How many GCSEs?

[m0therofdragons]

Dd goes to secondary next year. She's very academic. We have 2 school options but one has £1000 a year transportation cost and she's not certain if gaining a space.

School one: can walk but only allows dc to take 8 GCSEs

School two: needs bus and allows up to 11 GCSEs

I took 11 but I went to a grammar school which isn't an option here. Can anyone advise if it matters? Seems a big difference to me.

All good then Milady.

Facilitating only matters for A levels

And even then only to a degree. My very bright Year 11 dd is thinking about A Levels and at the moment she doesn't want to do any facilitating subjects at all: Religion, Philosophy and Ethics; Classical Civilisation and Sociology. As far as her research goes, this combination should be fine for many universities.

My DD has never enjoyed RE lessons since year 7... not everyone does enjoy the subject. (I didn’t...!) Also, she isn’t a natural essay writer... although I am sure she will get better with time.

She really wanted to do Modern History - school only offered Geography, History and Ancient History. So because of that and the advice of the history teacher about essay writing, my DD switched to Geography which she equally enjoys.

RE at my DD’s school isn’t an optional subject - which is why I have an issue really.

It is one if the mandatory 8 subjects that all students have to take - on top of this they have to choose a MFL & Humanity subject.

Dd has just done 9, as did most people we know. Her school, an independent girls school, only allows 9 for most girls now - they made big chances after the new GCSES came in, as did most local schools. The only ones doing 10 at dd's school were those doing Further Maths or those doing an extra Language, which was one where they actually spoke the language at home.

I did 11. It was pointless.

The new GCSEs are much more rigorous and have a lot more content to get through. Loren really don't need more.

I do agree, however, that 8 is a bit low as it restricts options, especially if you are have subjects that have to be done, or you want to do triple science.

Dd had to do English language, English lit, maths and at least 2 sciences. They were then recommended to do a language and a humanities. This then gave her two options to choose freely. A lot of her friends chose triple science as one option.

DD has just started her GCSE courses at our local Grammar school. She's taking English X2, Maths., and all 3 Sciences, as her 'core' subjects then Geography (humanity), German (MFL), and Art (creative) plus Latin as her free choice. PE is offered as an additional subject, some of the core PE lessons are given over to theory work plus they have to put in some work outside that. They've been taught sciences separately since yr8 so they've already covered some of the GCSE content in yr9.
I'd put school 2 down as first choice and school 1 as second, assuming DD is happy with that and the commute isn't too long. Only 8 subjects seems rather restrictive especially for high achievers.

I feel in my school the students are spread too thinly. They do too many GCSEs and teaching time is also compromised for each subject. We're in Wales, and a Catholic school so that makes a difference.
English x 2
Science x 2
Maths
Numeracy
RE
Welsh
Skills challenge (Welsh Bac)
Options x3

That makes 12. Plus some students do additional maths.

I should have said that if pupils opt for triple science, they do one less option.

11 sounds like far too much. My DD has just done 10 GCSEs. She is also very academic and got 8s, 9s or A* in nine of them and a 7 in one.

She found the examination weeks absolutely exhausting. Week after week, she had an exam virtually every day and there were some days with two exams. Honestly, if she'd done another subject, I think her grades would have been mostly 7s...... which still would have been very good but not as good as what she got.

DD4 has just done ten GCSEs and got 9s in nine of them and an 8 in the tenth (although the school has put the whole cohort in for a remark on that one). She really didn't find it hugely stressful and was still pretty chirpy at the end. It really isn't possible to generalize. I think she could have taken another (and she'd like to have done another language) with no impact on her other exams or emotional health.

I suppose maybe Additional Maths (the FSMQ thing) counts as an eleventh, so what she'd have liked to have done would have been eleven reformed GCSEs plus the FSMQ.

Yes, that's what most pupils do at our school, 10 GCSEs plus Additional Maths (FSMQ), for the top Maths sets.