Year 11 support thread

[pasanda]

I can't find a new thread, moving on from the old full one, so I thought I would create one (please tell me if I'm wrong!)

Last night ds stayed up till 4.30am doing his biology coursework

This time the tsunami affect didn't work and he left it far too late to do a reasonable job. Which is a bloody shame because he wants to do biology A level and he has done so well in his other controlled assessments.

I wait with bated breath to find out his mark

Oh well, thank God for half term!!

Thanks Tiggy I feel a bit better, DS was doing lots of work on themes yesterday so hopefully it will be ok.

minesawine from what i remember there was good stuff on Mc Beth online, get him to google his exam set up and put in Mc Beth.
also dd has done a mind map which she has found has helped.
There is information on you tube and again online.
good luck for him

Just typed a long message and lost it

DS's school doesn't have study leave so they are revising at school. For he past few weeks he has done 2-3hrs a night and 5hrs on one day at the weekend.

Tonight though he is shattered and looked as if he was about to collapse. He has slept since about 7pm. He's done about 15mins of tassomai but that is it. We didn't make him do more as we thought it could push him over, he is exhausted. I hope he manages to get back to the previous schedule though as that was really starting to pay off in terms of past papers.

He certainly hasn't read McBeth twice in full. We are relying on Brodie's notes 😳 well they got me through and I didn't even read it once

Macbeth not mcbeth!!

Ds has read his texts many times each and has watched versions of the two plays a LOT. He's read his 19th century text about 5 times (and its a biggie - Great Expectations) and listened to an unabridged audiobook maybe 5 times.

However, whilst he's theoretically very good at English, his exam technique can be erratic. He's taking lit for A level so we're hoping for at least a grade 6 (and hopefully a 7+).

That is where our DSs are totally different danglingmod. My DS hates English and just wants a 4 or 5 so that he never has to do it ever again.

Your DS is clearly enthusiastic and enjoys it. I think he will be unusual in having read all his texts so many times though.

I imagine most DC will be somewhere between our two extremes.

Hmmm. DD has read both texts once and not the Shakespeare, although she has seen it several times on stage and screen. She knows the all the themes, characters and that stuff really well though and has memorised a good handful of quotes for each. She scored very highly in mocks and is still revising (although baulked at listening to the audiobook of Lord of the Flies).
OntopoftheSunset - Latin Literature is our biggest worry too. There's so much of it.

Hello all. Good thread. :)

I was happy that DD had her maths and numeracy exams under her belt (with an A* and an A) and her english lit sorted too, (tears at 'just' getting a B but no chance of resitting or reviewing grade for some reason) but it seems that just allows the school to get them to do extra work - and exams!

Her first proper exam this week was Welsh. She said it went well, at least compared to her friend who answered some of the questions in French instead of Welsh!

WOW exam tomorrow - World of Work. Why? Why do they need an exam in that? Covering the practical ideas of CVs etc, yes, but an exta exam when they are already stressed? I have no idea how many actual GCSE qualifications she's going to come out with the other side!

She also has had to take additional maths after getting her GCSE out of the way in Nov. She's not doing A level maths and would have been far less stressed without the extra work, but there you are. She wasn't allowed to drop it and has an extra exam to prepare for instead.

She's had a countdown of the number of days til each exam on a whiteboard in her room and is the most hard-working person I know! Fair play to her. Instead I have to plan destressing activities to make sure it doesn't become too much.

No study leave until after half term, and then they are still encouraged to go in as much as possible. And we are away on holiday in May - bad timing, but we always have our family holiday that week - so she will have to bring some revision with her for whatever few exams she has yet to do at that point.

first day of study leave here! DD has a plan for the next few days, I think she just wants them to start now though. She's still struggling to concentrate on stuff that bores her rigid.

School had a lovely leavers event yesterday - old teachers came back, lots of funny pictures & speeches, leavers hoodies, prizes and stuff - it was very emotional apparently.

