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Secondary education

Connect with other parents whose children are starting secondary school on this forum.

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Original poster

Can't do triple science unless you're predicted at least a C in MFL

84 replies

sandyballs · 11/02/2014 10:22

To be fair I haven't discussed this with school yet, my DDs are year 8. But friends with older kids have been discussing it and getting tutors for languages.

Has anyone heard of this before, what on earth has achieving in a language got to do with science?

OP posts:

curlew · 12/02/2014 00:35

Does everyone in the school do GCSE PE? I haven't heard of this before- is it worth complaining?

curlew · 12/02/2014 00:37

Letting a child drop GSCE MFL is closing doors. Think very carefully before you let them do it.

horsetowater · 12/02/2014 00:52

What doors does it close? Whenever I speak a foreign language people speak English to me. I am fluent in French but I never needed to use it. If they really want to learn a language they can do it later.

Metebelis3 · 12/02/2014 07:51

curlew yes. This year, at any rate. I don't think the year above had to do it - but they had to do a compulsory second language (that's been dropped for this year because of the removal of funding - they still can do up to 4 MFLs but they aren't forced to do 2 any more. ). DS wouldn't have minded doing a second MFL as it goes but I'm secretly a bit relieved since I don't think we could support him at all in that.

Metebelis3 · 12/02/2014 07:55

IME - and I work internationally - not having an MFL closes no doors whatsoever. Apart from, you know, translating and teaching jobs.

Metebelis3 · 12/02/2014 07:56

Mind you when I was a kids not having French would have closed the Cambridge door to me because it was a requirement. Even for maths! You had to matriculate to be accepted at the university.

wordfactory · 12/02/2014 07:59

I think it's absurd that triple science should be linked to anything else. A child's ability in each discipline should be assessed separately.

DH failed his O level French. Twice.

He got straight As otherwise, in both O and A.

wordfactory · 12/02/2014 08:03

That said, I'd still recommend an MFL for most students. It's seen by some admissions tutors as a real preference.

For example in my department (not MFL btw) any applicant without a GCSE in MFL can be expected to explain why at interview. And any vague comment about irrelevance, not being useful, or not liking it would go down like a cold cup of wotsit.

OwlCapone · 12/02/2014 08:13

At DSs school you need to be good at both maths and science to do triple science as you have to drop a maths session to fit in an extra science one. This makes sense. Linking it to a MFL doesn't really, unless it is also a time table issue.

wordfactory · 12/02/2014 08:17

TBH owl you don't even need to be that good at maths for triple science.

Maths is definitely DD's worst subject. She'll be happy to get a B, ecstatic to get an A. Yet she sits at the top of her science sets. It seems to me that much of GCSE science is about graft.

Bonsoir · 12/02/2014 08:34

There is a strong correlation between ability in maths and ability in MFL. There are common analytical abilities at play.

However, the way MFL are taught in England is so bizarre and pointless that very analytical brains can be totally put off MFL and deduce that they are bad at them. Nothing could be further from the truth.

wordfactory · 12/02/2014 08:38

Bonsoir that may account for my DH's utter failure in French .

He's absurdly analytical. Maths, economics, law...you know the type.

Bunbaker · 12/02/2014 08:39

I wish DD's school would make a language compulsory and drop RE/Citizenship as a compulsory subject.

I think it is odd making PE compulsory at GCSE.

reddidi · 12/02/2014 08:39

"For example in my department (not MFL btw) any applicant without a GCSE in MFL can be expected to explain why at interview. And any vague comment about irrelevance, not being useful, or not liking it would go down like a cold cup of wotsit."

Why? Is there sound evidence confirming the correlation between success in your subject and affinity for a MFL, or is this just a prejudice?

Bonsoir · 12/02/2014 08:50

I expect your DH manages just fine without French, wordfactory .

reddidi · 12/02/2014 08:54

"Maths is definitely DD's worst subject. She'll be happy to get a B, ecstatic to get an A. Yet she sits at the top of her science sets. It seems to me that much of GCSE science is about graft."

