GCSEs 2018 (2)

[Stickerrocks]

Pre-empting our 1000th post.

Sorry, I wasn't clear - AQA will choose a poem to publish but you don't know which one! So it could be any of the ones in the anthology and you have to be able to think of a suitable comparison poem and know suitable quotations.

I see.

Just wanted to wish you all a happy new year and very best wishes to the dcs who have mocks coming up!
It looks as though art coursework will actually be ready to hand in at beginning of term!

May 2018 be a calm and focused year for all our DC. Seems only yesterday we were dropping them off at the Reception classroom!

Ah kings indeed. Happy New Year everyone and may it bring calm during exams.

Taking DS by the have for his first day at school does seem like just yesterday. I don't know where the time had gone. We've spent a couple of hours today trying to persuade DS to work or which A levels he wants to do.
A calm and happy New year to you all too. Let's hope 2018 brings good things to all of you and our children.

Happy New Year to you all!!

Back to school for DS this week and then it will all start again!

Happy Nee year all.
Dd2!has done her 6th form application and started to put her head down to work. Still ignoring science but it’s an improvement.
Mocks in Feb

DS2 starts his mocks today. They go on for two and a half weeks, but he only has to go into school when he has an exam.

After 18 months of me asking, the school have finally agreed that he can use a word processor (he struggles to write legibly due to hypermobility in his hands and wrists but can touch type without difficulty) so he will be doing all of his mocks on a word processor. It is the first time he has done an exam in this format.

DD seems to think that her English Lit quotations will sink in by osmosis. She has a mock exam on Friday and is currently procrastinating by writing thank you letters. I will have to resort to throwing our Shakespeare quote coasters at her in the hope the words go in!

Stickerrocks I think DS1 is hoping to use the osmosis method for learning quotes for his A-level English Literature.

Thankfully DS2 (GCSE) is memorising his.

I started another thread here but then saw this one.

Anyone else have DC with dyslexia who seem to be making such slow progress with revision? I am really feeling quite stressed for DS, who I think is going to do really badly in his mocks, despite him 'trying' to revise...

Back to school tomorrow....ds is finally doing his 6th form application. I will look over his personal statement when I get home from work. Then off it goes!! Relieved that he has taken my advice and will opt for Geography as it's his best subject. He was supposed to reread Jekyll and Hyde over the hols; I will lend him my audible copy read by Richard E Grant!

Welcome Pebbles...how is your ds revising? Has school given him any advice?

DS had a good day back today, thinks he's done very well in geography and his reward is loads more geography revision! Not so sure at all about maths. That bloody art coursework is out of the way now, hurrah!

DD admitted proudly that she left J&H at school so she hasn't been able to revise for the exam on a Friday. Grrr!

Back to school today for my dgd and brown envelope day on the 12 th.. ( mock results)as if they don't have enough stress! Dgd thinks she did OK in all but worried about English as usual. Spent Xmas holidays sorting books and revision timetable now up on whiteboard. Lots of homework done and a bit of revision mainly learning quotes for poetry. Not a happy chappie this morning lol!

My dgd opted for art instead of history so as she didn't have to write essays and she is only really interested in ancient history like roman and Egyptian. Now all she does is moan about the amount of work and time spent on art,she really does regret doing it...I did warn her that although art is pleasurable it really does takes lot of time.

Sostenueto She will be relieved to have had all that coursework when her chums are sitting 3 history papers. I think DD only has 2 exam free days as she's taking 11 non-arty subjects.

Hi stickerocks she had a 10 hour art mock though over 2 days. Yes, she was very good at history but was bored with it more than anything and of course the essays........

Ouch! I'll stick with my colour-in calendar!

I’ve told DS1 to look on the bright side with art as they sit the exam in March so at least after that he’ll have more time for other subjects! He swapped history for geography just before starting GCSEs and is quite relieved he did so!

My dgd history teacher was so gutted she didn't do history she was predicted 8/9 at end year 9 but heyho the children have to do what they want to do, for better or worse, no good studying something your not interested in.

It was one of DS's best subjects as well - luckily geography turned out to be a good fit. I think he was put off by having a very strict teacher but part of me suspects he heard about the workload!

Checking back in again with a DD who has finally started revising for mocks (next week).

This morning her main complaint (apart from phone confiscation) is that she doesn't have time for her relationship and that it's not fair since we've been away over Christmas.

I think it's going to be a long 3 weeks and DH is very helpfully working away most of this month

Well, DS's two mocks didn't go too badly yesterday although he said there was 'nothing' in one of his science papers that he'd revised

He tends to think he's done better than he really has, so I'm not too hopeful!

Last night we had the 'are these exams important or not?' discussion. We (and the school) have previously said 'yes, they're important as they're good practice for identifying if you're on track and what work still needs to be done, but then this was contradicted rather by an email from the school which basically said 'we obviously want you to do as well as possible, but these exams aren't so important that you should make yourself ill about them.' I understand where they're coming from (they had a student commit suicide a couple of years back ) but it's not a helpful message to try to explain to DS who tends to see things as very black and white.