In-School Course Work

[penguin59]

I would love to hear others feedback about the change to the organisation of GCSE coursework that used to be done at home. Coursework is now being done under supervision in school not at home. The rationale seems to be because of too much plagiarism from the internet, cheating and parents doing the coursework.

How is your child in Year 10 or 11 coping with what has become an exercise in creating a strict word count draft of a topic, memorising it and then writing it under what are basically exam conditions? I am unhappy with how this is being rolled out in my Son's School. The amount of effort my Son is putting into what is 15% of four of his GCSE's seems disproportionate.

My DD is in year 10 at a grammar and has done one controlled assessment in English. I have not heard about any others! She was certainly not encouraged to memorise it! They were allowed to bring brief bullet point notes or a grid into the exam room. There was not a word limit but they were limited to a certain number of sheets of paper. Her writing is large so she was complaining about that. Her preparation was minimal - she wouldn't even have bothered with the notes if I hadn't nagged her. She got an A in the practice one - not sure if she is overconfident. It is only 15% overall and they should be easy marks to get, but that can mean the difference between an A or a C and if universities are looking at GCSE grades to differentiate between students it is important.

for MFL it's a case of memorising and regurgitating stuff - which the teachers dislike as much as the parents and students, btu in order ot get the grades, that's what's needed.
FWIW though, DD1 did an "old style" Latin GCSE and learned the set texts by heart in both English and Latin - it's not just the newer controlled assesments you need to that with. And with some science courses it's best to learn the exact wording of the answers which will get you the marks, as even if your answer is correct, if it's not as written in the answer booklet, it doesn't get the mark.

I also think it's bad that some controlled assessments have to be done on computer within a certain time and a specific number of words have to be inputted onto computer. So, if you aren't nearly a touch typist that puts you at a disadvantage.

I can understand why doing topics at home was stopped, though. It was because parents were doing the work, not the children.

I really don't know what I think the best way forward is. It certainly does seem that the exact wording has to be regurgitated for the exams and I'm not happy with that, either.

This last generation of students have been mucked around. The GCSEs have been chopped and changed so much. I don't quite understand exactly what my DC have to do to get the marks and sometimes I think they're not completely sure.

Controlled assessments may have an impact on plagarism but they haven't stopped cheating.

I am still confused about this controlled assessment business. I was relieved when I heard about the end of coursework because my eldest is bright but not good at homework. Much to my chagrin, (Oh! posh word that I would never use in RL) I was asked the other day by one of his teachers to try to get him to catch up on his English Coursework. Do some exam boards have different rules? I have done my best to pursuade him to do it but haven't stooped to doing it for him.

LornMowa - some schools are doing yr10 early entry English on the old spec this year, rather than getting stuck into the new spec. That might be the reason?

In English language the exam is only worth 40% now. The rest (60%) is internally assessed - written controlled assessments plus oral marks. So they are very important.

I'm an English teacher & I quite like them.

My year 10s have completed one for Eng Lit on Shakespeare & the Literary Heritage & are just preparing for their first Eng Lang one (20th Century Prose).

We do a LOT of planning & prepping in class - as we would for any exam - & this does include drafting. My students have had two hours' worth of class time (& the same in homework time) to complete a draft of a very similar question, with my support.

I'll give them feedback next week & they'll then have 4 hours supervised class time to complete the actual assessment.

They are much more rigorous & better preparation for terminal exams, than getting your bright mate/dad/the internet pixies to provide you with a piece of shiny coursework...

I am really unhappy about the new controlled assessments. My very young Year 10 DD (14 and 5 months) has already done Creative Writing for Eng Lang and is about to do Shakespeare and Film for Eng Lit. She got borderline B/C for former but I am sure she would have done better in 18 months time when she is more mature. Universities don't care about when you took the exam - oinly the final grade - and as another poster has pointed out even GCSE grades may count now. She is also incredibly worried about the latter as, again, she has neither the maturity nor the expreience,to write a considered critique at the moment.

Year 10 should be a year of learning and not a constant succession of crucial and stressful tests.

Its a real pain for music. Like you can produce a composition under controlled assessments. It turns making music into an excercise in numbers.

Well - it's true but seeing others dissatisfaction with this - reaffirms that I am not crazy after all.

It would appear looking at these posts that schools are rolling this out differently - it comes down to how they interpret the guidelines. Has anyone found a link to the official guidelines for how this is supposed to be done?

Gossip said that the reason some of the pieces are being typed out is so they can be scanned by plagiarism software, and of course wordcount is automatic. But I agree, if you are a slower typist - you are in trouble.

My son was penalised on his first English piece for too many words, so he was frantic about the word count for the second piece - which lowered his creativity and grammar.

Finally, in a VERY full timetable , how schools fit this in without sacrificing time on non-coursework - I cannot get a proper answer to that question.