GCSE 2018 (7) [wine][wine][wine][wine]

[mmzz]

A new thread to take us through the exams
Link to old thread

Last year you only needed 78% I think, feel free to correct me anyone, for a 9 which in my way if grading would be a 7 so all ridiculous.

Oh Ellen I didn't know that, thought it was all programming? Shows what I (and it seems DD) knows!!

It is ridiculous - why they just couldn't stop at grade 8 as A* equivalent and not bother to differentiate further is beyond me

Agree with al about 9 and 8. So hard when it basically is based on a distribution curve. I agree should have stopped at a 8.

I wish they didn't give grades at all just the percentage, no-one would be particularly interested then in a long list of percentages plus there would be hardly any re-marks!!!

192 out of 240 for level 9 (80%) last year aqa maths. 154 out of 240 for an 8 so if you got 191 you would only get an 8 but if you got 154 you would get an 8 how pathetic and elitist of gove to implement a ridiculous way to set grade boundaries.

A friend of mine is a teacher, she is head of sixth form at a local school. She was told that a teacher should only expect to see a handful of 9's in their whole career so was quite surprised by the number her cohort got last summer.

DD is predicted a couple of 9's, mostly 8, 7's and a couple of 6's. Her friends are all incredibly clever and will get all 8's and 9's so that is what she is aiming for.

I too have no idea why they needed to introduce a 9.

Good call blue percentages makes much more sense.

Why they can't say 40% for 4 50% for 5 60% for 6 70% for 7 80% for 8 and 90% for 9? Oh that's far too simplistic. I remember well that in the 60 s a C was 55%.

Because the Government believes in separating society even more. They love grammar schools having just given another 50+ million for grammars to expand. They love elitism. Hence the new level 9. Give it another 10 years and they will have to add the 10 to keep the separation of society going.

Sost its to stop grade creep where the exam boards vault over each other to be the marginally easier place to get an A, so that schools will go to them, not their rivals. Then after about 20 years, you end up with an A being so normal that no one values it and people wonder what's wrong with you if you didn't get one.

Thank you for the welcome!

I wasn't scoffing at anyone who has put hugely more effort into the whole GCSE malarkey than I have, by the way. This child has an older sib with SEN who needed full-on parental input just to get out of the door in the morning, and who still needs help most days.

Hence lack of grip on GCSEs. Luckily this child will do fairly well regardless, except possibly in maths.

I think the grading is based on relative performance, relative to the whole year group cohort, rather than on absolute achievement.

Does anyone know whether this is true?

and Sost, you are right, they made 1 low, not high just so that they can add a 10 and a 11 if the 9 ends up being too easy despite all the attempts to make it a marker of the most able.

sonnyboo yes, that's right

Dgd has 2 predicted 9 s whether she gets them is another thing and does it matter? Nope it doesn't an 8 or 7 will be fine. After all she will be in the same classes studying the same A levels with those that caused themselves near nervous breakdowns and physical illnesses to achieve those 9 s.
She will go on to a decent uni and achieve her dreams. And hopefully done with the minimum of stress. ( I can dream).

Wouldn't need a marker for the most able if you just used percentages it would be obvious

Yep your right too mmzz

Grade boundaries have always meant that you can scrape or miss out on a desired grade. The difference now is that you can see it with the raw marks. When I did GCSEs (2nd year of them) and got my grades back I had no way of knowing if they were comfortable passes or scrapes.

In those days the top mark was an A and straight A grades happened quite a lot. Then the A star came in to 'stretch' people and the same thing happened. Hence the 9 has come about. I'm guessing we'll see the introduction of a 10 before long.

Dgd got 5 s in her SATs. Her year group for her subjects , all the top groups got 6s. So who has made the most progress? Those that had a level 6 and predicted to get 8-9 in GCSE? Or dgd predicted to get 7-8 for GCSE?
Progress is surely the most important thing? If you can get a predicted 2 to a 5 or 6 that us much more to achieve than worry about how many get 9 s?

Forgot to add she us in all top groups.

Not sure whether this cohort on new GCSEs will actually get what % or mark they got. Think they will just get the overall grade by what dgd told me.

Bluebelle123 - Agree much better not to label grades and work on percentages and then it's fairer and means 1% makes no difference whereas it could make a lot of difference...if you need a 7 but get a 6 by 1 mark.

I cant keep up with this thread ...moving too quick ..out to work for 6 hours and its moved on 4 pages.

Rufus - well done to your DC for sitting the exams I have a friend whose daughter was diagnosed with ME 4 years ago and she's managing to sit 5 exams (I think) but is really poor health - sitting exams at home.

Hoping French went well cannot see any feedback yet...

Take language for instance ( Spanish) 4 exams 4 marks but you will end up with 1 grade not the individual grades for each paper. You won't know what they were just the final overall grade.

Thats what Spanish teacher told dgd.