Re-mark of controlled assessment

[aliena]

Dd's school seems to have little idea of how to do this. DD got high As in her Spanish examined papers but her two controlled assessments were savagely marked down by the moderator from As to an A and a B giving her an overall A. Apparently she was not the only one to whom this happened. The teacher has 31 years experience and this has never happened before to her apparently. Can i get re-marks of both the moderated assessments? School in general dislikes re-marks and i get the impression they dont know what the procedure is- they said sending one off was sufficient for both. Thank you!

So if you're told to start from a b, it's norm referenced rather than criterion? I hadn't realised that.

Unfortunately your children are political footballs...

We used to have an exam system that only benefitted grammer-school children.

So they changed the system to make it more appropriate for more children.

But then, OH NO, lots of children started doing very well, and so they have moved the goalposts.

And our children suffer.

Forget about remarks, the whole system is shot to pieces under this government.

Very sorry about individual children. I'm sure they are bright and worked hard.

(PS The government also want experienced (expensive) teachers to leave the profession to make way for less cynical, less questioning and cheaper newbies...)

Checked out DDs Edexcel French marks, 6/300 UMS off an A* overall.

Written CA was 2/90 marks off an A. Teacher had given actual mark and estimated grade of high A/low A*!for the CA based on prior years UMS calcs.

DD will try and find the mark she was given and see if she can get raw marks from exams officer. That way, at least she will know if its down to teacher marking higher than examiner, or because of UMS boundaries. DD did say boundaries looked quite reasonable.

To be fair, nobody expected DD to get an A*, especially from her feedback after the listening paper. But she did better than expected in the papers, so loooks like she could have done if the CA had come out as told.

Incidentally, she only has a B in both Englishes, writing generally her sore point.

Re:norm referencing. That seems to be what Gove wants. Everyone seems to think we have exams based on meeting criteria. When I've marked (never been told to start on a B myself seems strange when C is meant to be an indicator of 'average' performance), and looked at student performance what becomes clear is at the moment we have a combined system. The raw mark is criterion referenced, with mark schemes based on demonstrating specific skills and knowledge. However, the UMS system which follows allows statistical games to be played and some norm-referencing to creep in.

It's not even norm referenced is it? It's manipulating the results to make an acceptable number of students get a particular set of grades, according to political expediency. And it changes year on year. Last year English, this year Science, some subjects it;s the top grades targeted, others it's the C/D borderline. It makes me furious.

Yeah, I should stop being polite about it. It sucks.

Does anyone know how the science ISAs work? Are these internally or externally marked? Can a remark be requested or can you pay to get the isa returned? Thanks!

They are internally marked, externally moderated. The school will have all the scripts (unless there has been a delay in returning the moderation sample, but they will still have most of them). Remember that the Science ISA grade boundaries have gone up a lot this year. We had no adjustment to our marking (so were marking correctly according to the mark scheme), but a mark that would have got you a C last year would get you a D this year.

Thanks for this info. DD got A*s in all 3 exams for biology and low B for isa so overall an A. Looking at your reply we will just stay happy with the A then! Thanks

It's not intended to be norm referencing, but a starting point for fitting the candidate's work into the marking grid. It's not how the final mark is assessed. It's not done in "grades" but raw marks. A low "B" is the average (median) for languages.

This is in the public domain in the examiner's reports, so no big secret. Assessors have a very clear idea what a piece of work scoring 10/15 for communication and content looks like. If it's better than a "10", assessors will then start looking in the top boxes to see where the best fit is; if it's worse than "10", the lower boxes are looked at. It's just a way of saving time, so that the assessor doesn't have to go through all the boxes. It also sets a standard. We also have about 20 pieces of officially graded work, against which we can compare candidates. It's actually criterion referencing. Approximately 25-30% of marking is double-checked by a senior assessor.

Assessors have nothing to do with grade boundaries and don't even know for sure that a piece of work will be awarded a certain grade. The work is marked against set criteria and the grade boundaries are set after all the raw marks have been collated. It's at this stage that political shenanigans play their part.

ONS, your dd achieved a "B" in writing, so I would hope that she can string a sentence together, but lower achieving candidates can't - and I did write "unaided". Anecdotal, I know, but...my own ds has just achieved As in Year 10 in maths, history and geography and is predicted more As next year in most GCSEs, including Latin. His lowest predicted grade is in German (A) and it will be the controlled assessments which will let him down. I refuse to do them for him, although he obviously has all the resources at home he could need. I know for a fact that he can't formulate from scratch a complex sentence with all the niceties of adverbial phrases and idioms, etc. of the type needed for an A*. I didn't intend to insult your dd. Sorry!

