Exams

[Minniemooseishere]

I took my gcse's in year 11 but I'm 35 so that was a while ago!

I'm just watching this morning and it said children are doing gcse's in year 9. Has it all changed then? When do they chose their options now?

The ‘standard’ is still to take them in Year 11, with teaching in Y10 and Y11 following options made in Y9.

However some schools do options in Y8 and start GCSE teaching in Y9, some take a GCSE early in Y9 (IT and RE seem to have been common choices for this previously).

The schools round here start GCSE learning in y9

They have made GCSEs harder so schools need more time to get through the syllabus. Options are picked in y8

As previous the syllabus are harder so start earlier now. Mine took their first gcse yr9, in fact my DC secondary school now start the new school year in late may/early June, once the current GCSE year has left for study leave the entire school moves up a year and feeder primary start Yr 7 then also (after SATS in yr6). It's to give the maximium teaching time to Yr 11 rather than having an early finish for GCSEs (hope I've explained that well)

Oh wow I had no idea. Hopefully the school will be forthcoming with info when the time comes.

Actually dd did say she moves up to yr 8 after the end of year exams and yr 11 finish their exams. I told her to stop being daft

Minnie If you keep an eye out on your school's letters page on the website (assuming they have one) you may find useful/interesting information by reading the letters of the older years. I find ours quite informative.