The return of the O Level.

[hermionestranger]

Leaked reports suggest that the government is to scrap the GCSE from 2015, 2013 option takers will be the last year to take them.

I'm sorry it's the mail bug they were first on my twitter feed. I 'm on my phone so can't link properly.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2162369/Return-O-Level-Gove-shake-biggest-revolution-education-30-years.html

Why couldn't a G grade student answer the easy questions at the beginning? That's what they're there for. And post 16 college courses for low ability students do look at grades below C because it shows that they have made some effort.

OK, I can read the Guardian's 'O' level English paper, you have to click on the tab Text, which seems to convert the small image to text.

So we already seem to have a two-tier system, with an easier foundation paper and a harder higher paper.

Claig, in Maths it's three tier. In Science there is a massive range of different qualifications that students can take (not all are worthwhile imo).

Not so different from the 'good' ol' days really? I personally don't see the point in making all students sit identical exams; not all students are identical after all.

i was educated in a different country, whose education system is ranked significntly higher than that of the UK by various bodies, and on attainment data (i.e. PISA scores)

i teach here in England.

fwiw, i find the A level exams in my subject comparable in terms of difficulty and challenge to the ones i took. my home country emphasised slightly different aspects of the subject (i.e. if it were maths i were discussing, my home country might have spent more time on algebra and less on calculus, with the inverse true in the uk. my subject isn't maths though!).

i first studied my subject at this level 20 years ago.

while many people seem convinced that 20 years ago pupils could recite hamlet from memory and calculate pi to 6542396989690834 digits in 0.00004 seconds in their heads while juggling flaming knives, whereas today's pupils can't stop drooling long enough to answer an exam question worth 80% of the marks about how many letters are in their own name, i must say, it doesn't really reflect my day-to-day working reality

I teach A Level and it is challenging and rigorous . Unless the maths a level is significantly easier than the one I teach ( which I doubt) those teachers are talking nonsense LeQueen. Unless they were very gifted 11 year olds which I also doubt as according to you schools are filled with teachers who have. Even to Micky mouse universities and have a third in surfing .

As I said before, I didn't do O Levels but I do agree that it's probably easier to get a top grade now than it was when I did my GCSEs 20 years ago. This is not because things are much easier - certainly not in my subject - but because teaching standards are so much better.

The government can't put in place measures to make schools and teachers improve without accepting that there will be a corresponding improvement in results!

'Claig, in Maths it's three tier.'

Is it? What are the three tiers? I thought it was just two types of GCSE.

About the lower GCSE papers. The student can only get a C grade for those papers and they need to get a high percentage to do that. The vast majority would get Ds and Es. Students doing the higher papers, would NOT have such easy questions.

Both my dds had friends who took these lower papers. They really struggled with them, had extra classes etc. What questions would posters suggest WERE put in an exam paper, which was to test these struggling children?

There's a huge amount of ignorance on this thread. I presume it is coming from posters whose dc haven't yet taken their GCSEs. Unless you are a potential Oxbridge candidate, which the vast majority are not, you DO have to work hard for these exams. Ask any parent whose dc have done them. Its a bloody nightmare time. My dd is a straight A student, but still had to put in a huge amount of effort. It makes me very angry that people are so dismissive of all this hard work.

My bad, you're right. It used to be three now two, changed in 2006 apparently.

Three tier maths GCSE was scrapped about 5 years ago. A fact much bemoaned by maths teachers, by the way. There are now fewer A and A questions on the higher tier paper because they need room for questions at the lower end. I agree with maths teachers who say that the higher tier paper doesn't stretch the most able because of the lack of space for more of the A/A questions. That isn't the same as saying that the A/A* topics are easy, simply that they are insufficiently examined.

My younger brother and sister have severed SENs and would struggle with the basic maths GCSE of writing out numbers as words.

I think two tier systems are bollocks quote frankly. Make GCSEs harder but at least you can measure everyone on the same scale instead of splitting people up and labelling them.

Why do people think that "back in their day" things were better? Is it because they can't bear the thought of younger people being smarter than them?

I worry for my children. Luckily both DH and u ate well educated and will support them through education but I certainly won't be belittling them claiming that their qualifications are shit unless I have real proof that they are.

Yes the different boards did offer papers of very different difficulties back in the day - I only happen to know because I read the lower set's mock papers out of curiosity and was . The board I did required essays, the other one did not (they were available as an option, but you could choose to do pure comprehension, and no, the questions were not particularly in depth - not trivial, but not requiring deep (or any) knowledge of the full text).

On the maths GCSE I think it's entirely reasonable to have some questions on the foundation paper that allow you to prove that you have a very elementary understanding of the very basics of numeracy, eg place value, and to call that a grade F GSCE. It's not great, but it's a hell of a lot better than nothing, and for the children with SEN who won't be able to achieve a grade C then it's worthwhile.

I agree kernow.

When I sat my exams there were no revision classes, no booster classes, no differentiatuion, we never looked at a past paper and exam technique was never discussed.

I spend most of my lunchtimes and time after school running revision and booster sessions. We go over past papers, they peer mark so they can enter the mind of the examiner. I constantly answer emails from students submitting extra essays for me to mark or asking questions. I can also remember when I first started revision classes they were a much simpler affair. I now run different sessions for an A state student than for a c/b student. Results should be rising.

X post with giraffe. My experience is that there is more scope for the most able students to be sitting GCSEs a year early and then using Y11 to do an AS though; as always it just depends on how creative a school is about their differentiation.

In teh GCSE English there is a question

'Explain how the headline and picture are effective and how they link to the text'? and you get 8 marks for it.

In the 'O' level, you have questions that test your understanding at a more specific level and which gain less marks

Explain in your own words what the author is saying about the relative values of the two books he mentions (lines 24-25). (2 marks)

I think the 'O' level is more difficult, since you need a greater understanding for fewer marks.

Exactly Ham AfL means that students and teachers are so much more clued up about how to progress. And parents understand an awful lot more about the system than they used to. My parents were both primary teachers but still had no clue as to what I was doing for my GCSEs; it doesn't take a particularly involved parent to find out what is expected at GCSE and point their child in the right direction.

"Explain in your own words" is much lower level than "explain why x is effective". The second requires deeper analysis, the first just basic understanding and a bit of vocal range.

Also linking different media varieties (e.g. text and pics) requires a depth of understanding and analytical skill that the other question doesn't. You haven't got the examples of the texts they are working with either (AQA can't reproduce them due to copyright).

I have complained to the Guardian with a detailed breakdown of exactly how their article about GCSE maths is misleading and damaging to the reputation of the qualification and the students who pass it, at a particularly sensitive time. How dare they miss off the hardest questions on each of the papers and then ask readers to decide based on this whether GCSEs have got easier.

I am really angry.

vocab, not vocal! Although like the idea of singing your answers...

Dd2 has finished her A levels this week and has greatly benefited from extra revision sessions put on by her teachers.

to all the teachers who have worked so hard for our children.

Yes, I would like to see the vocabulary in the AQE text and how many words are in it.