science controlled assesments

[Shazy123]

My son has sat 3 biology modules and had an A in the first module (3 marks from 100%. He's sat his second module, which he also thought went well, but is having his results this month. Today, he came home from school very upset as the science teacher told him how bad he's done in the controlled assessments, he had one of the lowest marks in his class along with another boy who has also got an A in Biology. I find this very strange!! My son told me that one of the boys in his class who is doing the foundation paper in bio had an A in his controlled assessments. It really doesn't make any sense! Personally I thought my son was doing well and that he would have an A or an A* in his bio gcse, but I'm beginning to worry now! Does anyone else have any experiences like this??

They will probably make him do another controlled assessment. Your son should also ask the teacher for more advice on how he lost marks and what he should do better next time. I'm surprised if the marks are variable like that for the same assessment, however it is quite possible for different assessments to give very different grades, as unfortunately some assessments are much harder than others.

The boys who had the A* in the exams and get the lowest marks in the controlled assessments really doesn't make any sense! They both had a 'C' overall mark I think and have been told they have to re-sit 2 of the modules. My son wants to be a doctor or a vet, so I'm beginning to wander if he's capable if he's not doing well in the assessements. When I went to parents evening a few weeks ago I asked the Biology teacher how he was doing in the assessements and he said he was doing fine!! I'm confused.com!

Get the teacher to double check the marks for the controlled assessment. If people who should have done well have done badly and people who would be expected not to do as well have got top grades, it's possible that someone has mis-entered results or done a sort badly on a spreadsheet somewhere.

Yes ring head of science. This doesn't sound quite right.
For a start your DS should have been given his grade / mark in each CA after it was done. They have probably been doing them since year 10 and he shouldn't be finding out at this late stage that there was a problem.
They are not allowed to have the paper back or specific feedback on CAs as this was why course work was discredited, but they are allowed to be given their marks and to resit the CA if necessary.

Pleased to say that my son has now 2A in papers 1 and 2 Biology and expecting the results of paper 3 and a combined mark for all 3 papers. He's also got an A in the coursework. In Chemistry he has 2A's and 2A's in Physics and also waiting results for the 3rd paper. He knows that he's had atleast A's in the coursework for chem and Physics. What do you think his overall grades will be??

you can work it out the best if you know his UMS scores for each of the sections he has already taken.
If he is doing AQA and has just finished y11 then each exam module is worth 25%, and the coursework a final 25%.
The boundary for A is equivalent to 90/100 UMS (on each module) so if he has 3 A's in bio then he already has at least 270 UMS, so to maintain his A then from the info you provide he may well need another A (assuming he got exactly 90/100 on each), but if he got eg 100/100 on each of the other sections, then he will only need 60/100 on the final paper.

I don't know what his UMS marks were, but I know that they were quite high. I don't think my son knows what they were either. He has 2 high A's in Physics, but I think the Chemistry were low A's - could he still get A*??. Do the boundaries change for science every year?