Advice from Maths Teachers please?

[SallyMcgally]

DS is in Year 9, but left school in January to be home-schooled due to severe ongoing bullying. His grades had dropped in most subjects, and were really pretty poor in Maths and Science especially - he was 4b in Maths when he left. After working in a quiet environment and blitzing Maths he has pulled his level up to high 6/ low 7. I'd like to enter him for the Maths GCSE a year early, so he doesn't get caught up in the new GCSE Maths mess. I'm fairly confident now that he'll manage the Foundation paper - we've practised loads of papers and he's doing better and better. Should we settle for that, or does his progress in the last six months suggest that it might be worth trying a Higher level? Many thanks for any advice you can give.

I am not a teacher so this from a parent's point of view.

My DS got a C (could have done a lot better if he has put a ounce of effort into it) and is now finding that some unis are out of the question as they require Bs at GCSEs.

Forgot to say well done to your son for getting the grade up

Thanks gaslight - that's useful to know. Hope it works out ok for your OP.

Obviously I mean your DS! Sorry.

Many schools are moving away from doing GCSEs early as universities are interested in the best 8 to 10 taken all at the same time.
This is something worth bearing in mind.

Yes it is. Thanks lone at.

You've got a year. What sort of grades is he getting on the foundation papers? I think in a year with 1-1 tutoring it should be certainly possible to go to a B from a low level 7.

I think it would be worth trying for higher. If you stick with Foundation his grade will be capped at a C, but if you try higher, he can still get a C but not be limited to it. We would always aim for higher tier with C grade kids, then drop to foundation tier if it wasn't working when they sat their mocks.

I think it's probably wise to avoid the new GCSE if you can if you are homeschooling. It's hard enough to find out what's going on and access resources as a maths teacher in a secondary school. He could always sit the new GCSE in Y11 as well if he wanted to. The government is discouraging early entry by only allowing first entries to count in the league tables, but that wouldn't affect you.

Thanks noble. He's getting C3 on his Foundation papers according to his teacher. I think the last one was 73%.

Yes, with a year to go it's definitely worth pushing for a higher grade!

Great! Many thanks for your help.