Thread 32 - Corona Cohort 'May' the Mumsnet force be with them for their venture to 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 31

CONGRATULATIONS ZEBRACAT !

DD is out of History (Civil Rights - there seem to be lots of variants!) and was pleased with the questions: hopefully that means it's been fair for all our DC!

DS just out of history. 2 x 25 markers were decent he said. The 30 marker was bad 😢 Business yesterday was good. Have told him to put it behind him & move on.

Sorry to hear about Covid x

Oblomov, I've sent a few friends a box of Gower brownies but never tried them myself. That said, I am famous among DD's teachers for my homemade brownies, and I've got a batch in the oven as we speak, for her to take in to a drama revision session tomorrow.

We've just been out to buy a thank you gift for her SENCo, who has been, in DD's words, like a second mum to DD over the past 2 years - she really goes above and beyond for DD, so we've made her an exam season survival pack with some gorgeous gin, fancy tonics, posh nuts and truffles.

@Oblomov22 they look rather nice, never heard of them before.

My DS finally does his first A level paper today, PE, so his ‘best’ subject. He has been studying very hard and driving me a bit mad with his facts and statements.
my other DS has GCSE chem tomorrow, he had Spanish today, so not much revision going on. He’s doing A level chem so I hope he’s prepared enough.

@singingstones its tough, I want to push my DS a bit more but really I think they’re all a bit stressed, your poor DD. I can’t wait for the GCSEs to finish either, so many exams it’s ridiculous.

Piccolo that gift sounds perfect. Your own brownies sound even more so!

Piccolo what's your secret to making them so good? Please share recipe.

Those brownies look lovely! Dd is in charge of brownie making in this house - or occasionally ds will do some. They’re always better if you use Galaxy or Cadburys!

@JustHereWithMyPopcorn i think an easy paper is better for morale even if grade boundaries will be higher!

DS v happy with his history exam : his dream questions apparently.

Well German History was awful apparently. 3 sources all saying the same thing so nothing to say, apparently. I think this might be a teaching issue, or a this particular student issue, if the exam isn’t exactly like the practice she just comes unstuck.

DS reasonably happy with physics, "could haven been a bit better but could have been a lot worse".

DD on the other hand is freaking out a bit about chemistry tomorrow. Roll on half term

DS also sounds ok about physics. He’s coming home later and can’t wait to see him.

Dd and her friend have just got back from McDonald’s. Her friend does Edexcel history and thought it was awful - modern British. So it sounds like the history exams have been a mixed bag.

Modern British is what DS called his dream paper though!

DD just out of PE and phoned me. Pretty happy but even with 30 mins extra time didn't finish and no time to go back and check everything. Seems some info she hadn't revised but thinks she remembers reading something so went with that. Was surprised by number of 8 marks and 15 markers. Ended up making bullet points on 1 question. She definitely lost points where she didn't answer in full as no time but only around 4 or 5 points so all in all pretty happy. She did say there was a question she is sure she hadn't ever been taught but she had touched on it in pyschology so was ok.

Hope it went well for others (not sure there are many on here taking PE).

Now for a nice long break until the next one. DD has last day tomorrow, fingers crossed that it's actually fun as everything they usually do has been banned.

DS liked today’s OCR physics but it was always going to be his best paper as he likes physics and has a natural ability for it.

he said he had his worst paper yesterday and the best one today.

My DS was happy with physics too. It was his first one.. glad to get it out of the way. He said it had gone well but he did t answer two questions.

You can never rely on reports of how a paper went anyway can you. One person’s dream paper is another’s nightmare, but even then, sometimes the one who thought it went badly can do well! Dd didn’t think her RS mock had gone particularly well and she got 97%! Hopefully all our kids will come out with the grades they need come August.

Im looking forward to half term and a break from exams! It’s DD’s birthday on the Wednesday so she definitely won’t be revising then. I did a photobook but left it too late so it’s not going to arrive on time 😬

AQA physics was okay. I took it to be a positive okay from the tone.

@crazycrofter DS had the American 20thC one as well, but I haven’t heard from him yet (he’s in boarding). It was a HUGE amount of content, I have been going over it with him and felt it had way more than either of his others (evolution of warfare and partition of India). Bit nervous that DD has chosen History and Biology….

@Volterra I know what you mean about distance and boarding, DS only started in Sept and he used to call/text every night, now it tends to be exchange of info only apart from the odd call. Mind you he talks a lot when he is at home.

Interesting about the time and ADHD thing, DD does have some traits, so does DH and they are both not great timekeepers, lose track of time, DD took a long time to get the hang of the analogue clock. Whereas DS (autism/dyspraxia) was precocious, he started asking what time it was obsessively aged 2 and had the whole thing nailed (analogue, digital, 24 hour clock) by about 5. It was one of the early signs of neurodiversity in him.

@sazzy5 are you another AQA PE? @Heifer was your DD surprised by the 15 mark question on Sport England? Apparently they knew it was going to be a major topic because it was green in the list of what would be covered, but they did not anticipate a 15 mark question because there is not really enough content in the syllabus to justify it. He is not expecting more than 5/15 for that one. Otherwise it was OK and he managed to finish more of it than usual time-wise.

@22Newnames he thought the Physics was OK, but there were 2 x 6 mark questions which looked unlike any other question he had ever seen, so should be OK for an A, but Physics has such high grade boundaries for an A (85% in 2019) that he is not hopeful of an A if any questions are dodgy. But that is OK, he would be happy with an A, delighted with an A*.

Re knowing how you have done in exams, DS1 got his university results for this semester today and he had been losing sleep thinking he might have done so badly that he would have to re-sit it, had even thought about where he could stay for the re-sit. Results out today and he got a high 2i, so a 1st for the year which is quite a come back from thinking you had failed!

@icanbewhatiwant I don't know whether to say that is rubbish timing or skillful timing to fit Covid over half term! Hope it is mild and you get over it quickly and enjoy having a great excuse not to do some of the things you would rather not do. Sorry you will miss the awards.

@EspeciallyDistracted DS does history and biology - I'd say that there was more content in History but more complicated content in Biology. Both still a shed load of information to learn!!

@icanbewhatiwant boo hiss for the Covid, hope you recover quickly and that your DS stays free from it.

@Monkey2001 Well done to your DS1 on that exam grade, that's a great end to the year.

DS has a class mate who misread one of the essay questions today and has answered it incorrectly. I feel awful for him and I don't even know him but there's nothing worse then the post exam chat and finding out you've done it wrong. Poor lad. 😥

DS1 was quite happy with physics exam today said there weren't too many difficult questions. Physics is his least favourite subject out of the 3 so let's see how it goes. DS2 had RS today which he said was more difficult than first paper. He has chemistry and computer science tomorrow so another tough day. These GCSE exams are really intense in numbers and all new to us after missing the first lot with DS1.

Ds said RS GCSE was ‘decent’ but then said he couldn’t really be bothered during the exam?! I asked if he knew his stuff and he said you don’t really need to know stuff, you just need to waffle! It’s not filling me with confidence…

@EspeciallyDistracted yes, the American content is massive. Dd also does modern Britain and finds it much easier. What with the coursework too, which seemed to take an inordinate amount of time, I’m steering ds away from history A Level!

I still haven't heard from DS. Yes, I'd forgotten about the coursework (they did theirs last summer/autumn). That was a lot of work.