Exam diet 2021.

[wingingitwithgin]

So we were told no National 5s or Highers last term.
My child has been continually assessed and tested week after week. Prelims in school before Christmas and online after Christmas.

Online learning better than 2020 but not great. No live lessons. Lots and lots of new material given but not taught.
Today announced exams to go ahead start of May as planned. Prelims disregarded as some done online so all prelims even school sat ones won't count.
Exam in May will determine grade. If pupil is self isolating /COVID they will use other evidence.

My child is burnt out by the switching of goalposts. Another month doing new material, no study leave then exams like normal (only the poor teachers marking them)

Ok this would seem fair if all schools doing this but their friends at 2 different high schools say they are just continuing with mini class tests like autumn term. Madness the difference in approach.

What are your schools doing?

@notanexam

If these main assessments are the main factor in deciding grades then it is completely contradictory to Nicola Sturgeon stating a couple of weeks that grades will be based on teacher judgement and no requirements to sit prelims or exams.

My DD has 15 upcoming starting on Monday. She was only informed of this day Easter hols started! So very limited time to consolidate and study. Surely many many pupils are similarly disadvantaged and will not perform to their best?

Exams by another name, an absolute shambles.

Very similar here notanexam

DD is in S4 doing 7 Nat 5s. Starting next week she has 3 weeks where she has assessments every day - in some cases 2 a day, and on one day she has English/ANOther/English in 3 consecutive periods. Absolutely crazy - surely they could have juggled to do the English in one sitting. And I don't agree with the SQA stuff about splitting the assessments being easier - 40 mins is such a short time to get your head into stuff.

I think my DD is in denial a bit. She's done loads of past papers but very few timed, and as they don't know how many questions each mini-paper will cover it's really hard to practice that. She's done very little revision outwith school so far but finally wrote a timetable at the weekend.

But totally - this is an exam diet, no doubt.

Well my child is getting on with it. He'll have had 7 days of assessment papers (Highers) over the past 9 school days, come the end of this week. These are all 'Prelim-Style' assessments but there has been no talk of whether the results from these papers will be 'taken into account' for reaching the final grade. The teachers seem to be saying that they will be functioning like Prelims and that the grades they get in the next batch of 'exams' will be the only 'evidence' used to come up with the grade? Does anyone know if this is true? I read on another thread that if they do better in the Prelim-style assessments then that grade would be used instead?

I wish I could get some clarity on this! But as a citizen of Glasgow I got a letter from Maureen MacKenna advising parents and students to 'avoid any unnecessary contact with staff about the provisional results before June 15th'. Which I interpreted as 'leave the teachers alone with all your questions about this'.

So if you discount the week beginning Mon 3rd May, because of the May Holiday (Mon 3rd) and the Election (Thurs 6th) when the school will be closed - that leaves 5 complete weeks left in which:

The results of the 'Prelim style' exams are marked
The results of the above are returned to the pupils
The pupils work out where their weak spots are and revise accordingly and presumably still have lessons in their subjects to get some teacher input?
The 'real' assessments take place for all subjects
The 'real' assessments are marked in-house and by colleagues from other schools to arrive at a 'final' Grade (which will be discussed with each pupil between 14-25 June)

The Grades are then forwarded to the SQA on June 25th

I dislike all this talk of 'Prelim-style'. OK, if you're going to be pedantic, these assessments are 'preliminary' because they're 'preceding' and 'done in preparation' for the 'real' non-exam assessments. But they lack one vital and pretty fundamental aspect of the real Prelims and that is TIME. There is no real chance for anyone to reflect on their performance in these Prelim-style assessments, seek further clarification of where they might have gone wrong, where they can do better, have a proper sit-down with a teacher and go through areas of weakness and receive guidance etc... It will be bang straight into the 'real' assessments - it's got to happen that way because there is no time to fit in and schedule all the Nat 5s, Highers and AHs and get them marked. We haven't got a schedule for the 'real' assessments yet.

Also unlike the 'real' exam schedule there will not be, as is often the case, gaps in between exams. My son's Nat 5 schedule last year (before it was cancelled) often had 2, 3, 4 days between exams. There was an occasional run of 2 days of consecutive exams but that was the exception not the rule. He had a glorious 5 days between one exam and his Physics or Chemistry exam if I remember rightly!

So this is tough on pupils. And off the back of some sub-par teaching during the 4 months they weren't in school too. My child definitely didn't learn as well in this 'virtual' environment and he's a bright lad.

