Starting Y11 support thread

[AtiaoftheJulii]

(Yeah, I'm procrastinating ....)

For all those with one or two (or more?) offspring going into year 11: controlled assessments, coursework, practicals, performances, GCSE revision (or not ...), being guinea pigs for the Maths and English 1to9 exams, choosing what to do next - schools/sixth form colleges/college/apprenticeships/BTECs/A levels and more - and generally being 15!

It's a tough year academically - in some ways harder than sixth form I think because there are just so many subjects and exams - and a tough year emotionally - not always mature enough to organise themselves, too old to have organisation imposed upon them!

Ds still has an MFL CA, a couple of science practical CAs, and two assessed drama performances, plus coursework to do for History I think. I can't see there's going to be much let up and he's definitely feeling the pressure I think he'll probably end up staying at his school for 6th form (he's very mathsy and his school is a good fit) but we may well look at a couple of sixth form colleges as he's already talking about whether he can go somewhere that won't feel quite so pushy.

ds sixth form recommend three A Levels for most students and four for the very high achievers.

Open eve was a good talk & info pack but to be honest I really didn't know what questions to ask as we walked round, & neither did Ds. He is thinking English, history & either geography or business studies. He can take 3 or 4 with an epq? Or other alternative, apologies for my ignorance, last night was the first Ive Come across these terms & I don't have the leaflet on me.
He has to submit choices by Feb & I have no idea wether his choices are useful beyond him favouring them. We have a parents eve coming up but if anybody can point me towards finding more out or offer any help I'd appreciate it.

Aargh. Dd was told yesterday that neither of her AS choices had enough interest to run , nor her back up.

Lots of pupils start EPQs and then drop them. It's a lot of work for an extra qualification that most unis won't count as a proper A Level. Obv depends on how interested you are in the topic.

Thanks decorate.
It seems his options, if I understand correctly, are
3 A+ EPQ
3 A + AQ
4 A levels.
I understand from you people that the 4A option is for further maths only, although I don't see this anywhere on my info.
Interesting how the school were selling the EPQ & AQ & yet they aren't recognised. The last thing I need is to be encouraging him to do extra work unnecessarily! Good to have the advice of people that have already been through the process.

Hi - can anyone point me in the direction of a good example of a revision timetable online?

DS has one put together with school etc and they are very supportive, but I would like to be able to,show him an alternative. He just doesn't seem to have found his way yet.

How much revision are your kids doing on a daily basis on top of other homework?

Well we've had a last minute, out of the blue decision to move school for sixth form. Dd came home and asked if X school has a sixth form. We looked in their website to see what a levels they offer and sixth form evening was starting in an hour. So we shot off, both really liked the school.

Definetly 3 a levels only apart from exceptional circumstances, this is a really academic school.

So application form has gone in today.

jungfrau. Get revising.co.uk is meant to be very good. You put your subjects and exam boards in and can say what subjects you want to concentrate on and what times you can't revise.

Dd isn't doing any revising.

The EPQ is recognised - it's an AS level.

Its merits towards uni offers are debatable and it can be a lot of work, but it is recognised.

It's (almost) compulsory at ds's school along with 3 A levels.

Well, 6th form evening was good. DS has to choose 4 A levels (form in by dec 9th) then he drops one after a year, so will end up with 3 A levels and an AS level (if he works.....)

It seems a LOT of work to me. I just don't understand why they just can't do 3 A levels for 2 years. Like me, in the olden days

Anyway, he thinks he wants to do PE, Business Studies, Biology and Psychology. Dropped the idea of History when he found out a lot of it was about Russia

What a nightmare LIZS, I'm worried we might face a similar issue on DDs 1st choice - though they did start running it with just 2 students this year and have gained 3 students who've transferred from another local school as their original school dropped it because of low numbers.

Thanks Ralph, seems your info is correct having looked further into it today. Glad he won't be wasting his time!

