reads really slowly so can’t complete the language paper even with 25% extra time. He got a 2 in Lit in the mock and a 5 in Lang. He needs a 6 in at least one of them for his A Level choices.

That’s an amazing result, Crazy!!

English - Mr Bruff, Mr Sallis, or Sadie Rae/Ray.

Mr Bruff is my fave - YouTube vids and his books for Lang.

Which texts is your DS doing? I’ve got some of DD’s revision books you’re welcome to have, if they’re what he’s studying.

Stacey Raey, not Sadie.

Thanks @Alsoplayspiccolo. He’s doing Jekyll and Hyde, Macbeth and something else - can’t remember now! The problem is, I bought him a full set of revision guides for all his subjects but he barely uses them except for Business. He hates reading basically! He much prefers online so I’ll see if Mr Bruff works.

Oh sorry, cannot STAND Mr Bruff . Most female English teachers can't...also Mr B pitches very high (whilst talking absolute crap...)

And don't get me started on Stacey Reay.

But - hey- if it helps the DCs it's fine!

I recommend Akala's videos on BBC about the poems. And Massolit if your school subscribes is brilliant.

eg

Akala on Wordsworth.

Cantonet, DD has tried Elvanse and Concerta at various times but didn’t get on with either.
Her previous consultant felt a non stimulant might help the come downs she (we!) were struggling with on Equasym.
I didn’t realise they weren’t as effective as stimulants; I’ve told DD that now, and she wants to go back to Equasym to help her focus.
Thanks for your knowledge.

Got Ds’ exam timetable through today. Does anyone else worry how they will cope with doing 3 papers per subject when they have never sat that many exams in one go before? I feel like that will be an issue for Ds. He is doing one of his subjects at a different school & their mock exam weeks are at a different time so he had never even had to do his three subjects in one week.

@Alsoplayspiccolo ds also struggled with the comedowns on Equasym, which is why he still has some of the 2020 medication left! Might be his only option though.

Thanks @Piggywaspushed that’s probably why his English teacher wouldn’t recommend any online resources! With ds we just have to try everything and hope that something sticks

@Decorhate yes that does concern me as our mocks have only been 1 paper per subject each time.
As they didn’t sit their GCSEs you’d think schools would want them to have an experience of sitting full on 3 paper exams

crazy, I’m regretting getting rid of DD’s many boxes of Equasym now!

As for English, try Mr Sallis, if the others I mentioned don’t suit (DD and DS both enjoy(ed) Mr Bruff, and DS has gone up 2 grades in Lang, thanks to him, so still worth a look! )
Videos are so much easier to take in for kids who don’t enjoy reading.

@Fiddlersgreen I’ve checked back & Ds had 2 papers in 2 subjects for his first mocks & then had 2 papers in his 3rd subject a few weeks later. In his recent ones he only had one paper in Economics (because they’d done papers 1&2 already ) and 2 for maths. No idea when or if he will do another set of mocks for his 3rd subject

I think some kids - most especially boys- really like Mr Bruff. I taught an entire class of girls once and their immediate response was that he was very arrogant. He honestly does talk a lot of rubbish specifically on 'Poppies' which then get spewed out in exams so caution with that one. Mr Salles is a lot better but again high pitched. They both do the 'how to get a 9' type stuff, which isn't helpful for most students. I think all schools should get Massolit but it remains a bit obscure because it isn't YouTube. Don't overlook BBC Bitesize for revision too.

If DS watches a video, please encourage him to do something with it afterwards like a mindmap.
In terms of revision guides the Snap books are good. Small, bitesize chunks and practice tasks and pitched at the middle, more or less.

@Decorhate my DS has done all 3 papers in each subject but he did 1 paper per subject in November, 1 paper per subject in January and then doing the 3rd paper of each subject this week.
I don’t feel it gives them much experience

@Fiddlersgreen I agree. Having said that, I think ds1 had around 30 GCSE papers in total so 9 seems very little in comparison!

@Equasym & Concerta are the same drug. Just made by different companies.
Elvanse has a different profile and has a more gentle dosage reduction. DD had bad side effects at first on it but the assessor started her at a low dose - 20 mg for two weeks & then increased it by 10 mg every two weeks. That way the side effects are minimal. Plus she said at the lower doses she felt awful when the dose wore off. Almost similar to a low blood sugar episode, when she nearly collapsed during swimming & basket ball. But now I think at 50 mg she seems to be fine & coping. She's also managing to get into bed before 12. Before she would procrastinate so much she would not get enough sleep and be a permanent zombie.