Do GCSE subjects need to be rethought?

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Do the subjects taught at GCSE need to be rethought? A couple of subjects especially spring to mind:

• modern languages
• physics

Modern languages: rather than teaching a single language would most students be better served by a course which taught a bit about life in different countries. Some simple do's and donts, how to order a coffee (or other drink of choice), some basic courtesies, basic numbers.

The aim of this course would be to provide students with the tools to allow them to visit different countries.

Physics: would students be better off either studying a general science course or if they have the aptitude to study an extended maths syllabus. Physics could then be introduced later.

Students dont study engineering at GCSE level so why physics? It is such a broad subject, does GCSE level do it any justice at all? Would students be better of being given the tools they will use if they go on to study physics later?

Are there any other subjects which would benefit from a radical rethink?

Well given that most kids can access the NC, anything that reduces subjects to just 'what's useful' is going to be inadequate for most.

Replace French with French history and culture, how does the able linguist do A Level, or even know they're able, if they don't get the chance to learn the language.

Learning about stuff, even if you never use it in real life, is still a good thing. It broadens the mind, makes you aware, gives you the opportunity to find out more, introduces ideas and thoughts and culture and awareness.

For the few who cannot access the curriculum then yes, functional skills type programmes, esp in literacy and numeracy are vital, but an introduction to art, PE, dt just might give an academically-weak kid a chance to show what they're capable of.

IMO what we need to do us allow schools to assess the students likely to get grades 1-3 in GCSE English and maths and have them do Functional skills L1 and L2 instead.
Great idea. They could have different assessment systems. You could give them different names ... something like, oh I don't know, say O Levels and CSEs.

The whole idea of GCSEs was so that everyone could have a go and not be divided into sheep and goats at a young age. You are, effectively, saying that you want to go back to the old system.

Having watched both my children go through GCSEs and onto A level (and one on to university), I see GCSEs as almost 'taster courses' for higher levels of study. For the most part, they teach you either certain basic functional skills (maths, English language, modern languages) or things we might consider to be desirable general knowledge (geography, physics, biology) or things that teach us widely applicable academic skills as well as some general knowledge (history, English literature). But I'm essentially of an academic disposition, though not a professional academic, so I pretty much just value learning things.

I guess the children who see GCSEs as most pointless are the ones who don't want to pursue any further academic study.

I see the merit of a paper that absolutely all students can sit but unfortunately the range of abilities is so large that in order to be able to distinguish 7s from 8s from 9s in maths you’d need to have a paper that was mostly incomprehensible to the students struggling to achieve 2s and 3s. English Lit or History isn’t so bad because you can set a single essay question which two students working at very different levels can both spend half an hour on working to the best of their ability.

I agree with Ontopofthesunset about languages.

As far as physics is concerned, leave it as it is (very important).

What else should we teach? There is also a place for a very instrumental approach ...

Financial literacy! I need someone to tell me how to avoid being taken advantage of by mortgage companies and banks; how to know when to change gas and phone companies etc etc - I wish we had learned that at school (except that people weren't always trying to trick you into giving them more money in the 1970s ...).

In Domestic Science: Add a module or two on how a vacuum cleaner or washing machine works, and how to repair it yourself. Include plumbing and electrical repairs.

Kids also need to learn how to be safe and discerning when using the Internet etc, but I think most schools do teach that now.

Domestic Science I don't think that has been taught for years.

I'm not a fan of a utilitarian curriculum. It's how you get really pointless arguments from students (who think they're being original) like 'but when will I ever need algebra? My mum hasn't used quadratic equations. What's the point in studying poetry? There's never a point in life when I'm going to need Wilfred Owen.'

GCSEs provide a general baseline and the foundations for students to specialise. Without the foundation coverage then A Level and university become not really an option.
There's already a curriculum discrepancy between state and private schools. Private schools value sport, music, drama and the arts. In state these are getting pushed out.