No, I'm sure he won't. Ds's school say it develops skills which the universities acknowledge as being very helpful for their undergraduate studies, and sometimes an excellent grade at EPQ has garnered a lower than usual uni offer.

It also strikes me as useful for students who wish they could pick a particular fourth subject and can't - they could do independent research instead.

Thanks for that Pikachu.

Yes very frustrating , error. Dd is pretty down and wondering whether to look elsewhere. Tbh the school did such a half hearted pitch at the information evening for AS courses and the current year 12s are Guinea pigs for the format, I'm hardly surprised at low take up. Dd has said she'll go back to the teacher on Monday and ask what is proposed to run. Several A2s ran with 2 or 3 last year. This was only supposed to be a provisional indication so it seems premature to eliminate at least options already but I assume it means staff will be asked not to research and write the course in the meantime.

Oh no LIZ - what will she do? Picking all new subjects involves a lot of compromising. Would she go elsewhere to be able to do the subjects she wants?

Ds didn't go to school yesterday He overslept and then got upset about being late. He's been doing really well lately though, got through last week's four controlled assessments ok, so I'm trying to stay fairly positive about it. He's also got himself a job, but he controls when he works, so it should work out quite well.

Tbh I don't know. Her 3 A choices are apparently ok but the AS were actually exciting her. She claims to have mentioned it and had fairly relaxed responses from other teachers but not confident she stated the issue clearly, if she did. It is disheartening for her, earlier this term they are telling her to consider Oxbridge, her mid term report was really good then this. It isn't the end of the world but she was very despondent.

Ah right, I'd misread I think. So her school are saying 3 A level subjects to carry through and then pick one AS to do for a year?

I'm getting a bit frustrated with ds's school not having their sixth form open evening until 1 Dec - I want to know what their plan is now for A levels! The 6th form college he's applied just say you can do 3 or 4, it's all very laidback there ... He's got an interview there at the end of this month so I guess he might get more information there.

(Deleted a paragraph!)

I hope she can pick something else she's happy with, if she has to do an AS. Does she have a list of options to choose from?

Yes that's right. She had 3 potential AS subjects , had narrowed it down to 2 either of which would have gone nicely with her A choices and potential uni and career options, after the info evening, but now apparently none of the 3 will go ahead. She didn't want to move at this stage and has now missed the information evenings elsewhere.

All schools seem to be different. At DDs' school, everyone has to do 4 A levels - they have to sign a contract?? It's good for DD1, as currently she can't get her choice below 7 subjects. She has no idea what to do at uni, and loves both sciences and languages equally.

She's made a provisional choice of Physics, Chemistry, Maths and German, but that changes on a daily basis.

Sorry to hear that Liz - that sounds like a nightmare. Would DD consider moving school? (Sorry haven't read whole thread)

Sorry I stupidly didn't read your last post. How can they refuse 3 choices??

She doesn't really want to move. After 4 years she has found a niche and the main local coed competitor took many DC from her old school she didn't really get along with, so we'd suddenly be looking further afield and possibly end up no better off. Hopefully on Monday she can find out more of what is on offer. I suspect the only possible AS available would be psychology which, although a popular subject , the school's track record in it isn't great.

I guess because these AS courses are new and there is work involved to set them up they were aiming for a minimum number of students to commit to them in advance. Dd spent ages thinking this through, researching what would be good for her, others just returned the form the same day without a second thought. It could all change again when the next snapshot is taken after GCSE mocks in January but parents evening isn't until after half term. It is difficult to know how hard to push without losing goodwill of the staff involved. We had a bit if a todo over GCSE options and in the end conformed. At least her A levels seem OK.

readyforsunshine what I meant was that if a uni offer is for, say 3 As, the EPQ won't count as one of them. I'm not against doing it for the love of it, it's just that it's a lot of work. My dd did talk about hers extensively at one of her interviews though, so useful from that pov