GCSEs 2012 support thread

[Kez100]

Here we go........hold on tight!

Yes, I too have lost count of the number of French assessments he has done. that and Science Modules and resits.

Thankfully my DS doesn't have too many exams to go. DS is aiming for A* in Maths, sciences and English lit and language, A-B for the reaminder. As long as he doesn't fall into the trap his sister fell into he'll do OK. Sadly DD kept leaving things (including revision) till the last minute. Teens are such a joy!

@yellow that's something that really worries me for next year. Not necessarily the number of the exams (I remember I had 20 for my O levels) but the fact that they have no practice of that number of exams till Y10. The 'exams' they are doing in Y9 this week just seem like glorified tests to me. And they are doing lessons in between. When I was at school, you had 'exam week' with proper several hour long exams in each subject each year in the first and second year, and then twice a year in the third and fourth year. With proper 'exam week/exam fortnight' time tabling - not coming in if you didn't have an exam (although you could come in if you wanted to brave the buses and the temptations) etc.

But none of the exams are "several hours" long any more. They were in my day too, and I have to stop myself -unsuccessfully- harumphing at the 45 minutes most of my dd's exams are!

Seeker it's not my memory playing tricks on me then? I'm sure I remember 3 hour exam papers.
DS recommends the website GCSE101 for all the sciences. He says the Biology is particularly useful. It covers Maths as well but he has done that.

1996 he does triple science and his options are History, Geog and D&T. What's a pain is that there are too many days when the longer revision heavy subjects are am and pm.,

Metabilis the January mocks are more than adequate though and the school is great at constant low level testing which is what some parents who don't like the school class as pressure but I find quite the reverse (in that I rarely know when any of mine has a test, they just do them). This particular DS has had a slow start through Y7, 8 and 9 but he's working really well now (for a boy) and has made the (nice) garden shed all his own. My main concern is that we don't get too many bunches of Hoorays coming to stay in the holiday let next door, popping their champagne corks over our fence and being generally loud (that's a euphemism). This rain is great, it flushes them off the decking and back into the house :)

@ Metabilis I mean parents not at the school.

I am at my wits end tbh because DD refuses to do a stroke of work. I sat down with her yesterday and we planned what she needed to do but all she did was glance briefly at a book and surfed the Internet for the rest of the day. She is already on study leave, I am thinking of calling her school tomorrow and asking if she can go and work there in the library or something as both DH an I work FT and it looks like we will have to watch her all the time.

I've just looked at dd's exam lengths. I can't really remember how long my O level exams were, but aside from French, (just 35mins and 50mins ), dd's exams are all between 1 and 2 hours long which seems about right to me. I think exam papers longer than 2 hours tended to be A level ones.

I'm sure it varies between syllabuses, but it seems odd to me that some subjects have more than double the exam time of others, though amount of CA work seems to explain at least some of the differences. Mostly it seems subjects with CAs have 2 hours of exams and ones without have 3, but Eng Lit has 3 hrs of exam AND CA. French has just 1hr 25mins of exams, but as lots of us have noted, French CAs seemed endless.

@yellow I never know when B has a test either. I didn't know when she had any of her English modules. I only ever hear about them when she gets the marks. I think it is probably for the best - I'm a real worrier and the kids all beg me to be away for work when they have music exams so I don't wind them up - but on the other hand I do feel a bit redundant. And they seem to do so little work. But I guess that's a function of the exams these days and the fact that the school can teach them at their own pace - pushing on rather than holding back. Which is of course why we let her go there in the first place.

This years Y9s are doing a physics module early - in June I think. I have no idea what the date is though. I suspect B does but she's not telling. Fair enough.

Her call then. But if you get a burning desire to know/ organise your awayday, the timetable is up on the school website and the module is listed there :)

@yellow She didn't know. We had a look. I'll be in Luxembourg. it's for the best. Luckily the exam date looks far too early to be an issue for either her singing grade 7 or her recorders grade 7 which should both be in July. There might possibly be a clash with Dd2s flute exam but hopefully not.

The real question is whether DS will have recovered from whooping cough by then (it's been 7 weeks now so we might have as many as 5 weeks to go :( )

Your poor DS, Metabilis, how nasty. Hope he's feeling better soon.

Most subjects DS has seem to follow a trend - four 'sections' (be that CAs or exams) each worth 25%. This seems to be the case for history, geog, latin and english. The others just baffle me though!

BeingFluffy - I feel your pain!
Same story here, revision timetable done, revision plan for each subject done, study guides and DVDs bought, study set up, revision wall set up, bribes in place! And still she does nothing..... And breathe!

Maths linear I understood! Two papers - one calculator one non calculator!

Problem is.....she did it in November of year 11, banked a C and was told last week by college that they will test her on Maths in her first week there - nearly a year after passing. She said I should have seen her face! Apparantly even the tutor picked up on it and told her not to worry, she won't lose her place if she meets main conditions, they just timetable some Maths allocation in addition if she appears to have forgotton everything!

Does anyone know if Ds is doing 2 papers for RE ie one for philosophy and one for ethics if he is doing full gcse or a half. The board is OCR.
I was under the impression he was only doing a half gcse.
He is still grumpy and needs food all the time. It's going to be a fun couple of months.

I find just stuffing them with cereal helps with the constant need for food, bruffin! DS has been known to dissapear into his room armed with a full box of cheerios and it hasn't returned

I think dd does edexcel rather than OCR for RE bruffin, but for her it's definitely one exam for short course and two for full course (she did one last year and will do the other soon). I thought that was the same for most RE courses but I might be wrong. I got sent shopping today as everything had been eaten - we're definitely getting through more food than usual (especially chocolate)!

DS is doing OCR RS. He's doing a full GCSE for one of his options. He's still got :
a 60min exam on 15th May ('Prospectives on World Religions')
a 60 min exam on 31st May ('Islam 1')
another 60 min exam on 31st May (Islam 2')
He did some part of it last year, and has also been doing some kind of assessments during the year I think .
Don't know if that helps Bruffin ?

Bruffin - DS is doing full course RE but only a handful of his year are. They didn't have - time in class so he has been doing twilight RE for a year. There are 4 papers altogether, one done and three to go. I would guess that your DS is doing the half if there are two papers?
DS chose to do it because he wanted to "clock up" and extra GCSE, didn't see the point of half a one. Plus, atheist that he is, he enjoys the ethics and philosophy.
I think it was a mistake because he seems to be spending a disproportionate amount of revision time on RE..
He has stuck post its with biblical quotes all over the house....

I have a DD on study leave literally groaning in the next room over a biology past paper....

It all starts on. Friday for her with Maths first up and then finishes on 20th June....... Lots of chocolate and hugs will be required in between.....

Thanks, he is only doing the 2 papers so only doing the half gcse then. There was a twilight for RE on offer but he was doing another twilight at the time and wasn't allowed to do two, but when I saw two papers I wondered if it was the full paper.
I was under orders to buy index cards for bible quotes today, unfortunately he wanted blue but I could only find white

Starting with French on Monday and finishing at the end of June with German. It is all stretched out with long gaps then doubling up.

No block exam leave for DD, as exams are taken subject lessons are dropped but they are still expected to go in.