Request for advice from parents whose children have done their GCSEs

[Michaelahpurple]

Can experienced (traumatised?) parents please advise on buying revision guides or text books?

My year 10 son needs to go over his whole year of physics as his file is pretty much empty, and I would like him to work through some maths topics. He has two old physics textbooks from school so I thought it would make sense to get him a book utterly aligned to the edexcel IGCSE 1-9 exam he will sit next summer - I think that he is the first or possibly second year to do so. Question - should I get a text book or a revision book? I find the CGP products rather thin and silly - are there other, better ones? Ideally I’d like something with questions and answers to work through which reflect the ones in the exam - are there such things?
Similarly for maths - is it important to get a book branded with the same board as he is doing (again edexcel igcse 1-9) or would any new style one be ok?
And finally, when we get to the point of practicing past papers, how have students managed with the reformed syllabuses - does one try to sweep up practice papers from lots of different reformed boards or is there still value in working through historical ones?
Sorry about the list, but I am sure that these are issues others must have tackled so hoping there may be Mumsnet words of wisdom available!

Well-meaning grandparents, other relatives and close friends have politely asked what grades DS2 needs for sixth form.

He has six different grade offers (for four A-levels or for three A-levels) from three different sixth forms, all slightly different and all taking into account average point score plus specific grade requirements for the individual subjects he wants to study.

I've decided to reply with "It varies."

Gosh well I'm surprised that in real life as opposed to MN people share DCs' predictions. I'm always asked how did DCX do on all the various results' days but never questions about coursework v exams etc. My parents aren't alive any more but I suspect the nuances would go slightly over their heads, despite being interested in the overall thing! Absolutely no-one has quizzed me on predictions - how intrusive and rude . Some people.

It's not quizzing, It's more people who have been through it over the last few years asking how the course work is going, what she needs for college and how she should get a host of As and A*s so there will be nothing to worry about. It's also professionally where employers have absolutely no idea of how GCSEs have changed and simply don't understand the new grading structure. From this year onwards, employers looking at taking on apprentices have faced a mix of letters and grades and don't realise that a 9 is truly exceptional, a 7 is an A (despite being 3rd from top) and a 4 is still a grade C.

School's have actually been very reluctant to predict anything, as they have so little idea themselves of what the papers would even look like. Some foolishly predicted 9s and will now be bracing themselves for angry parents and disappointed DC who actually get 5s and 6s.

DS sat mainly IGCSEs and there was no coursework at all. DD's school is happier with the new GCSEs so has swapped to them for some subjects. She will do about 50/50 and there is no coursework except for GCSE Eng Lang for which she has to prepare a spoken element which has to be completed but doesn't count towards the mark.
Schools like hers are geared up for no coursework, exam only testing and will have a huge advantage over schools which have previously concentrated on course work. I'm not sure how long course work has been around but there must be quite a few teachers who have never even taught for final exam courses. IMO the changes aren't just going to effect this years pupils it will be quite a few years until there is a level playing field.

In terms of sharing predictions surely there is context. American parents often fretted about GCSE grades and how to achieve the top grades possible, as US offers are effectively unconditional so A level grades matter less. Top US Universities have acceptence rates as low as 5%, so nothing can be left to chance.

Ditto a controversial and very selective grammar school near us set a very high bar for entry to sixth form even from existing pupils. And yes in my experience mums would share their concerns not least as part of their research into good fall-back options.

In contrast DC had a number of cousins and second cousins of about the same age. Several, not mine, were apparently brilliant. We were very careful not to share much.

I agree with cake. IGCSE here. Virtually no coursework, thank goodness. I guess final exams suits some (the less dilligent?), whilst coursework helps others. We also knew of tutors employed to 'help' with coursework, one reason, perhaps, why London private schools tried to avoid it.

Another vote for CGP books, all available on Amazon

cake I sat the final year of O levels, so there has been coursework since 1988 onwards. All of DD's GCSEs were final exam only, so we were lucky that she has a strong memory. I think several in her school only remembered that they had to submit portfolios for subjects like art, photography & graphics and had a mad rush to complete everything when they should have been revising.

Which brings me onto my next tip. Accept that the best designed timetable in the world will be shot to bits straight away when 3 teachers simultaneously decide that you absolutely must produce homework for them overnight. Be prepared to have some subjects with teachers who will set homework at the same time each week, which can effectively be treated as revision, whilst others won't set a thing. These are the ones you mustn't neglect, as mock results will probably reflect the lack of work done outside of the classroom.

