I'm just getting my head round Gove's changes to the exam system- and I am even mor horrified than I thought I would be!

[curlew]

The three things that leap out at me are 1)all year 11s have to do 8 GCSEs of which 5 have to be EBacc subjects, which will be a real struggle for many, 2) no more tiered papers, so one exam for all, so kids for whom a C is a real achievement have to sit a paper which has also to cater for the effortless A*, and 3)only the first attempt at an exam counts for the league tables. This means for a school like ours, where the vast majority of students are middle/low ability, and where we have always let many have a "practice go" early, won't be able to- because the risk to the school is too great.

My 14 year old son has taken 25% of both his English and science GCSE in year 10

No chance of retakes, no mocks so he can have a go and balls up without it causing a huge problem. I think that's dreadful, would be quite happy if he was doing this in year 11 but not this early

My 12 and 10 year old will be \ may be doing this new system, I probably won't be happy with that either!

"I believe it's called 'real life'. A C is a C, and it is not worth as much as an A. It might be a real achievement for you as a person, but out there it's still worth less than an A. Pretending otherwise is doing the kids no favours at all"

Who's pretending?

When I was at school I was told even if I got 100% the highest possible grade would've been D which resulted in me not even trying with those subjects.
I would've tried a lot harder if I knew I could've achieved higher grades by doing so.

That is a big issue imo with the tiered system.
I am not sure how it is confidence boosting when you know you have to do the lower tiered paper as you will never be good enough for the 'average' one (that all students should do) let the alone the 'good' one.

The problem is that now you will be presented with a paper three quarters of which you can't begin to attempt. Is that better?

I think the changes as outlined in the OP are EXCELLENT.

They may be excellent for high achieving children. They are disastrous for low and many middle ability children.

Are they really scrapping the tiered papers in maths? Along with the new style of maths questions I saw from the OCR (with much more deduction and less being led through the questions) it means the whole paper could become potentially inaccessible.

Completely agree Curlew.

According to last night's meeting there still might be 2 tiers for maths- it hasn't been finalized yet.

The reality is that international norms require a broad knowledge base for as many DC as possible and a reliable, comparable measure of achievement.

I can't believe (well I suppose I can) that they are rushing this through so quickly without even knowing where they are heading, no trials, just live experimentation. Poor poor kids.

"The reality is that international norms require a broad knowledge base for as many DC as possible and a reliable, comparable measure of achievement."

Agreed. How will making it impossible for many children to gain qualifications help with that?

I think scrapping tiered papers is a good idea. Anything less than a C grade is basically a fail anyway. I mean, if you get a D grade, you are not particularly good at that subject are you?

I'm not a teacher, but I really wonder how on earth anyone could set a single exam paper that would be a fair test of such a huge range of abilities - you need to have questions that will differentiate between A and A*, as well as questions that will distinguish between E and F or however low the grades go.

I don't see how you could do that without either making A* students waste time ploughing through a load of ridiculously easy (to them) questions before getting on to the real stuff, or only having a handful of questions lower ability students could attempt, or having an incredibly complicated exam paper where you choose between different sections to attempt, which is tantamount to having a tiered exam system anyway.

Luckily DS is doing GCSEs this year, so won't be affected; DD starts yr7 next year, so I am just hoping Gove gets chucked out and someone who actually knows what they are doing is put in charge before she gets that far.

Our kids are nothing but guinea pigs. Every change is being rushed through with no lead in periods and no proper consultation because of this "we must do it during the 4 years we are in govt" mentality. because of this every successive govt just pisses around with the edges rather than tackling the real issues. we have kids lots of them leaving school without basic numeracy and literacy skills. we have kids who are now being required to stay on until they are 18 and of course if they don't want to be there that wont be disruptive will it! We have employers moaning that someone with 10 GCSE A stars cant answer the phone. the whole system needs a proper long winded root and branch review. we need to look to Germany where kids who aren't academic get the chance to learn a trade. we need sort out endless exam taking and teaching to the test. we need to get real about grades top 5% A star, next 5% A and so on not everyone getting A's so that no one has a clue who is really stellar and who is a bit bright. we need to concentrate our efforts on kids with lower than average achievement and bring them on not waste time money. but of course this wont happen because to do this the political parties would all have to agree and it would take time 5 - 10 years to bring in and all of them don't think beyond this current term of office. piss poor education system today, piss poor education system tomorrow no matter what edges they tinker with.

It is perfectly possible to set exams that test a wide range of abilities and skills. IELTS is a great example.

I took the A grade maths gcse paper as an at best C/D student. I spent most of it in panic staring at the questions I had no idea how to answer. I did what I could, but had lost confidence less than half way through. I got a D. However I was able to retake in 6th form and got my C. I thunk I took the paper that went up to C only.
Not great I know, compared with most people, but what I had been aiming for and it felt great.
My ds is in year 10, so this is all worrying even though he is doing well ATM.

I thought that there were two tiers to the IELTS?

Oops, think. And I got two As for English...

There are two exams for different purposes.

You get a grade from 0 to 9 (with half grades eg 7.5) for the four sections, plus an overall grade.

I think, personally, that the A-B-C grading ought to be scrapped in the UK - it is too nebulous and there has been too much grade inflation.

there are a lot of singularly ill informed people on here who - like Gove - cannot conceive of a world without A levels

FFS
tractor drivers and petrol station attendants do not need an A*
many of them struggle with basic literacy

if only you lot were forced to send your kids to comprehensive schools you might have some comprehension of what lower set learning entails

these are children at the opposite end of the IQ scale from Oxbridge undergrads who will never read and write competently

for whom getting through school at all is an achievement and getting a C grade in a foundation paper is a real credit to their teachers

Gove is an effing idiot if he thinks that setting them up to fail will give them the slightest incentive to stay in school till 18 and out of trouble

as are all of you who agree with him

I agree mummymeister, I think education should be seperate from the government.

English teacher here. Firstly goblindancer I find your comment about anything below a C being a fail a very antiquated and patronising view. Not every child will be able to get a C and some children overachieve by getting a D. When I was at school and no doubt when you were at school there were children of all different abilities.

For those saying that it is easier work for a foundation paper - it is not, the same controlled assessments are done. The only difference is the actual exam paper, where questions are similar but often worded differently - a Higher tier paper will ask more for analysis of a text rather than a foundation paper which asks for understanding and insight.

A pupil doing a foundation paper in English can still get a B as the marks are linear - so with controlled assessments and exam added together a B can be achieved. My current class did November entry and three got a B grade despite being predicted a C. They are all articulate, confident writers - the majority of the others got a C (all reached their target grade). The two who got a D were not made to feel failures at all.

The forcing of the baccalaureate is what will break our education system. Not all pupils can access a full curriculum, they should be able to take the practical subjects that will help them in life, along with the essentials of English, Maths and ICT (note I didn't say science - I think computing far more important in today's society).

We are setting up a society that goes back many many years - it will be divisive and will be a disaster.

"for whom getting through school at all is an achievement and getting a C grade in a foundation paper is a real credit to their teachers"

Absolutely!

TalkinPeace - being a "tractor driver" is not a job per se but an incidental part of jobs that do require skills.

And petrol station attendants are few and far between these days.

The whole point is that the type of low skilled "job" you describe barely exists these days.