Sitting an extra language GCSE outside school - help!

[Clayhanger]

DD2 , who is in year 9, enjoys French and has a flair for it, but at her school she can only do one MFL GCSE. She is keen on learning Spanish as well, as she wants to travel to South America when she's older.

As I said, there is no provision in her school for two languages - they don't even offer taster courses in other languages and you have to pick either French or Spanish from year 7. It's incredibly annoying, but that's a whole other topic...

Does anyone have any experience of learning a new language at this level, and how you would go about sitting a GCSE externally? We are in London so I suspect finding a tutor wouldn't be a problem. Btw, I am a linguist (but not in Spanish, unfortunately) so I'm under no illusions as to the level of homework required.

All advice welcome!

My daughters friend has done French at home because it didnt fit into her option blocks (when she had chosen all the other subjects she wanted to do).

In her case, her Mum speaks French and has taught her.

However, she couldn;t do GCSE because of the controlled assessments problem, so has had to sit O level. The school are entering her and she will do the exams on school site. It's a new thing to them but they are seeing how it goes and supporting her where ever they can. The exam will be this summer.

I think you need to talk to her school and see if they have a policy for helping support you help her achieve her goals.

Thank you - I hadn't thought about controlled assessments. I suspect I will have to be quite determined about this as the MFL department at the school isn't very proactive, shall we say.

But there are a fair number of pupils who sit GCSEs in their home languages (Turkish, Polish etc) so I presume it's a similar set-up in terms of organising exams through the school?

I don't know how the set up works using a school as the exam centre and maybe they are all a bit different, so better talk to them early.

Our school seem really supportive of all strange manner of requests. There was a lad who sat Astronomy last year and my daughter, who needs to put some work together independently for sixth form college (because she didn't do the GCSE) is being supported by the art department, even though there isn't anything tangible for them at the end of it.

I would hope the school would work with you where they can - obviously there will be a great onus on home and tutoring with this choice, but you were expecting that. Just hope they can overcome some of the practicalities of exam sitting for you.

If she could pick French or Spanish and therefore both are being taught to GCSE there should be no problem if your MFL dept is obliging. If you can get a tutor, your DD can do all her studying and prep with them (3-5 pieces of controlled coursework, presentation and/or conversation plus listening and reading exams all depending upon the exam board) and then the actual assessment in school with the teacher at lunch / after school. Obviously this means a teacher giving up time for this but I'm sure anyone with a responsibility point would do this (or without if they are just nice!) This would all be dependent I imagine on DD's attitude in her school language lessons - I wouldn't give up free time for someone who was a little shit didn't fully engage in my lessons, and her chances of passing. Hope this helps, good luck!

My DD took a language not taught by her school all the way through from GCSE to A level. This was not a language we spoke at home BTW.

So far as the study is concerned there are plenty of external courses (try National Extension College) which she can study on her own. It should be possible for your DD to take the exam using her school as her exam centre (this is what my DD did). I simply told the school's examination officer which subject and which board and she made sure that DD was entered into the appropriate exam.

To avoid clashes with other subjects it might be helpful if your DD took the 'extra' language out of sequence with her normal GCSEs. Of course she would have to put the work in but if she is committed then this is perfectly possible.

Once you settle on which language/exam board then you can help by getting lots of past papers. I coached my DD through a language GCSE in year 7 by teaching her exam technique (DD was far better at the language than I was).

Taking this individual approach was a useful experience for DD and for me.