Adding to Stickerrocks's timetable tip, be prepared for the teacher's to stop co-operating with each other after the Easter holidays, and suddenly they all start clamouring for your DC's time.
One of DS's teachers was particularly bad - he was setting so much "mandatory" homework and compulsory revision sessions that there was barely enough time to do everyone else's homework, never mind revise.
I think DS's carefully planned revision timetable was re-written daily for the last 3 months, with longer and longer days being scheduled because so much time was spent doing homework that covered the things that DS was strong in anyway. In the end, he was doing 7 hours of solid study per day, for about 3 months with only a couple of days off when he needed to rest because he could not concentrate any longer.
That wasn't what he had planned, but it became necessary due to the demands his teachers were making on him.

Yes, when it gets to March/April of Y11, every teacher seems to think theirs is the only subject that needs revising.

DS2 kept getting instructions to spend an hour every evening doing A, 30 minutes every evening doing B, 45 minutes every evening doing C and so on. If he had listened to all of them, he wouldn't have had time to sleep.

Third that is so true!
Some subjects still have coursework - we had three of those (although the coding one didn't count in the end) and thank goodness he didn't take DT! Art is the trickiest as there is a lot of reflection and artist research plus showing all the stages - if anyone is doing art the advice is to produce as much as you can - photos, sketches, notes on techniques in the Summer holidays. Then get onto exam prep as soon as you can in Y11.
I know the students who did DT were spending a lot of their free time finishing their projects, too.

TheThirdOfHerName
That annoys me (and I'm a teacher).

Every year I advise my Y10s to revise properly for their y10 mocks so they don't have to do more than a quick brush up of y10 content in y11.
Every year I tell my y11s to revise the 1st half of y11 content properly for their mocks for the same reason.
Every year I say to y11 that as I set 45 mins a week homework (and it should be an hour) that they spend 15 minutes refreshing their knowledge of something they are unsure about.
I do the same for A Level.

Every year I teach revision strategies from the start of courses throughout y10-13. This is all to help students be prepared and not have loads to do from January of Y11.

Every year some follow my advice straight away, some follow it a few months in when they see others doing really well following my advice and some still think they don't have to start revising until 8 weeks before their exam.

It doesn't matter what we say as teachers with regards to revision. That's why I stopped on the big pushed. It's now 'this is what you need to do and you can look round the class and see who is doing well and who is being lazy'. Otherwise endless big pushed simply stress diligent students out.

Maisy & Loose can I just add that you two were invaluable with your little nuggets of help.

Next tip: Get someone who understands what your D'S is up against, but isn't their parent to nudge them into revision. My DD will listen to her uncle (an academic & tutor) but totally ignores the same words coming from my mouth (I'm a post grad exams tutor ).

Stickerrocks I'm glad if any of it was helpful!
I totally agree with you about bringing in a third party to give advice if needed.
Maisy's revision advice is spot on. It is up to the individual but DS felt there was too much stress around the mocks and his actual exams seemed a lot calmer.

The mocks seemed like such a big deal at the time, but by March, they were nothing.

Stickerrocks
Always happy to help.

mmzz I think the trick with mocks is to emphasise the value of them but not over stress.
I generally expect a grade below target during mocks for hard working students as we have months to perfect technique.
Some middle to able students need the mocks for a massive kick up the arse because they think they can turn up and wing it. Then they get 3s and 4s and we get the calls from.parents asking why their child did badly. Ummm probably because they've not revised and were far too overconfident.

Wow - amazing advice here (sorry have been quiet - wrestling a reluctant smaller child off to a music residential).

Coursework - this rather passed us by. I did o levels (ahem) so long ago that it was unheard of and DS's school and those of most school gate friends' DCs have for years done igcses to avoid it. Given DS's diligence , thank goodness for that. Have to admit that it would t have suited me either.

Took the team advice and got the new spec official exam board text book (given that I suspect his fees may break £40k next year I really do resent having to buy that. Whinge whinge) and the cgp crib and exam papers, mapped the school year 10 syllabus to the exam one to work out which bits he is meant to have done already and sat him down with lots of coloured pens (can never resist those). Couldn't resist a profoundly helpful rant about "and this is why universities expect higher grades from some sectors of the applicant base than others". I Must do better in this regard

Anyway - all going well so far. Only on day 3 but he has reasonably happily done about 2.5 hrs a day and really likes the textbook - found him meditatively reading a different chapter in the bath.

I am happy as much with the concept being established of working at home, which he has rather lost since he finished his entrance exams in easter of year 8.

