too many people having extra time

[IrmaFayLear]

I didn't quite know where to post this, so I've tried here...

Dd came home in some distress as it turns out that 15 out of 20 people in one of her A Level classes are having extra time for exams.

Dd is upset that it now seems that rather than levelling the playing field for people who genuinely need assistance, a minority are being penalised. Furthermore some of these extra-time people are in "competition" with dd in that they are highly ambitious A* people.

Dd said that one girl told her that "slow processing" is the new watchword and they paid for a private assessment. Dd said that this girl has no processing problems when it comes to quick-fire banter on social media and it's never been mentioned before.

If the exams are deemed too short, then surely give everyone 25% extra time? As it is with this particular subject, it's a case of some people being given 25% less time.

I had a quick google and a)there are masses of sites telling you how to get extra time and how to "fail" the tests and b) Ofqual has said that it is getting out of hand.

I’m wondering if you are on a wind up, OP. How exactly does your DD know they are all getting extra time? Did she leave an exam and 15 stayed on? Or is it something she’s heard?

It’s not that easy to get extra time. You may have seen many people talking about how to get it online, but you’ll never know how many actually did.

Slow processing is certainly real, and it’s not about being ‘less intelligent’ one of my DC will need this and I’m already concerned that it seems like it’s going to difficult to get.

Threads like this annoy me as so many kids really do need that bit of extra time, for pointy elbowed parents to claim there’s ‘nothing wrong’ and it’s not fair...

It's a while since I did A levels/GCSEs but this was also the case at my school, on exam years suddenly everyone was getting diagnosed with something or other and getting extra time. It was a private school and I think they were keen to endorse anything that meant better results. Our invigilators were always the same people, and studiously ignored two girls phones going off in our A level English lit exam, and let another girl leave the room with her notes after she vomited then come back half an hour later to complete the test having already seen the questions and had time to look at her notes. She was very anxious (hence being sick) but a high achiever, they didn't want to risk her not getting all As/A*s. They also ignored girls texting each other and talking in our Art exam. Private schools encourage sly cheating in my experience, everyone I know who was educated privately has similar stories. If these girls had really had issues that needed extra time in exams that would have been picked up much earlier than just before GCSE/A level exam season, they all managed to pass the rigorous entrance exam at 10/11 after all. As far as I'm aware dyslexia doesn't develop spontaneously but it seemed to be a common occurrence at my school.

Irma, you really are, but are clearly too ignorant to even see it in yourself, no surprise your DD sees it in the same way. Your post is pretty offensive tbh

If you engaged even a couple of brain cells, the reason as I stated below is pretty obvious, schools with good pastoral care, will attract more DCs with various difficulties & they will get in, because they have those difficulties. There's a high percentage in DDs year too, because other parents of kids with health issues, like us, felt good pastoral care was important

It's not that easy to get extra time.
DS1 has ADHD and dyspraxia. He is very bright, and I know this because with extra time, he can give full and complete answers.
In a quick fire situation, he would fail miserably.
A timed exam situation will not get him to perform at his best and neither is it an adequate assessment of his ability.
Should I not fight to have his needs met? Should he be regarded as not that bright? Is this not why non-neurotypical young people were told they would amount to nothing in the past?

Have a bit of compassion please.

Please stop abusing me and making nasty comments about my dd. This is a fair thread. I am not judging anyone disabled, simply the questionable number of people claiming adjustments in one class.

If you get a kick out of upsetting people I suggest you limit yourself to AIBU.

The point about independent entrance exams is a good one @nocluewhattodoo

Around here, it's only the less academic ones that give any extra time in the entrance exams. The academic ones don't - but then do push for extra time in state exams.

Are people who are "slow processors", and need "extra time", allowed to drive when they are older? Genuinely asking, as if one is slow at processing info, how do they react if a kid steps out on the road, in front of them, or a braking incident at 70mph on the motorway ?.....Are they too slow to process this information in safe time/in comparison with the other drivers who never were given "extra time" in exams ?..Genuine, folks, ...

Your opening post is blatantly ignorant of difficulties experience by those with the processing problems that go along with disabilities & how you're backing your DD bitching about her being disadvantaged became she doesn't have any problems.

& now I'm abusing you & your DD ... errr right snowflake, you just carry on with your disabilitist bull

Torridon - in DS1's case, unlikely. I don't think he'd ever pass his test.

Torrin

No, my understanding is that it doesn't work that way, though there may be an underlying disability that would prevent driving, but not the processing itself. It's more about reading at a normal speed & retaining the information you've just read in a normal way. DD needs to read at least twice to be sure she's read it correctly, on a bad day, she's still been known to answer a completely different question to what she should have.

She's very sharp in short bursts, or when relaxing in her room & chatting online etc, but completely different in a test situation & in class with all its distractions too

Torridon My DD1 drives. I suspect her reactions are slower than average, but clearly not so slow as to prevent her from passing her test.

We simplified driving for her by her learning in an automatic, so that frees up some brain power. And then she uses bigger than average gaps to pull out of. She 'only' goes at 65-70 on motorways (as opposed to general driving on them being 70-80). She takes more rest breaks.

