starting KS4 in year 9 - pros and cons?

[MrsCreosote]

Can any secondary school parents/teachers give their opinions please about extended Key stage 4 i.e. choosing options in year 8 and working on them over 3 years (9-11)?
They do this at one of the secondary schools we are considering but I am concerned that my daughter might get bored working on her subjects for 3 years and also that its quite early for them to choose their options early in year 8. I think the reason they do it - presumably- is to increase the chance of good GCSE results across the school.
Any insights or opinions very welcome
TIA

Do they sit any GCSEs early? (A bad idea).

Our schools do this & I don't find it a net bad thing (have read threads on MN for many yrs why folk think it's bad, and am not at all swayed). I like the way it eases DC into the exam mindset with some real exams as early as end of yr9.

My only caveat is I would prefer math especially to be decided end of yr11, I think math is the only special case.

It's more like the education system I grew up with; i profoundly loathe the traditional English system where your entire future came down to the test results in just a few short weeks in yr11.

Just my tuppence.

Our schools do this & I don't find it a net bad thing (have read threads on MN for many yrs why folk think it's bad, and am not at all swayed

However the data is undeniable. Children who are entered early for GCSE do worse than if they were entered at the appropriate time.

This is common at grammar schools. They don't do the GCSEs early though. They extend what they study and spend an extra year on it.

The early options thing would be a disadvantage for me. Not just that making decisions in year 8 seems very early/young, but also that they're narrowing their education down by dropping subjects even sooner than necessary.

DS2 is in a year group where they are doing this for the first time.

Big con for the current Y9: in many subjects, the GCSE curriculum for examination in 2018 has not yet been finalised, so the teachers don't yet know what to teach.

It means you get to drop subjects you don't like a year early. So for children who really hate certain subjects it's a good thing.

But it also means everyone else gets to drop subjects they don't like a year early - which solves some behaviour problems.

In reality you don't have many choices for GCSEs. So choosing them a year early isn't hard.

They also don't necessarily start the syllabus a year early. They might still be studying KS3 history or whatever. But because they're only studying GCSE subjects they have more hours per week.

That's true, WildStallions - I guess it's good for children who dislike certain subjects, but less good for those who eg enjoy art and textiles / food tech / drama / history / geography / french but can only choose one or at most two out of them to continue to GCSE.

I wonder if it's a more common thing in grammar schools because the pupils study more GCSEs, hence have a larger number of option blocks? In DD's school they have two options and that's it. So if you want to take a language and a humanity, that's it - no space for a creative subject (it may increase from dd's yr onwards to three if triple science is taught in the same time as double).

Dd has just started year 7 and I have started getting her in a gentle way to start thinking about this. She thinks that she will be making her choices at the end of year 9. She's in a private school so this may change as it has recently been bought out by a consortium who are definitely exam led. I actually think it's a good idea as dc have a chance of learning something in depth without the rush to the finish line iyswim. I was however unaware that doing the course over three years yields worse results. Which has made me pause for thought. Has anyone got a link to the data which shows this

Doing the course over 3 years doesn't give poorer results, what gives worse results is schools that start GCSEs in Y9, then sit some at the end of Y9/10 instead of Y11. They may pick up new subjects in Y10 and schools then bang on about how many extra GCSEs are studied, ignoring the lower grades.

My ds2 is in yr nine and started hos gcse options, I thought he was very young to be choosing to drop subjects, he was 12! But they will not be taking exams early. It's early days in yr nine so far but it seems to be going Ok. Ds2 has asc and being able to drop some subjects is probably beneficial for him, he is more motivated as he is mainly doing subjects he enjoys.

Tbh it's all new anyway as they are going to be the first year to take the new gcse in all subjects, we just got his half termly report thing which shows expected grade, etc as well as giving them a score for behaviour and attitude for learning...

I wouldn't be happy if he was taking exams early, he is summer born and with his asc already at a disadvantage and there is no benefit to taking gcses early.

Local parents mention many benefits (in their minds) to taking a few GCSEs early. They tell me that they think it takes the mystique out & much pressure off. They say this is marvellous compared to the system they went thru (O-levels all-or-nothing end of yr11, I guess).