That may be so, but beware that much of A level science is about maths. Physics particularly so, but statistics accounts for a fair few marks in Biology, and in Chemistry rates of reaction and other aspects of physical chemistry are tough if maths doesn't come easily.

But I cannot understand why Schools treat science differently from any other option - there is no reason why students who are good at science should take one more GCSE than those that aren't.

OwlCapone · 12/02/2014 08:55

TBH owl you don't even need to be that good at maths for triple science

You do if you are losing a maths session to allow for the extra science!

Bonsoir · 12/02/2014 08:57

Economics is a humanity in the French bac ES. Sciences and economics can, up to a point, be taught verbally as a sort of general knowledge subject without addressing the underlying maths. But you cannot progress properly without a good grasp of mathematics.

reddidi · 12/02/2014 08:58

"There is a strong correlation between ability in maths and ability in MFL. There are common analytical abilities at play."

I'd drop the "M" there - Latin is even more analytical and many mathematicians do well in it.

Bonsoir · 12/02/2014 09:00

I agree that Latin is very analytical.

But teaching MFL as if they were a dead language is not the way to engage analytical minds.

nickymanchester · 12/02/2014 09:03

*There is a strong correlation between ability in maths and ability in MFL. There are common analytical abilities at play.

I was just about to disagree quite strongly with your first sentence as I was one of the people above who got a low mark in French and As in everything else before going onto a RG university to study a heavily maths based course.

However, I then stopped and thought about your second sentence. I have worked in a couple of different countries - Spain and Russia - and actually found it reasonably easy to learn each language. OK, so I've got a terrible accent but at least I can speak the language.

So perhaps there is something not so good about the way MFL is taught - or should I say used to be taught, don't know if it's changed since my day - in British schools.

bruffin · 12/02/2014 09:20

The way it has been taught has been changed. For one thing we were given no preparation for o'level. Nowadays they are given the questions in advance and prepare a script. My dyslexic ds struggled because he couldn't remember a page of words. It took us all day for him to learn 5 sentences, yet he got a Gold in the Senior Maths Challenge. he is very analytical and techy minded. I do think we don't have the opportunities to be immersed in languages the way other Europeans are immersed in English through tv, film and music.
I did German O level. I understood the grammar, but was no good at remembering the gender of the word, so it would sometimes appear that I got the more difficult part wrong rather than the simple bit. I am also half Greek and could speak Greek as a child but I have no memory of speaking Greek. Saying that I am very good at the logically side of languages and can work out meanings of words in other languages and I can pick out words when listening to Greek, I just couldn't have a conversation in Greek.

wordfactory · 12/02/2014 09:23

red I think the idea that a good education includes maths, science, the arts/humanities and languages other than your own, goes way back doesn't it? To the ancient Greeks?

Also, in many other countries, the idea still pervades. The early specialisation of study in the UK, is anathema is many cultures.

But on a more specific note, our discipline interests itself in the communication of ideas between humans. The reflection of what it means to be human by way of language is where we focus. So it would be odd if someone wanted to devote themselves to that without having even a passing interest in how people communicate in other tongues, I think.

That's not to say no one ever gets an offer without MFL. But their reasons would need to be cogent.

wordfactory · 12/02/2014 09:24

Oh and I agree about A level science. I wouldn't even suggest to DD or anyone with her (in)ability in maths to tackle them.

But GCSE is fine IMVHO.

SlowlorisIncognito · 12/02/2014 18:45

A few universities do require MFL for degree entry, UCL being one. However, I don't think not having one closes that many doors, and of course the majority of students taking GCSEs aren't aiming for entry at a top university.

I wonder if the reasoning for this is timetable based? That if you took triple science and a language you would have to be in the top language set, and someone predicted less than a C wouldn't cope so well in that set?

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