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Secondary education

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Original poster

Year 11 support thread

999 replies

pasanda · 10/02/2017 09:37

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 Shock

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!!

OP posts:
Cafeconleche · 20/05/2017 16:52

DS has AQA English Lit on Monday. Surrounded by Macbeth and Christmas Carol notes and quotes. Taking 15 minute breaks every now and then to perform violent acts on his PlayStation. There must be money to be made in someone coming up with video games of all the set texts - I swear my DS would ace his GCSEs. In the meantime Merrylegs, I don't know enough about the iGCSE content, but am amazed there's no compulsory Shakespeare component - perhaps because they're 'international' and it's a language thing...? Good luck to everyone out there with a load of 'big' exams next week - our recycling bin is already filled with half a rain-forest's worth of biology 1 and chemistry 1 revision notes and past papers. Roll on half term

LIZS · 20/05/2017 18:10

CIE English Lit here on Monday - verse and prose.

Snowchaser · 20/05/2017 18:25

Same here LIZS and DS is only part way through a school cricket match! Not much revision today!

BertrandRussell · 20/05/2017 18:43

Ds has recently discovered Brian Eno, and very strange noises are now emerging from his room. I think he is sampling the cat.

Sprog19 · 20/05/2017 18:59

Practise questions on Merchant of Venice here this afternoon, followed by quote learning. Kitchen now plastered in quality of mercies and cut-throat dogs. Just about to settle down to the Al Pacino film with a plate of garlic dough balls. This beats Law revision hands down!

LittleHo · 20/05/2017 19:55

Listening to very depressing poetry quotes is not my favourite way to spend a weekend.

Original poster
pasanda · 20/05/2017 20:16

God I hate Shakespeare and poetry

I really feel sorry for them all!!!!

OP posts:
LIZS · 20/05/2017 20:27

Dd doesn't seem to think she needs to know quotes as they are extract questions Confused

LittleHo · 20/05/2017 20:54

Possibly a different exam board?

Sprog19 · 20/05/2017 20:58

For AQA DS says that quotes aren't absolutely necessary but you do have to relate the extract to the text as a whole which is when they might come in useful.

Snowchaser · 20/05/2017 20:59

LIZS if she is doing CIE IGCSE then they get given the poems and they have a choice of a whole book/ play essay or an extract essay. It sounds like she's decided to do the extract essay ahead of time. DS has decided he will do the extract on the prose on Monday but has a couple of whole text essays prepared for merchant of Venice on Friday - if they don't come up he will do the extract question then as well. Don't panic. I say this as I panic over the fact that DS is just back from his cricket match aghhhh!

LIZS · 20/05/2017 21:06

Thanks snowchaser. That seems to be the strategy. I don't remember getting this involved with ds' gcses, no idea how he approached it.

pointythings · 20/05/2017 22:15

Took DD out with us to the forest today - our club was running an archery taster session so lots of fresh air. She used it to support coaching archery. Also to mentally revise biology and physics. I am impressed with that much multitasking.

Piggywaspushed · 21/05/2017 07:08

Been reading this with interest as a stressed out parent and English teacher!!

I come home form school every day with DS1 recreating that painting : The Death Of Chatterton on his bed, complete with pre Raphaelite sighing.

Am I the only one who's got a DC whose insane English teacher has chosen Great Expectations!!?? He hates it , can't remember it (unless it's Miss Havisham) and the only quotations I can find online are about six lines long each. And he also has Macbeth, which could go either way... praying for Lady Macbeth.

And , by the way, not taking books home is par for the course these days. I had to force my year 11s to take their books home , to a chorus of whys? It's generally the school's fear of a sudden visit form Ofsted or work scrutiny... every other teacher in my department keeps books in school for occasional manic marking and feedback cycles, which are like Dante's circles of Hell.

I do have one tip for all your DCs for tomorrow : don't forget CONTEXT ! And SUBJECT TERMINOLOGY !!