Michaelahpurple One of my DCs was / is a minimal (or occasional scribble) note taker but I have learnt that the amount and beauty of notes did n't equate to understanding or learning. It certainly reassures me though when DCs have a good textbook. In fact thinking about it I used textbooks rather than notes myself to teach myself and revise.
However if your DS's school is the one I am thinking then I am amazed that your DS has to do this daily 2.5 hours during the summer holidays of catching-up. Particularly as it sounds as though he could be quite interested in physics since he likes the textbook.

IME for bright teenagers without spLD who are at a good school (teaching independent learning with access to the right study material) takimg a breath and step back from organising study out of school is worth considering. Otherwise DCs get into the habit of requiring parental prompting not only for motivation but also for mapping out what they need to do. It engenders passiveness.
IMO it is about playing the parental longterm game for life skills and holding nerve even if our DCs are n't as studious as we hope they might be and don't end up with the top exam scores othey are capable of with cajoling.

Sendsummer, DC were at similar schools and now at University.

In various ways they have discovered that there was a huge variation in the hours peers put in at home.

Our mfl exchange suggested one of her friends was unhappy as the English exchange was spending four hours a night on homework with more at weekends. Another busted a gut to get good science A levels when humanities would have come more easily, in order to pursue a dream career. A lovely Asian friend of DC who spent a Christmas with us when at University confessed he had spent every school Christmas and Easter at a full time and residential crammer.

All three ended up at Oxbridge, where they did well but continued to work very hard indeed. Mine, who had perfected the fine art of doing enough to keep teachers off their backs, did not. When so many coming out of this type of school have good grades, you really need to be at least be beating class average if you want a popular Oxbridge course. More if you want Ivy.

Its fine. There are plenty of good courses outside Oxbridge. DC seem pleased that they started university with academic headroom, and an understanding that they controlled their destinys. In fairness they also benefitted from the sky high ambitions of their peers and a belief that with hard work anything is possible.

DS is about to start a (generously funded) PhD at a top 10 department in the US. So the Yr10 summer playing cricket did no harm, perhaps some good. But in retrospect he may have had more potential than some others, something that was perhaps masked by their (and their tutors) hard work. Given the arms race to get onto this type of school, and into top grammars, this is not surprising. If you worked hard to get in, you may need to work hard to keep up. (Hence the regulat MN assertion that 'everyone' is totored. Most of DCs friends weren't, but perhaps others were.) Plus my observation was that parents who came from school systems where 'class placement' counted, would often move heaven and earth to help ensure that their DC were keeping up with top sets. So DS was completed gobsmacked when he came top in a first year University maths exam. He had probably never managed the top 30 at school.

Sendsummer and Needsmore - you perfectly bracket my feelings and concerns - I oscillate between these.

I didn't plan to be involved at this point - I thought I had built him up to independent work - year 7 revising with him, making.notes with him, winter year 8 he did his own notes with supervision, easter year 8 I just helped write the timetable and did any vocab testing (and helplessly agreed that the french papers were killing - v helpful!), happily believing that he now knew how to build up through the year etc etc. Ha! Then he, as sendsummer said, spent year 10 summer term playing cricket.

Looking at the school results it seems to all comes out in the end but I worry about him just cruising along and getting a handful of middle of the road results and still not realising that this isn't enough. And most god his closest associates are not very academically driven

Sorry - premature send. I think he gets too much comfort from being just about in the top half and doing better than semi professional sport men and trust fund euros.

I am also fascinated by the contrast with the girl's London schools, with the amount of oversight and structure, compared to the apparent lack of scrutiny at his shop, and how that all works out. (Together with the ever present fear about whether others are having their brats tutored). Hey ho.

Needmoresleep and MichaelahPurple
I too have heard from students of those sort of schools describing school as a relative rest compared to what they have to do during the holidays.
Others said they learnt the hard way not to believe their friends who said they did very little work (that myth continues to be propagated at university). It seems rather European to claim accomplishment is achieved with no effort.
I observe that more and more DCs including at university and beyond rely on parents not only as their 'goal setters' but also to tell them how to achieve those goals. They become better at following instructions than autonomy.

Teachers at some very good boys' schools are often better at letting boys make their own mistakes. Sometime that does n't reap benefits until after university though which is why like investments there are shortterm risks and dips.
Anyway I prefer the Needmoresleep model for DCs' education, including the benefits of observation of what ambition and hard work can bring even if it is not put into action until much later (or possibly never but at least they make their own minds up )

Tiger parents come from all over, Europeans as well. Inevitable really,
when the City collects over-achievers from across the world who are determined that their children will follow similar paths.