Five days before exams start, the first week isn't too bad - french & biology on Tuesday then creative writing & chemistry later in the week. Week 2 is heavier - both Eng lits, maths non calculator, physics & geography - but except for the maths the heavy going ones are all after half term.

Most of the kids are bussed in (arriving between 8 & 8:30 for 9am exams) so their head of year is running a free breakfast service for anyone who is in early for the morning exams.

(dd has read her English texts a couple of times but is sticking to crib notes now. Think she's doing poetry atm - teacher said know four really really well (context, themes, quotes) and another 2-3 well (general themes & a couple of quotes))

I am absolutely petrified that she's going to forget to hand her phone in. They have a teacher on the door taking them as they go into the exam room & dd says they then have two "everyone check your pockets" reminders but I have nightmares that she'll bug it in a blazer pocket & completely forget about it. Someone did that last year apparently - I'd ban blazers!

Oh & she's lost her spare calculator so we're down to one without a solar back up (I ordered a spare through school but she bloody forgot to pick it up). Idiot.

'bung' it not 'bug' it

(she says I'm more stressed than her ... that might be true )

Good luck for those taking exams today! Ours don't start till next wed.

Macbeth I meant to say in my last post not mc Beth

Well, it all kicks off on Monday for us - loads of French and some Geography.

At least we don't have stupid amounts of homework like last week, just revision.

Last school day and Human Bio done!

DS declared French reading fine, was finished in 20 minutes and had 40 to check the paper and twiddle his thumbs. Let's hope it's not hubris! 4 GCSEs down....

The difficult stuff (for him) starts next week.

We're WJEC and they did maths in November, eng lit not far after that and 2 exams this week.

DD says she whizzed through World of work in 30 mins, checked her work thoroughly, then had to sit for nearly 50 mins because she'd finished.

She's just annoyed that she had to waste the 50 mins as, in her mind, she would normally have been in Welsh Bacc at that point and would have been able to revise other subjects as Welsh Bacc was completed a few weeks ago.

RE on Monday. Then another exam on Thurs for DD. No study leave - yet.

One is Drama so that's a bit of a cheat as there was no written exam, just 60% controlled assessments and 40% practical which was last week. I don't actually know the board for that as it's listed on the exam timetable! The English Language and the two MFL were CIE IGCSE.

Here we go again.

It has been a long time climbing to the top of the roller coaster and the ride is about to begin.

My dd is revising in and out at home. Luckily her revision planner is pretty good. First exams is RE and then English so she's focusing on MacBeth and mind maps ( seems to really help her) we don't have a major concern at the moment. She seems to be doing well organizing her self

Just found this thread!
DS completed history yesterday (iGCSE) so that's one down!
He's half way through Spanish - again iGCSE.
I think most of these early ones are iGCSE.

He will be all finished on 16th June - countdown!

On Tuesday, DD has French and Biology.

DD doesn't like French and says she's not revising for it. She's forecast to get a B, but her coursework is around an A, so I suspect the teacher knows she's not going to put much into it!

However, she desperately wants an A* in biology and today has done three test papers and is trying to learn from her mistakes/where she could improve.

The aim is to fit in some English today as well.

We have the problem here that she hardly revised for her Year 10 and mock exams and she got the grades she hoped for. Up to this point, I feel she could have done more revision, but in the last few days has got her act together.

ifonly4 dd is the same - biology & French on Tuesday. She hates French, is predicted an A but I think she'll get a B - it hasn't been high on her agenda :/ , predicted & wants an A* for biology - it is one of her A levels so she's taking it quite seriously.

She's been doing Eng lit/maths/geog/physics & a bit of French for the last couple of days but tomorrow & Monday will just be French & biology (& some maths), she's got chemistry later in the week which again is an A level choice & she wants an A* but it is the weakest science for her ... she's fretting about it a bit.

Thanks fully we are only RE next week so it breaks her in slowly.
Revising mac beth again today lol
I want her to go over science too but she seems to be only focusing on English. But I'm leaving her to it saying the odd comment here and there.