Parents of Year 11's - in the midst of exams!

[OhYouBadBadKitten]

roll up roll up, for our new support thread for all parents of year 11 kids. Whether your kids work hard or not, what ever their goals (or not!) this is our place to de-stress :)

Our school gave us a list of the exam costs and dd has asked if she has to go tomorrow because this one doesn't cost much my reply yes you bloody well do lol

It's a bit disgraceful,to,have in an exam paper about underage drinkers!

Nobody in this house drinks, but DS knew what an alcopop is not least because he reads the paper and watches the news and knows about the problems with teenage drinking (we see them every weekend when drunk students roll down our road of an evening on the way back to their digs are drinking their heads off on campus).

Kids these days don't seem to watch the news much though, or read papers... DD2 was amazed that nobody else in her class was aware of the PUerto Rican default crisis a week or so ago...mind you she is also amazed that none f them watch the walking dead so I think she is just amazed a lot of the time, really. I suspect I may be bringing up my kids wrong. :(

DS has been allegedly revising chemistry most of the evening. But I suspect he might have been watching community a bit, too. At least it makes him happy so should distress him. Little or no revision action from Dd1. DD2 has her final KS3 maths assessment tomorrow and certainly hasn't revised for that at all (she was at play rehearsals all evening).

Even though DDs biology paper wasn't too bad DD is worried for chemistry tomorrow Incase they get a bad paper with what happened with aqa biology even though she's igcse

Oh dear Exit. Hope everything is ok.

Chemistry tomorrow here. DS has been working hard tonight as he wants to do well. Looks like he's been studying the examiner's reports-maybe he's trying to get his head round what they are looking for after the Biology exam.

Good luck everyone for tomorrow's exams.

CIE Chemistry for DS today.
Good luck to everyone with exams today - onwards and upwards!

Chemistry & Law today.
WithLaw done it's a huge revision topic down and same with French. Pressure easing off already,not that she sees it that way. Am intrigued to the chemistry paper today. Dd1 is pretty much all AQA so could be an interesting exam season.

"Kids these days don't seem to watch the news much though, or read papers"

DD doesn't. She has struggled with Citizenship because she is totally unaware of what is happening in the world around her. She doesn't watch the news because it is boring, and never looks at the local paper that I buy every week. We don't discuss current affairs very often at the dinner table either.

And, to be honest, I didn't know about the Puerto Rican default crisis either

Dd doesn't really watch TV full stop. She lives in a bubble of revision, her horse and dogs and reading. She's going to state 6th form in September partly because she is aware she needs to broaden her horizons!!

OH's DS due to go in to chemistry shortly. His DS has ASD and finds attendance at exams and lessons very difficult and overwhelming. It's all gone very quiet from their end so I am worried.

My own DS has year 12 exams including that bloody awful maths one yesterday, and I am also losing that mystical plot.

Oh happy day.

Good luck everyone. sneaky for us plot losers.

That aqa biology has really knocked my confidence, never mind dds. still, I'm going to be able to eat to my hearts content when we go on holiday to make up for now, despite cooked breakfasts.

We are r4 listeners over breakfast, so we get our news shot in early in the day. Sometimes it leads to conversations that none of us are ready for at that time of the morning, but mostly we just let it wash over us with glazed expressions.

slgsue - nice try!!!

I hope that both lads are doing ok today Liney.

Hello, so glad to find you lot, sorry I'm late. We've been through the AQA Biology debacle (DD will be doing it for A level, but didnt get to the last question, worth 9/60 points, because she was thrown by the odd question topics) twitter cheered DD up, Hitler cheered me up (never thought I'd ever type that). Latin wasn't as easy as she'd hoped either.

Chemistry this morning.

Welcome Peace! Chemistry starts in 10 minutes. I reallyreallyreally hope it is better than biology.

Thanks, Kitten, I'm ever hopeful!

Hello, Peace. I know what you mean about the Hitler meme. The C1 maths one was pretty funny but it does feel a bit wrong to be laughing at it.

Anyway, yes, chemistry today and then a bit of the old C2H6O for us I suspect.

Chemistry will hopefully feel like a lovely anti climax after the Twitter and hitler storm that was biology! Fingers crossed for them all today. DD was so relaxed today she said she might go to athletics tonight despite having Spanish tomorrow!

I came across a pile of C1 past papers this morning while looking for the missing yellow MFL folder which had somehow turned itself red and had therefore become invisible to the teen eye. I waited until he'd left for the school bus and put them in the recycling. It's made no difference to the huge heap that cascades out of the box it's supposed to live in but it's a step in the right direction.

As far as DS and I were concerned a C in biology would have been acceptable. I'm hoping the grade boundaries will be lower as a result of people getting thrown by this paper, and that will hopefully work in DSs favour since he wasn't thrown so he will likely have performed as he usually does in biology which is sort of low B-ish standard. He's sitting in an A for his ISA so if he manages to get Bs in paper 1 and 2 and sort of scrape a C in paper 3 (it's not that he finds that stuff harder, it's that it's straight after paper 2 and he will struggle in it because of his SpLDs) then he should be fine for a C or even a B. Fingers crossed. Chemistry though, that's more of a worry. He has the potential to get an A or so we are told. His writing style (minimalist) is less of an issue apparently. But he can vary wildly from one question or one past paper to the next so he has had As and Cs in tests. Unrelated to how much effort he put into preparation or, even, the perceived or actual difficulty of the questions or even the topic. It seems to come down to some days he has a good day some days...not. (There seems to be a confidence thing going on - he doesn't accept he is decent at chemistry so if something outs him off his stride ... He doesn't have this problem in physics because he expects to be getting most of it right and doesn't care about the bits he is more challenged by because he knows he has enough of it sorted that he will get what he is aiming for anyway. He is always aiming for a B. Even though in physics he often gets As and As in physics, in his mind he is a B student and if he gets a B all is well with the world - and actually, it will be cos that's his offer for college).

Feeling really nervous about chemistry. Nearly time for them to turn over the paper!

My work here is done - out of bed on time, sausage sandwich, water bottle, check ink level on pens, find missing folder whilst biting tongue, smile and wave off to the bus, double espresso, wipe off the day on the chalkboard, throw past core chemistry papers.

Tomorrow is a non-exam day for us so I can drop the cooked breakfast and the forced calmness and go back to what passes for normal around here.

Chemistry is 9 - 10 isn't it?

I had 8:45 on my list but that might be the time the school wants the kids to rock up. Or it might be the time I wrote down on the family calendar which is on DSs phone to give him time to get his arise in gear. He was in school before 8 anyway. I did not check his pens. He growls at me when I try to do stuff like that.

Chemistry (also AQA!) and Citizenship today - only one tomorrow afternoon, Latin. She's tired and I'm not looking forward to next week when there's one every morning and some in the afternoons - at least we've then got half term for relaxing.

Tired here too and a big week next week with all of DDs least favourite subjects. This is hell! Not sure what I was expecting really...