When GCSEs were first introduced, writing wasn't a compulsory component. It's the most difficult skill and, arguably, the least valuable. My personal opinion is that it's a waste of time for the weakest candidates and that they should concentrate on reading, listening and speaking, which are likely to be of more use in life. Even before coursework and controlled assessment, grades for writing were usually worse than they were for the other skills. Writing remains the skill which differentiates amongst the best candidates. For a piece of written work to be awarded in the top band, it has to be something special.

But is it worth us asking school for isa back and getting someone to go through it with her? She is doing A level so obviously needs to improve her isa skills. Thanks

Spot on, englishteacher! I hadn't noticed that you'd already made the same point about the relationship between marks and grades.

Yes, FD! It sucks!

Always worth asking for papers back to go through. I believe the boards charge for exam papers but ISAs should be in school anyway, yes?

For the A level we do, the practical skills assessments are completely different to ISAs. ISAs are rubbish, IMO. I would actually be reasonably happy to see the back of them. The practical component is really vanishingly small, unlike at A level.

Ah, now my top end students all got what I expected in the ISA, because if a student should be getting As, then they should be getting close to full marks in the ISA, and that gives them full UMS. A low B sounds odd for an A student. I wonder if the school did have an adjustment? If so, there is nothing you can do about it, unfortunately. I wouldn't fret though. TBH, nailing the exams is more of an indicator for A level than the ISA (did I mention that I dislike ISAS?!!)

Thanks FallenMadonna. I have 2 friends who both teach science at different private schools. Both have switched to igcses to avoid the isas!
Do you think DD should be ok with A level then despite her problems with the practical side? She is doing AQA so 25% practical. Sorry for asking this on someone else's thead!

Module 3 was 100 ums....isa was 73!

A poor ISA certainly doesn't mean a problem with the practical side. There are no marks at all for actual practical work! TBH, there is a formula to be learned for ISAs, and it sounds like she didn't learn it. She'll be fine for A level. And will do proper, meaningful practicals. Hurrah!!

Thank you!!!

Daphne So from what you are saying, for MFL, the writing is the most difficult and there tends to be this kind of differential.
Any idea if we can expect the same for AS French?

AS languages only have two components: Spoken Expression and Response/Understanding and Written Response. Listening, reading and writing are all assessed with a single exam. There is no coursework or controlled assessment.

I don't think the breakdown of marks for individual questions on Unit 2 (Understanding and Written Response) is available, but obviously any weakness in writing will cap overall performance.

Daphne, a little off topic, but relevant. DS is a good linguist doing well in AQA Spanish and French mock exams and controlled assessments. He is also learning Mandarin after school, and we thought to maybe enter him into (I)GCSEs as an independent candidate. However AQA doesn't do Mandarin. Edexcel, OCR and Cambridge International do and I wonder which specification would be most suited to DS.

Our problem is DS has SEN including a language disorder. He has difficulty planning long essays and under exam conditions he would find it more difficult planning new extended text even in English. More time with controlled assessments helps with that. So could you advise which exam board gives most structure and direction in the writing part of the exam, so DS would cope best?

Thanks Daphne maybe there's hope for DD yet if her writing continues to mature. Highest marks at GCSE were in the spoken CA and the reading paper.
Is there much difference between the exam boards for AS?. DD changing schools and going from Edexcel to AQA.

Sorry, I don't know anything about Mandarin. :-(

Circular, I've only taught OCR and Edexcel at AS/A2, so I don't know much about AQA. Your best option is to look at the specification on the AQA website. Nevertheless, I know that the format of the AQA AS is the same with listening, reading and writing all tested on the same paper. Speaking is a separate assessment.

Hopefully, the teachers will do "bridging" work with your dd and ensure that she has a really thorough grounding in grammar and encourage independent reading/listening. They will almost certainly start setting written assignments without the spoonfeeding of GCSE, which she might find difficult at first, but should become easier with practice.

Daphe, sorry, I was not clear. The question is not about Mandarin, it is about the requirements of the specifications. Could you perhaps explain what does the writing Edexcel specification for the language that you teach really requires and what this would mean for DS? As a parent, I don't really know what to make of the specification ...