PE GCSE

[DangerousMouse]

My daughter is in year 7, so they are starting to think about the options they have to pick next year. DD wants to do PE, she is very sporty - swims competitively and trains 6 times a week, is on the school netball team, attends handball practice after school and is grade 10 (a teaching grade) in artistic roller skating.
In October she had a knee injury and she couldn't do PE for 3 months or so, In Januarys parents evening, we were told that theres no way she can GCSE PE as her grade is too low - I questioned this at the time as she had only had 1 months lessons before being signed off, the low grade wasn't to do with her attendance, it was purely ability.
Now she is back at PE she says the teacher keeps giving her low grades in assessments, apparently she graded her this week without even going over to watch her play!
I do think she is good enough to take it for GCSE, she really wants to as she wants to do her Swimming Teachers course as soon as she is 16 and maybe study sports physio in the future. Does anyone know what I should do about this? Can I challenge the grades given or ask her to be assessed by a different teacher?

Sorry, just to check. She is in year 7, so 2 terms in to secondary and they are already thinking about GCSE options?

DD1 didn't choose until Feb of y9. At her school they do a pre-options for tech and performing arts, but that is only from y9 so not chosen until ~May y8.

(Sorry no help wrt to your actual question)

DC didn't make option choices until March Y9 but at no stage was it suggested that teachers dictated what you couldn't do outside the compulsory core subjects. Assuming your not in the very small group of pupils that wont even be able to get 5*Cs and need special treatment.

Are you sure this is solely about PE and nothing to do with number of subjects or grades in core subjects or timetabling issues etc? Could there be a miscommunication somewhere?

At our school the sporty kids do BTEC PE while the less sporty do GCSE PE instead. (I'm guessing that there's more theory in one than the other?)

This doesn't sound right to me. Assuming they are picking options in Year 8, she still has a whole year before making options choices. Most schools pick options in this term in either yr 8 or 9.

There is no way she can be classed as unable with all her sporting achievements and I don't believe a teacher could make that decision yet anyway. Either your daughter is misunderstanding something or there is a real problem with this teacher.

Dd chose options in about Feb of yr8, but I'm not getting why OP has to worry about this in March of yr7. At DC's schools, you are welcome to do PE as long as you put the effort in. Not about grades, just about attitude. They want kids who turn up no matter what the weather, always game, etc.

Just to make it clear, GCSE PE is not so much about how good you are at one or two particular sports, this is only a small element of it. It is about leadership and a huge element of it is about science related matters.

Those who score well at PE are not forcibly those who are best. She might be great at the skills of handball, but if she is not good at being a team mate for instance, she will not score well.

My DD is not great at sports even though she loves it, however, she was asked if she wanted to do PE at GCSE as an additional subject. I laught when it was suggested, but when it was explained what it was about, it made sense as she is a natural leader and is top of her class in science. She has just been assessed for fitness, netball and basketball and seems to have done well even though she doesn't practice any of these three sports.

GCSE PE is a lot of biology type stuff, physiology ('sports science') and so on. There's a lot of written work. I used to cover the lessons sometimes and its not ideal for children who are good at sport but less good at science.

Some schools start KS4 at the end of Y8 (like my DC's), so she will need to think about her options after Christmas/Easter next year.
The nonsense about her getting low grades in her physical assessments is worrying - surely it is obvious that she is sporty and has good skills given all the sports she does. Do the teachers know what they are doing?!

The GCSE my DS is doing is 60% practical (ie sports - each one to a mark out of 10) - if she is naturally good at sport (which it sounds like she is and she does team sports so I would guess is a team player) then getting 10's for that shouldn't be too tricky. There is 40% theory. The theory is fairly challenging, but not too difficult for most students if they knuckle down and focus/revise. Yes DS, I'm looking at you

And I know from friends that schools try all sorts of sports for students who are not particularly sporty, like rock-climbing, till they find one that they can get decent marks on. It sounds like your DD won't need to worry about that, if the teacher is grading her wrongly ATM.

The PE teacher said it to me at parents evening.. Its crazy they have to think about options in year 7, they chose them in mid year 8 to start at the beginning of year 9, but the teachers are already talking about it and getting the kids to think about it.

I think I may have to fight of ruer to be able to do GCSE PE, but I will as she more than able and really wants to take it.
She knows it is the mechanical side of PE, thats what she is most excited about learning and she is able in that area too (she's in top set for every subject)
I don't hunk her PE teacher does know what she's doing, my DD says she is very negative towards her, I think she may have taken a dislike.. Hopefully she'll get a new teacher in September.

wow bad auto corrects going on there!

I think they're being unfair to your dd.

What a shame she has a negative teacher. Glad she's not letting them put her off.

There's no way one teacher will have enough say to disallow her taking the subject. Leave it for now and if there's an issue when the time comes, they won't have a leg to stand on. She's academically able and good at sport...there's nothing a negative teacher can do to get past those facts.

Thank you, thats really reassuring. I'm gonna let it go for now, encourage her to do her best and see how the land lies when the time comes.