BertrandRussell · 21/05/2017 09:22

Blimey- Great Expectations???? -she must be mad! I thought most teachers went for the shortest! I hope the people marking are gentler on the GE people. I just said "context and subject terminology" to ds and he said "well..durr....." which I am taking as an encouraging sign.Grin

Danglingmod · 21/05/2017 09:30

Ds's class has studied GE. Luckily, he had already read it several times and was familiar with it before year 10. But he is not normal...

I'm also hoping the examiners go easy...

Danglingmod · 21/05/2017 09:33

(Bertrand, before I recently nc'd, we'd exchanged a few reading recommendations between our dses. My ds has just finished Tom McCarthy 's Remainder and said it was fabulous and thought-provoking.)

Sprog19 · 21/05/2017 10:43

DS is doing Dr Jekyll which is much more manageable.

Laniakea · 21/05/2017 11:03

dd is really fed up :( next week will be the worst week for her and she's a complete extrovert & really struggling without the bustle of being with people all day. None of her friends are available for social stuff & she's just blue.

For Eng lit (edexcel) she's learning character, context, themes, symbols & quotes (she's got more for Macbeth than LOTF because she prefers it!). I think she's got two to support each theme & then a few multi-use ones. There seems to be a huge spread in the number they have learnt - their English teacher said about 15, one friend has pretty much memorised the book (!), another has only got 2 or 3. She's hoping to avoid any character questions. Will have to ask her about subject terminology!

She's also got physical geography tomorrow which shouldn't be a problem at all but with all the English & maths panic she hasn't done anything for a while, I don't even know if she's got around to learning her case studies yet.

Tuesday is off - will be spent on maths/physics & the second English lit - then she has physics on Wednesday, maths on Thursday & Eng lit poetry/Dr Jekyll on Friday.

Piggywaspushed · 21/05/2017 12:03

Dangling - that sounds positively abnormal!!

I am not sure my DS has even read it once. I think the English teacher thought it would be 'challenging' he isn't even all that bright

AtiaoftheJulii · 21/05/2017 14:03

My ds has hated War of the Worlds, I dread to think what he would have thought of Great Expectations! - that's a big ask for a new spec. Fortunately he really liked Never Let Me Go. The only work he's done this weekend is collating and learning quotes. Bloody tedious for them all.

Piggywaspushed · 21/05/2017 14:48

I have just spent an hour long route march through guilt in Macbeth with lots of head clutching and angst.

GE later... after some maths and at some point Geography.

Three are approximately 5 interesting pages in GE - so let's hope that's where the exam board go for their passage...

Redsrule · 21/05/2017 15:22

Just got home after 4 hours of revision at school. I teach two classes and did different texts with each, to alleviate my boredom, bad move!
For one class 14/18 turned up and the other 25/28. All worked really hard, enjoyed the silliness of the games, and every single one thanked me for coming in on a Sunday. The charm, ambition and work ethic of today's teenagers is constantly underestimated. Good luck to all your DC!

Danglingmod · 21/05/2017 15:32

Just asked Ds what questions he hoped might come up for both texts in tomorrow's exam. He replied that he never likes to anticipate anything, to be prepared for all eventualities and think on the spot. I must say it's the way I approached all my exams but does seem contrary to the way most students learn and most teachers teach these days.

GiraffeorOcelot · 21/05/2017 15:33

Very impressed with the Sunday session Redsrule. Ours have an 8am session tomorrow morning!

I really have little clue how much DS knows about his texts. Not enough I suspect but English is one subject we really can't help with as we both hated it and it was our weakest subject. Fingers crossed he has done enough to get through.

Today seems to have mostly been MrBruff on YouTube. Not sure that much geography has been done today but he has been doing very well in geography recently so hopefully that means he is ok.

He is going to play football soon which will hopefully tire him out a bit, he is still struggling to sleep.