Changes to GCSE English language - what a bugger!

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So we just had a letter from school saying Ofqual has made changes to the GCSE English language exam and Speaking and Listening marks will no longer count towards the qualification.

This means that all assessments taken last year by yr 10 children will not count towards their GCSE ( speaking and listening component should have represented 20 %) and instead the examination will now be worth 60% of the total marks.

It seems so wrong to change the format of an exam half way through and really unfair to the new yr 11s who spend all that time last year working on something that is no longer being counted.

My DC will be really pissed off when I tell him.

"high achieving private school students, HE (I suspect you mean FE) students and borderline state school students."

That it's a qualification attractive at the C/D borderline rather gives the lie to the claim that it's a rigorous, harder, more stretching qualification, no?

I mean HE as in Home Educated!

But your last line is exactly my thoughts last night.