IMO what we need to do us allow schools to assess the students likely to get grades 1-3 in GCSE English and maths and have them do Functional skills L1 and L2 instead. And not punish the school for it.
Agree with this.
I also think more vocational options and pathways should be available, but I'm not sure I trust some academy chains not to push any middle ability students down non academic pathways because it will firm up performance figures rather than get the children set up for higher study that they'd be capable of.

What else should we teach?

There’s no room to teach anything else. If you want to teach kids how to repair a vacuum cleaner (not something that strikes me as particularly desperately missing from education) then you need to bin several hours of something else.

... more's the pity! OK, what's it called now then - Food Technology? Textile Tech?

Noblegiraffe: I know . And subjects are getting dropped all the time. But I think the school day could be lengthened for high school kids ... In Scotland, we have half a day on a Friday - lovely, but rather unnecessary, imo.

clary there’s a big difference between a pupil who isn’t going to get a 1, and one who looks like they’ll get a 3. Should a pupil who is going to get a U be entered for GCSE? Probably not, if the reason they’re headed for a U is severe learning difficulties. But I’ve seen some things in my career that would make me very wary of writing off a child from getting a 4 at GCSE and not even entering them.

I don't think that physics is any less important than chemistry or biology. I'd argue that physics can be seen more than chemistry or biology as you need a microscope for some of the topic areas. My kids don't find GCSE physics too maths heavy either.

MFL - I have 2 kids who did an MFL GCSE and one who won't be doing one. I've warned him that the school will try to push him into doing it but he's not interested. MFL teaching is terrible in England compared to continental Europe (I don't want to make comments about N Ireland, Scotland and Wales as have no knowledge about education there) but "giving up" is not the answer. There are children who enjoy languages and it would be divisive if private schools became the only places to study them.

I have a child in y11 who has RE until Christmas (she's not studying it for GCSE) and quite frankly I see it as a waste of time, it's only a lesson a fortnight but I suspect that they would be better served with a lesson on Current Affairs like I used to have at primary school (a long time ago). They didn't know stuff like how the electoral process worked (despite covering the suffragettes in History), how laws are made , the main members of the Royal Family... which should be common knowledge if you're English.

When I took my O'levels, we only had 7 subjects we could take at that level. Now, most students take 10 or more different subjects for GCSE, and they are probably spreading themselves too thin. They can't study each subject to the level we did. I still have my old O'level biology textbook, and when dd was doing her GCSEs I couldn't believe just how little was in the curriculum compared with how it used to be. Surely it would be far better for them to do fewer subjects, but in greater depth?

When I took my O'levels, we only had 7 subjects we could take at that level.

Really? I did 10 O Levels.... 7 is too few subjects to provide a rounded curriculum. You could maybe combine English Lang and Lit, but even then you'd have Maths, English and Combined Science which counts as 2, so only having room for one language, one Humanity and one other seems really narrow, and we specialise early enough in England as it is.

Baldricks I think the science GCSEs are pretty comprehensive. I only did Physics and Chemistry for O level, so all the Biology was 'new' to me when DD1 did her GCSEs. I think it is way better to do all 3 sciences to 2/3rds level than miss one entirely.

The thing is 'G'CSEs are meant to be general. If you only do 7 subjects you are cutting out a lot very early. At our school I think the standard ins now 9.5 (maths, 2 English, double science, 0.5 RE, plus 4 options).

If you only did 7 and wanted full science content then you are saying maths, 2 English, 3 science, plus only 1 other. Even changing the triple science for the double combined only gives 2 others. So you are dropping everything else at the age of rising 14.

The time for greater depth is A levels.

I am totally bemused at the idea that physics is the science we should drop.
I remember clearly doing O levels, 3 sciences and I totally understood biology, pretty obvious, totally understood physics, electricity, forces, magnetic field, all visible and great to understand how they work.
But I was flummoxed by chemistry.
I went on to do sciences, and I have never got to grips with it.

But my engineering dh, loved physics and chemistry and was flummoxed by biology.