I suspect that her safety will be more of an issue when she gets old and reactions start slowing down more. Whereas your average old person may need to stop at 85, she might need to stop at say 75.

You can definitely game the system. I once taught a girl for yr11 English who was very bright and very capable. She had no assessment of Send or any sign of it. Finished yr11 with two As in English. At the start of year 11 she hand wrote 9+ pages for the Shakespeare/Lit Heritage controlled assessment (exam conditions) over a four hour time slot with less than a dozen SPAG errors. I know that because I had to dig it out in yr 12, when she started to struggle with her alevels* (maths and science, no essay subjects) and her parents paid for a private assessment. It came back as so severely dyslexic she got 100% extra time and a reader for her a-levels! That in no way reflected her needs and was completely unfair. I had to act as a reader for one of her yr13 chem papers, it was so ridiculous, she could read it better than I could, I couldn't pronounce the names of half the chemicals, she was correcting me.

*By 'struggle with a levels' I mean not get As, she was expecting to apply for medicine at uni.

Torin,

Though thinking on that further, anxiety would be a huge barrier fir my DD as she's prone to panic attacks & needs medication to get her through the exam, don't think she could take it fir a driving test, so though she could cope with driving safely from a reaction POV, she'd just never get through the test

As a university lecturer, I do see students who get extra time in exams but there are many, many fewer than you state. And that's even taking into account that we have students newly diagnosed e.g. wIth dyslexia while with us, and that some of those with special arrangements just need a smaller room but no extra time (to take in food if diabetic, for calm if anxious etc).

So I am not sure if you have a very unusual bunch, or if those who need extra time don't then make it to our course (we are not RG but we are top 10 in our subject).

A couple of other things to consider

• parents of children with SpLD will often send their DC private if they can afford it. Smaller classes, more individual attention, teachers who (due to the smaller classes) can adapt teaching styles, give handouts of presentations etc etc.
• parents who can afford to send their DC to private schools can afford private assessments....which means that when they are given extra time they are not advantaged. Instead it means that children at underfunded schools are disadvantaged.

As a result of these 2 facts, yes private schools are likely to have more DC with diagnosed SpLD than is the norm .

My DDs best come-back to someone bitching about her getting extra time was "well, they could give you an extra week and you still wouldn't know the answers".

In English GCSEs she walked into the exam knowing she had already lost the SPaG points before she had even picked up her pen - 25% extra time doesn't even begin to level the playing field despite the fact that in the real world we use Word with spell check on!

Without knowing the precise circumstances of each individual in her year group she quite simply doesn't have the right to judge

Serious ignorance on here about dyslexia and slow processing.

If your DC doesn’t need extra time, lucky them.

Mine does. He is predicted 4 A* at A level but getting his answers down takes him longer than his classmates. He’s still the best in his school in two of his subjects.

@IrmaFayLear I am sorry but your post indicates that you are judging disabled people. To suggest your dd is being disadvantaged fails to recognise the challenges many other people have.

She is indeed very fortunate not to require adjustments. Compassion and understanding goes a long way.

If the 75% figure is correct, some may be rest breaks rather than extra time. Rest breaks means the exam takes longer as the click is stopped when the candidate takes one, but they don't get extra time in total (unless separately entitled to it).

75% is high if all ET not just RB, but I've had from 50% down to zero so there is a lot of variation.

Clock not click!

Bloody hell. An adjustment does not mean that a pupil is disabled. To claim so is crass and insulting to those who genuinely are facing terrible difficulties in life. I simply can't believe people are taking some sort of moral high ground and expressing outrage over a learning disadvantage . Were either of my dcs seriously ill or disabled I would be seething . As it is I'm seething on behalf of people I know in this situation.

This thread is about questionable numbers of pupils claiming extra time.

God there are some ignorant bitches on here.

My daughter has slow processing, she had 3 days of assessments, including numerical, logical, sequencing, memory and recall tests. She also had to bring worksheets home.

She is also ‘above intelligence’ she has short term memory issues which means she has to learn by using repetitive learning techniques, she has ‘gaps’ in her learning whereby the class is moving faster than she is keeping up. Therefore she has to put extra work in, everything has to be read through at least 3 times and she has to make extra notes, this slows her down and she has to use a window card for reading hence the need for extra time. However she also gets high grades. She suffers bitchy comments and people ‘joke’ how it’s now fashionable to have a learning difficulty.

She is currently in year 11 and asleep for an hour as she is exhausted before she has to spend two hours going through the work she did at school today and rewrite it as well as trying to fit in revision.

Fuck sake it’s no better than when I was at school in the 80s being called thick for my Dsylexia.

It does seem like a very high number and as a parent I would want to clarify this. But I have had extra times, sometimes it,s been great sometimes not needed. But yes if only 5 out of 20 were getting the "normal" time then they would surely be the disadvantaged.

To add, reading for learning and testing and having a chat on social media are opposite ends of the scale can’t believe I’m even explaining that as it should be glaringly obvious.

Somebody needs to check the dictionary definition of disabled