And to top it all, today they received their forms to select their Advanced Highers. Lots of advice to make sure that they choose subjects appropriate for their chosen University Degrees. When they have had NO careers advice, university guidance etc... My son hasn't had a moment to think of anything other than getting through this Tsunami of testing. I cannot overload him further with thinking about the sort of course he wants, where he wants to study (I tried a couple of weeks ago and his head nearly exploded because he couldn't step out of his revision mode)

And he has to make his decision in the next 2 days. And the AH subject choices look quite limited too. No advice of how he might be able to study subjects not on offer in his school at a Hub or another school (which I know has been a possibility in the past) And, again, he's far too stressed to look into this with a clear head.

And I don't feel comfortable approaching the school because I know they are under so much pressure just to get their students through these assessments. And the teachers are going to be completely bogged down with marking and assessing.

So yeah, getting on great

(bet you wish you'd never asked!)

So sorry to hear this Tsunami.

@AssessmentTsunami - just picking up on this -

And to top it all, today they received their forms to select their Advanced Highers. Lots of advice to make sure that they choose subjects appropriate for their chosen University Degrees. When they have had NO careers advice, university guidance etc

IME secondary schools don't have this resource in normal times! There should be mentors assigned in S6 to guide the children through their UCAS application so I'm not sure you're missing out.

Agree with @LizzieMacQueen, other than an annual pathways meeting one evening (which covers S1-S6 and is mostly focused on vocational college courses at our school), there is little to no careers advice or support with options choices in most schools.

I would recommend you don't wait for the school to provide this and you/your ds start your own researching. I did this recently with ds and it took a long time, something the schools don't have time for every child.

I know that the careers officers attached to my school were working through the lockdown and doing video call meetings for those who wanted.

Thanks all. Apologies for having such a rant - have calmed down a bit now!

Interesting to note that not much tends to happen in S5 in schools anyway when it comes to career and university advice. There is a careers officer in our school who has been working remotely but there have been no one-on-one virtual meetings, just generic Powerpoint presentations. I think the main issue is that we would have had more headspace to think about these things in a normal year. I think I might have been a bit more proactive and would have been asking the school for advice. It seems that most of the schemes like UniQ need pupils to be applying in the January of their S5 year. Obviously certain schools are more focussed on this - other schools are concentrating on getting their pupils educated. And some kids just know exactly what they want to do. Mine is still undecided.

I've been concentrating on keeping my son's head above water. He's done really well considering but it's been one day at a time. He'll choose some subjects to put on the form and if he changes his mind, so be it.

A quick question for teachers-

Are the provisional grades given as a percentage or an actual grade?

If it's an actual grade, are the grade boundaries assessed and adjusted by SQA before the provisional results are released?
TIA!

We mark the work, adjust if needed (usually through cross marking) and then award a percentage. That should become a band (1-9) which we report to SQA.

Before we do that though, having looked at primary evidence (exams) we can take into account secondary evidence (class work or less robust tests e.g. past papers from books). This will only really be needed if a child's percentage is way off what we expect or if they are just below a borderline.

If a child has 69% in the summer final assessment but lots of others at 70%+ then there is a good argument for awarding a band 2.

If they have 65% and skimpy evidence of anything above 70% then they get a band 3.

A = band 1 and 2
B = band 3 and 4
C = band 5 and 6

If an exam has been really hard and lots have done poorly there is good reason for adjusting, as the screenshot suggests.

Equally, if the exam leaks (lots of schools are using the same assessments) and a child does unexpectedly well then, in theory, we could take marks down. In practice it would be open to challenge and impossible to prove.

As many pupils sat prelims in December, but some didn't, what is happening all over is very variable.

Your child should be awarded the best grade possible, that is fair to them, their work, their circumstances. But, it needs to be fair to other candidates as well.

We thought pupils had got wind (via another school) of a bit of the Higher paper. We have substituted another poem. But, we have also told them we are using a different paper to avoid them believing they know what is coming and not revising properly.

My pupils have done 2 close reading papers and we will pick the best one. Two critical reading papers and we will do the same. This will vary from pupil to pupil.

Happy to answer questions.

Careers advisers are working remotely mainly afaik, but my dc was able to have a telephone appointment - it's a national service so I would have thought that if this is available in one area, it's available across Scotland.

@aurea No. We submit bands and they should just agree them. They don't want percentages or any detail.

I am hoping to avoid too much detail as we will have given pupils the highest possible mark and not have pulled anyone down but don't need 250 pupils taking over every paper looking for a mark here or there.

And they can appeal the band but only if it will change their grade. So, you can appeal a band 3 but a 4 would never work.

We don't yet know what will happen if parents appeal. I assume I will have to send away evidence. However, as I will have used the most successful assessments and tried my best to find marks, the risk is it goes down and a band 4 becomes a 5 (C).

@Cismyfatarse

Thank you!

Gosh! this is completely the opposite of what what I thought was happening.

So are teachers sticking to the guide bandings of 70% A, 85% A1 and so on?

What happens if the whole cohort gets low marks which is a real possibility? Do teachers use their judgement to adjust bandings internally?