How much you push depends in part on how much value you attach to an Oxbridge/Ivy place. My sense is that admissions people are so used to seeing "perfect" applicants from top schools that those with the odd B are pretty automatically ruled out. Often their loss. Relatively few of DCs sciency friends ended up at Oxbridge, with most making their way to London, despite the fact that over 50% of the year group would have been Oxbridge/Ivy. Were they less bright? I doubt it. Clearly there were some very bright/special kids who got Oxbridge, but there were also several slightly dull sloggers. And some of those who went elsewhere, quirky brilliant kids who used their teenage years to explore and develop their interests rather than do too much revision, have done very well indeed.

And there are differences. In DS' subject, without exception, those that got Cambridge would have interviewed very well indeed. Their parents were senior City folk, and they were destined to be senior City folk and would have had the confidence that went with it. Most other Universities do not interview for that subject, and given how well so many of DS' peers did, I doubt that his cohort was any less able. I am particularly proud that DS' UG tutor had no idea which type of school DS went to till she saw his final results just before his graduation. (She was American and went to a similar school in the US so thought she recognised the type.) I suspect that, just as it is difficult for academic schools to sift the very prepared from the natually able, it is difficult for Universities to work out which of their public school products sitting in front of them is the real deal. Easier to simply focus on those with the straight As, even if in some cases those As will be the result of a pretty intense tutoring schedule on top of a good education. (Though most have done fine, and as educated young people with a great work ethic, will be very employable, we did see a few car crashes along the way.)

London suited DS. His schooling had left him with an interest and engagement in education which meant that he was happy to get involved in a range of stuff beyond his course, and given the number of people who pass through London, he had exposure to some fantastic stuff. May Balls/punting were not really his thing. DD too felt she did not need to try for Oxbridge, though she would have been a credible applicant. She has been surprised to find herself missing some of the scarey ambition and focus that she thought she wanted to get away from, but I suspect that is a first year problem and that as she finds her tribe she will settle on a happy balance of work and play.

My preference too is to see it as a long term game. Focus on encouraging your child to enjoy education, but also encourage them to develop important skills like self-discipline, their own ambitions, and resilience. Being able to try things and fail, then try again is as important a life skill as straight As. Whilst the ability to be happy and to be kind and supportive to others is crucial - who knows what life will throw at our DC. Good enough in the context of this type of school is very good indeed. (I read today, though I am not too sure I believe it, that 51% of university applicants have 3 Grade Ds or worse.)

However Oxbridge/Ivy is very important to some people, including those for whom London does not appeal, and for some careers. If so, I would be tempted to help ensure that you don't give an admissions tutor any excuse to weed your DC out before interview. The same will not apply to those from more academically diverse schools. Its just if 70% of A levels and 90% of GCSEs in the school are at A*, anything less than that looks poor.

Tiger parents come from all over, Europeans as well. Indeed but I was referring to something different, the dissimulation of effort put in. That I have observed more frequently in the British and Europeans than Asians.
Fine to aim for Oxbridge or whereever to facilitate a career path as long as the career goal is what the DC fixes on not the parents plus the DC is self motivated. And the fear of missing grades does n't detract from letting a DC make their own mistakes and learning from them.

Personally as there are not enough Oxbridge places for all suitable students, I think there is an argument to reserve an undergraduate Oxbridge education for those who have not already benefited from a similar small group type teaching provided at certain top private schools (and I say that despite not being a socialist or believer in social engineering). Then not getting to Oxbridge would not be a sign of failure by private school parents and lots more very bright state school students would get a chance.
Sorry for diversion from OP

Send - no apology for diversion needed - all very interesting and you and Needsmore are totally stirring through the issues that are brewing away under my gcse and work patterns thoughts.

I am far from convinced he has the temperament and drive to try for oxbridge or indeed other top flight options but I will, tbh, be very disappointed if that proves to be the case and I don't want doors to close now, hence the gcse kick. To be clear it isn't not getting into such an institution that would be disappointing, but the failing to position himself to be in the running.

I went to a what was the time a "nice" girls' school that didn't send many to oxbridge and was very disorganised and quite immature plus a year out of age, but I used to hang out in the library aged 12/13, browsing oxbridge college brochures. I didn't really understand what university was about but had picked up that this was considered "the best", so I wanted it. D.C. naturally just rolls his eyes and says "what a geek" to that!

And yes, English boys especially are very prone to the need to appear effortless and unengaged.