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Original poster

New maths GCSE exams declared too difficult by Ofqual

94 replies

noblegiraffe · 21/05/2015 18:06

www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-32831905

So Ofqual have finished their investigation into the new GCSE maths sample material and concluded what any maths teacher could have told you all along: they were too hard. So now the exam boards will have to change them and send out new sample assessment materials.

The BBC news report says that schools will be starting teaching this GCSE in September, but the truth is that most schools have already started teaching them to Y9 as the extra content means that we needed to start as soon as possible.

What a fuck up. There is no way that the new GCSEs could have effectively been introduced so quickly, I suspect this will not be the last fiasco.

Shame on the government for working to a political timescale and not to one for the actual educational benefit of children.

OP posts:
Original poster
noblegiraffe · 21/05/2015 21:57

No, I didnt teach the linked pair.

Pretty much everyone thought the double GCSE was the best option, including Carol Vorderman in her Gove-commissioned report into maths education. God knows why he saw fit to completely ignore her advice.

OP posts:
HarveySchlumpfenburger · 21/05/2015 22:05

Good point OYBBK. Enough trouble trying to recruit secondary maths teachers as it is without increasing the number needed.

Poor year 9s are a bit stuck in limbo. Probably not enough time to teach all the additional stuff in the new ks3 pos, then expected to do a gcse course that assumes that knowledge. An extra year would probably have helped that situation too.

namechange0dq8 · 21/05/2015 22:06

Pretty much everyone thought the double GCSE was the best option

Indeed.

The problem seems to be that journalists with English degrees have heard of calculus, and think it's the sine qua non of maths. So whether or not some rote differentiation is included in GCSE has become a real shibboleth. That in the real world in 2015 a lot of what was done with calculus when Gove was not doing A Level Maths is now done numerically, and it would be at least as beneficial to bring back the 1960s/70s set, group and boolean algebra work (computer science would kill to have more discrete maths in 11-18), seems to pass the nostalgics by. Even if that's a step too far, then decent statistics and probability is worth more than calculus as well.

ErrolTheDragon · 21/05/2015 22:11

namechanged - I did the 16+ Biology in 1977. I'm not sure how closely it resembled the eventual GCSE - I seem to remember thinking it was a bit dumbed down relative to the other O-levels and I don't think had anything like an ISA or coursework. But yes, they had a long lead-up.

Original poster
noblegiraffe · 21/05/2015 22:15

The new GCSE doesn't have calculus in it. They've put in stuff about rates of change and the gradient of tangents to a curve by drawing but not proper differentiation. It's very odd. You read the syllabus and think 'oh, we've got to teach differentiation, then you read it again, then you consult with your colleagues and then you conclude that they don't mean calculus.'

What hasn't been mentioned that I've seen so far is that exam boards have already written their textbooks for the new course. They've got thousands of them sitting in warehouses ready to go. Yet the textbooks were written with the sample assessment material in mind, which has now been binned. GCSE textbooks usually have 'exam style' questions or practice papers in them. So what's going to happen to the textbooks? And if they need fixing, how will they do that by September? In fact, wouldn't it be good if we had the textbooks while we were writing the schemes of work?

It's a bloody shambles.

OP posts:
HarveySchlumpfenburger · 21/05/2015 22:21

Maybe they can go to the place where all the nice expensive shiny copies of Jim Rose's primary curriculum went. Onto a shelf to gather dust nicely.

If I was an exam board I'd not be at all happy with ofqual. That's possibly a huge amount of money they've lost in unsellable text books written for a qualification that had been accepted.

OhYouBadBadKitten · 21/05/2015 22:27

I hadnt thought about that noble! what a shambles.

clam · 21/05/2015 22:31

I know that this is a Secondary thread, but we have a similar issue in Primary. We have just got some non-stat assessment papers for the new curriculum and in the Year 3 maths one, (so 7-8 year olds), one of the questions is: "3/8 of a number is 6. What is the number?"
And in Year 4: "5/10 divided by 10"

PiqueABoo · 21/05/2015 23:17

@TheFirstOfHerName, reformed GCSE maths still has Foundation and Higher tiers.

@ErrolTheDragon, 16+ English had coursework which in my corner of the world was done as homework (even in those less fretful days Milly and Molly from the posh end of town got a teensy bit of help). I forget but think it was around 40% coursework, 60% exam.

