Parents of Year 11DC support thread. The final term.

[OhYouBadBadKitten]

Eep.

Dreams I am sorry your DD is upset. I can never figure why girls find it necessary to post pictures of themselves on Facebook. I know they are looking for validation, and it's to do with self esteem etc, but they make themselves vulnerable to criticism too. They don't see it do they? Thankfully DD finds it odd too. I would maybe be trying to find ways of showing her how fab she is that doesn't involve her appearance/looks?

Oh dear MrsGuy at the drunk thing. It's going to happen though at some point to us all. At least he's cracked on with his revision now!

DS has been revising. He did a physics past paper and was pissed to mark it and get a B, dropping marks overall rather than screwing one subject. So he's back upstairs revising the subject.

He hasn't looked at English yet, I've reminded him about Youtube.

Hope you guys are ok Exit, take care.

We had an email from Tassomai saying that they're concerned that DS1 is working too hard! Because of the amount of content in the CIE iGCSE science courses, they usually recommend 6-8 months to complete them and DS1 is attempting it in less than 6 weeks. I think that maintaining this pace will be tough when he goes back to school, so I've emailed the school to ask permission for him to do Tassomai in the free periods he has timetabled for learning support & independent study. I don't want him to feel overwhelmed.

My son is also doing CIE igcse. How much is your dc doing Second?

oh how funny TheSecond - thats a pretty rare email for any parent to recieve!

228a he is doing about an hour a day on each science.
Mostly Tassomai plus he is going through a revision guide and doing a few practice exam questions. Because the syllabus has recently changed and 2016 will be the first year the new syllabus is examined, there is only a set of sample papers available, but he has also been practising some questions from the old past papers, which are still available on the CIE website.
I think the course has too much content and I wish he were doing AQA GCSE.

I think ShanghaiDiva also has a child doing the CIE iGCSE sciences. They are meant to be O-level style courses for international students, but a few British schools are using them too.

I think my son is doing an hour for all three sciences together.

I think my son is doing an hour for all three sciences together.

That sounds more sensible. DS1 missed a lot of work in Y10 due to illness, so is learning some of the Biology & Chemistry for the first time. He isn't doing Physics, so at least he only has 2 sciences to catch up on.

About 15 mins a day for physics! 6-8 months - that'll be interesting, Ds is doing edexcel igcse

Yes, my son is taking cie igcse Biology, Chemistry and Physics. Biology has such a huge volume of work and also a lot of changes to the syllabus for 2016 :(
He is using xtremepapers to download past papers, but no good for the new material.
For the chemistry course the teacher has been testing them throughout the 2 years (15 past papers for homework in the Xmas holiday) so he knows the material well. All the lessons at school are spent on revision and more past papers for homework.

I understand your dds reluctance dream. It's so unfortunate that this incident wasn't dealt with more effectively at the time, but hope that it's the perpetrators who feel the most uncomfortable about the consequences when they arrive back at school. How does study leave work at boarding school?

Uniform is all washed and ready. Am a bit annoyed that final exam timetable still haven't been given to students. dd was also given a letter with her sixth form offer from current school to be returned tomorrow, so no chance to ask the school further questions, and there are aspects of the letter that are a bit unclear and dd has a different interpretation to us. Basically the school sixth form wants to be pupils first choice unless they have higher offers elsewhere where it can be a Reserve. Would they know what offers pupils have from other sixth forms? Do you think this is a bit dodgy or just a way of weeding out pupils and getting them to make their minds up if they would rather go elsewhere? Any thoughts would be appreciated.

From dds experience 6th forms don't seem to share offer information with other 6th forms but her schools 6th form does interrogate the students a bit to find out the exact detail of their plans.

One more term of uniform! yay :) Though I reckon dd will miss her blazer with zillions of handy pockets. She hasn't been told anything about study leave, an old student reckons it will start at half term, so about half way through the exams.

I am dreading this half term. It is only 23 days to the first exam. eep!!! hyperventilates Thats a bit of a shock! wish I hadnt thought about that.

DS2 starts back on Tuesday, which reminds me that I need to get a new pair of trousers for him before then. Come Tuesday 5 weeks exactly until the first exam . For any iGCSEs even sooner, I'm presuming that's where your 23 days comes from kitten.

Study leaves starts part way through the second full week of exams, so just ahead of the half term week.

From uniform to suits for 6th form here,. On the bright side that's a day out at Meadowhall to look forward to.

DS1 happened to check the online learning portal thingy this afternoon and noticed that he was set two Maths papers to do over the holidays, both due in tomorrow.

oh - oops TheSecond! busy evening for him?

yes boys3 - waaahhhh.

Catslife Are school actually doing sixth form offers through UCAS? I understood that you could hold as many sixth form offers as you liked and not make your mind up until the day you enrol. I imagine it makes planning the numbers a nightmare but that's not your problem is it? She can tell them all that they are her first choice and then make her mind up later. If she feels bad about doing that all she has to say is that she changed her mind along the way.

I will not miss the weekly white shirt wash at all.

We are being pushed to accept an offer. I too presumed you just accept them all at this stage.

I should say "state" somewhere in there, obviously if you're paying for sixth form then you will enter into a contract at some point.

knitting - that's my understanding too, that you can hold more than one offer via UCAS. DS is in a tricky position of having been offered the subjects he wants from his second choice college, but only offered single maths (as yet) from his first choice. They have both assured us that he can hold both offers until enrollment (ie after GCSE results are out) and at that point he will attend the first choice college enrollment but come away without enrolling if they still won't offer him the subjects he wants. Second choice college seem to think this is OK as long as he doesn't end up enrolled at both!

Icouldbeknitting I understood that you could hold as many sixth form offers as you liked and not make your mind up until the day you enrol.
That was our understanding too and it's a state school sixth form. It's very oversubscribed but that's not our problem!
dd has decided to be honest and tell them that they are her Reserve choice - I hope that isn't a problem.