Thing is, what her local schools are doing now (OP has a kid in yr6, so is touring schools?) may totally change in 2-4 yrs time, depending what measurement stick schools are being held up against. I gather that Progress 8 means that schools are likely to go for fewer good grades rather than may almost-as-good grades in future. So it Progress8 means pressure to go back to the ALL OR NOTHING system in May-June of yr11.

DS's school is more traditional, they chose at end of yr9 with almost all exams at end of yr11. It meant that his subject range dramatically narrowed compared to DD, who will complete 12 subjects in yrs9-11.

Pros are that they tend to be doing subjects they like (or at least have dropped the ones they don't) for an additional year, so there is more curriculum time devoted to the examined subjects.

Cons are they are still quite young to choose sometimes (although there is less of a choice really nowadays anyway) and of course the curriculum is narrowed earlier.

You're right about why they do it, to get better results.

I personally think a big issue is that now in year 8 is very early to choose. In the school where I teach, expressive arts are done on a rotation, so at this stage of year 8 a student might have done just a term of music or art or drama - not subjects covered in detail maybe at primary. How can they seriously choose? Tech might be a similar situation - DS2 is in yr 8 and has only done textiles, for example,, for a term last year.

I think we specialise too early in this country (and I speak as someone who specialised very early and thoroughly in my school career). This just makes it even worse.

More & more schools are doing this. Partly in response to the new harder GCSE's. Ds2's grammar does it & our first choice school for ds3 does it. Neither take exams early.

It's working well for ds2 (currently in year 9) - he's much more focussed now he's been able to drop the subjects he doesn't like. He did say the teachers don't actually know what they're meant to be teaching yet :rolls eyes: - but he's in the first cohort of all new GCSE's.

Oh ds2's school allows free choice - so he is doing music and drama - I know not many schools allow that. It would have been more of a problem if he'd had restricted choices.

I suspect it will soon become the norm though - to give the extra time needed for the new GCSE's.

we started it in my subject ( to take exam in year ten) last year - was a huge success.
Before that we tootled through the course over three years - same results

( this is a compulsory subject though)

Not sure why a grammar school would do this- but I'm not a fan of doing loads of GCSEs. I would have thought broadening the education in years 8 and 9 would be better for high attaining children rather than narrowing it, surely?

At ds's secondary modern they have chosen options early for a while- one of the big difficulties low and middle attainers have is not so much the actual content they have to learn for exams, but the technique, interpretation and language skills required. For example, our history results are below where they should be because kids tend to see key words in the question and just "download" everything they know about it. So they can have excellent subject knowledge but still have crap results. The extra year has made a significant difference to the achievement particularly of our low attainers.

He did say the teachers don't actually know what they're meant to be teaching yet :rolls eyes: - but he's in the first cohort of all new GCSE's.. He's right. The specs have not been confirmed yet. Teachers are having to go by the drafts.

Grammar schools have the same reason as every other school to have a 3 year course: it will be harder to get the highest grades, by which the school, the pupils and the teachers are measured, so they will need more time to get there. There is also nothing stopping them teaching above GCSE requirements.

I agree with Bertrand, it probably depends on your dc whether it will be of benefit or not. I've got a dd with broad interests who could happily go down a scienc-y route, languages/humanities or tech/practical stuff. The only subject she'd like to give up is Welsh which is core so she'll have to do two GCSEs in it regardless

I work with DCs across a range of local secondaries - one of which has a three-year KS4 model.
A lot of those DCs seem to change their options at the end of yr 9, having changed their minds about subjects, which seems to defeat the object, really?

Oh iguana - the eye roll was aimed at the government, not the teachers!

In terms of why a grammar would do this - presumably to up the results. It's a change that seems to have started with the local grammars & is now extending to the other schools. When it was announced the HT made a point of saying another nearby grammar was doing it. They've also decreased the number of GCSE's taken for ds2's year from 11 to 10 (although some maths whizz kids may take further maths as well I assume) - they said this was due to the increased demands of the new exams.