@clam, DD would have nailed both of those despite her alleged "2b" on entry to KS2. Surely the issue is whether they're more the exception or the rule?

EmberRose · 22/05/2015 06:42

Secondary maths teacher here- most of us in my dept think double award would work well. Like in science, students can take single, double or triple for most able. English is two GCSEs. Everything has been rushed through and worst of all how many departments are actually fully staffed for sept? We've not replaced our head of department and currently don't have enough teaching hours. We need to recruit two more maths teachers but no one is applying. We are a good school in a suburb of a city.

EmberRose · 22/05/2015 06:44

Noble giraffe- having the textbooks whilst writing the scheme of work would be a great idea. We're sticking with edexcel as they map old spec to new in one doc and provide stage programme for year 7-11. They sent us a sample of their new book- the pages are awful quality!

VivaLeBeaver · 22/05/2015 07:09

I have a Yr 9 dd and I am gutted for her.

lljkk · 22/05/2015 07:30

DS is taking Stats+Further maths GCSE. Is it really that unusual for a school to offer?
He's saying it's not that tough... has stats exam in a few weeks, actually.

tiggytape · 22/05/2015 08:36

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Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Cafeconleche · 22/05/2015 08:53

Feeling very stressed for my Yr 9 DS. The maths department are being brilliant about it all, but are still very much in the dark about what the hell is going on - utter, utter shambles and causing a lot of unnecessary worry for the current cohort. Why they can't just move the new effing maths GCSEs back a year until everyone is comfortable with the content is beyond me. But hey ho, why let common sense get in the way of politics. Thank you Gove - you utter tosser

tiggytape · 22/05/2015 09:06

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Message withdrawn at poster's request.

HmmAnOxfordComma · 22/05/2015 09:31

Yr 9 parent here, too. All rather concerning.

Ds's teacher said his set are comfortably working at solid grade B / into grade A in 'old money', so I hope delays of any sort still give time to teach the new content. I imagine it's middle ability children who will be most affected by confusion and delays at this stage? So unfair.

If the maths does get put back a year (I know it won't), I have to really hope they keep the new English. The new courses are more interesting, more challenging and free teachers and students from the time-sucking controlled assessments. Please let the new English stay!

Cafeconleche · 22/05/2015 10:16

I agree with you about the new English Hmm - happy for that to stay. As for maths DS is in the top set, but is now worried he won't do as well as he might have with the old GCSE - and the middle ability kids are bound to suffer the most. As if the teachers don't have enough to cope with without this cock-up. Ridiculous to feel this stressed now - and Year 10 hasn't even started yet. Grrrrrrr

tiggytape · 22/05/2015 10:35

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HmmAnOxfordComma · 22/05/2015 10:38

Well the comparison with those who came before doesn't matter so much, especially as there will be numbers instead of letters. More likely that they will compare unfavourably with those who come after - current year 8s and 7s - whose teachers will have had more time to prepare them.

Millymollymama · 22/05/2015 10:39

Nicky Morgan could make the decision to delay right now! She does not have to follow the Gove timeline - but does she have the guts to go against Gove? Probably not.

Gove never did care about middle or lower ability children (they are not like people he knows). Most of the curriculum changes are to the benefit of the very bright children, who he believed, were not extended by the curriculum. They were probably not, but there should have been ways around this by doing a further paper to show off their brilliance.

One of the problems of teaching the new maths curriculum in the Y5/Y6 classes of primary schools is that so many teachers feel concerned about their ability to do this - in English too. Teachers are going on Grammar courses!

tiggytape · 22/05/2015 10:44

This reply has been deleted

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Oliversmumsarmy · 22/05/2015 10:51

What does this all mean for those in year 10 already, going into year 11 in September?

HmmAnOxfordComma · 22/05/2015 10:52

Nothing. All the same for them.

PiqueABoo · 22/05/2015 10:58

Ofqual have just said they're shifting the (higher) results distribution curve to the right, so why are people talking as if that weren't the case?

They have also said lots about initially pinning some current GCSE boundaries to reformed GCSE boundaries e.g. D\C to 3\4 and their expectations around the proportions hitting them.

If necessary they'll obviously fiddle for England to ensure one cohort doesn't take a serious dive compared to their predecessors and successors. Surely the central issue here is starting that first one off in the best place possible to minimise the amount of fiddling they have to do around comparable outcomes in future?