Will you divulge marks to students on individual papers?

There is so much opportunity for lack of parity and fairness

@aurea Yes. We will stick to them as far as we can but then look at individual circumstances. A pupil who had 3 bouts of isolation and got 69% would be seen differently from someone who got 69% which is a huge success for them and we expected a C based on past performance. One might get an A2, the other might too but we would look very carefully.

So, the final judgement is holistic but the way we get there, at least to start with, involves numbers.

Every child will be discussed. Some will be easy to award, others more complex.

Thanks Cis

There's going to be such a disparity in grades then. It makes my blood boil.

A huge number of pupils are going to be seriously disadvantaged this year and the gap between advantaged and disadvantaged will increase exponentially.

I hope the universities take the background and contextual information of each applicant into account with their offers.

It is going to be so difficult to ensure fairness if schools do take into account mitigating circumstances such as isolations that they know about, when there will be many covid related impacts they have no idea about.

We had some prolonged distressing circumstances and a covid bereavement in our family that impacted ds much more than 3 isolations ever would have and the school don't know that, all the school office knows is he had a day off for a funeral. He had lower working grades across all subjects in his January tracking report, has worked really hard since and hopefully he has caught up, tracking report due today should hopefully tell us 🤞.

You're right @WeAllHaveWings it's going to be very difficult to ensure fairness. It's not a level playing field this year but I'm not really sure what can be done about that.

Every child has been affected by the pandemic even if they didn't have periods of self-isolation from school. They've all been socially isolated from their peers and usual support networks, some have lost family members, others lost family incomes, others living with parents whose mental health is poor. The list of mitigating factors could be enormous this year. It either all needs to taken into account or none of it.

There may be many appeals! Again!

The list of mitigating factors could be enormous this year. It either all needs to taken into account or none of it.

I agree with this and your examples, and as it is impossible to know how each pupil has been impacted I would personally fall on the side of none. I don't expect ds to get bumped up based on our covid circumstances but I would expect all to be treated the same (although I reserve the right change my mind when his tracking report comes home today, or when he gets his final results 😂).

Regarding tracking reports, as the levels/bands are evidenced-based, should the final (provisional) result not be any less than the latest report?

Wings - hope you get some positive news tonight.

I would not assume that aurea as the reports won't have been through a moderation process unlike the final results.
Cismyfatarse your explanation helped me keep than the hours I've spent on the SQA website! Thank you.

I don't know if they can go down, but it might come down to the subject.

For English they have hinted that they will take the highest marks between the interim and final assessments on each of the 4 elements RUAE, Set Text, Critical Essay and Folio so English shouldn't go down, but have said it is also important to keep studying and taking the final assessment seriously, just because you did well in the interim one doesn't mean it is in the bag.

For science the interim assessments here have been unit based, and they seem to be putting more of an emphasis on the final full course assessment holding much more weight as it wont be split into different assessments.

Well yes, if you've only studied one topic and do a test on it in October and get an A, that was easier to achieve than an A on the whole course in May.

meant they had 3 x unit tests covering the whole course in the last 2 weeks as interim assessments.

We can only take into account circumstances that we know about and have documentation for (even an e-Mail at the time). And this will only matter for pupils who might otherwise have got a mark or so more that would change their grade.

We can't do anything about parents telling us now that someone was very ill in November. That evidence needs to be reliable.

In any normal year that would be sent to SQA (for example I had a pupil whose granny died the night before an exam). This year we have to collate it and use it.

So it is not just my gut feeling - it too must be robustly evidenced (as far as can be).

So someone with a history of long term sickness supported by a Dr would be considered. Someone who just pops up now going "Oh, forgot to tell you but....."

It has to be fair.

Thank you Cis for taking the time to explain everything. I'm sure you're a great teacher .

How is everyone? We're coming to the end of a week where a few results have come in on the 'Prelim-Style' assessments they've been doing since they got back after Easter. Some excellent results, some disappointing.

We've been told that the next lot of 'non-exams, exams' starting next week and running over next three weeks will be used to get to their final grade. But, my DS has been told that if they got a higher mark in the 'Prelim-style' assessments, they will use those instead.

As predicted, it's the Maths and Physics that have been disappointing. Really hard papers that were created by the school where lots of kids got poor results. My DS says he's going to have to do a lot of self-teaching via YouTube and other online services to get his head round some of the stuff. I heard of a few people who have been paying for Tutors these past months because their kids were struggling (particularly in Maths and science). We haven't been able to do that.

My DS has suddenly decided what he wants to do at University though and has been watching lots of online content about potential courses. Most of the courses require he gets 5 x As at Higher apparently. I'm really hoping he can do this but his struggles with Maths and Physics might scupper him.

Meanwhile election-wise, I see John Swinney has retained his seat - no surprises there.