Which just goes to show that your dislike/aversion to physics is really based on your own experience and skill set.

No, we should not be dumbing down GCSEs, as to your suggestion that we shouldn't teach MFL, I bang my head on the desk in despair, MFL are bad enough without reducing them further.
But the best thing would be to improve the teaching, and increase the expectation, so people actually end up being able to speak another language, like they do in every other European country, except ours.

People don't need a GCSE to help them travel to other countries - my DCs have travelled widely without any language GCSEs (they aren't old enough to have done them) and will be dropping languages before GCSE.

As for engineering, it's a GCSE option at their school and one of them wants to be an engineer so will be studying it at GCSE level alongside Physics as they want to do triple science.

I don't see the need for any changes really, the GCSE curriculum at schools is broad enough to allow for specialisms and personal preferences.

I have not suggested that physics is unimportant, what I wonder is if physics teaching would be better left until later with more time devoted to a broader maths curriculum for the students with aptitude - essentially offering further maths GCSE rather than physics. Physics can then come along later but be built on a far better knowledge of applied maths.

Many students lose interest in subjects where they cant see what they are for. How many students are put off subjects by their lack utility? Would more students be inspired to stick with subjects if they could see a use for it?

but I loved physics, and not maths, and I would not have been bale to do further maths at all.
I went on to do physics at A level, but could never have coped with A level maths.

I simple do not understand the idea that physics should be done later than maths. I would have missed physics all together if I had had to get through some sort of maths gateway to access it.

Physics, of all subjects, makes sense - it is practical, it relates to the real world and how it works, further maths is abstract.

I like the idea of a functional skills level world culture type course. May lead into further language learning for students who enjoy it. Still a place for GCSE languages though.

Physics can then come along later but be built on a far better knowledge of applied maths.

So 98% of kids should never do physics then? Cos the vast majority don't continue with Maths beyond GCSE.

And those that do have the aptitude have to wait till they're 16+ before they learn about electricity, power, energy, gravity, Newton's laws, planets etc...

I suspect you've had crap teachers, and that's what needs addressing, not banning physics for all until they start Maths A level.

Interesting steppemum DD2 saw in her classes that the students who struggled with physics A level (to the point of dropping it) were the students who weren't studying further maths let alone maths. Possibly depends on the syllabus.

wrt modern languages.
I have lived in several countries over seas, and now speak 3 languages fluently and 2 more at tourist level (one was fluent, but I have lost it through lack of use)

When I was learning one of those I was in a class with 2 people who had never had to learn a MFL at school. They were from Australia, and it was, at that time, not on the curriculum.

They really struggled. I mean REALLY struggled, and talking to one of them one day, he was telling me how he just couldn't get his head around things like the different word order, and that the grammar isn't the same etc. They had a mountain to climb before they even began to learn vocabulary.
By contrast the rest of us had learnt at least one language at school. In my case bad French. I wasn't a great French speaker, but I had learnt how another language works, and had to learn that the grammar is different, that word order changes, that the same letter is pronounced differently etc etc. You only learn that by actually learning enough to speak the language.
So, when I came to wanting to learn another language I had a huge step forward.

If we don't teach our kids to speak another language, we will prevent them from ever being able to learn one

Many students lose interest in subjects where they cant see what they are for. How many students are put off subjects by their lack utility? Would more students be inspired to stick with subjects if they could see a use for it?
Get rid of art because who needs to draw?
Get rid of music because what's the point in learning music?
Get rid of drama because who needs to act?
Get rid of history because most jobs don't need you know about stuff that's happened years ago?
Get rid of RE because there's no need to learn about other cultures?
Get rid of English because other than basic reading/writing skills there is no need for poetry or plays?
Get rid of any topic in maths and science that's not directly applicable to most life routes?

In fact, why not make school about basic literacy and numeracy? Then a massive PSHE curriculum to cover all the stuff people insist is useful for life and more important than learning stuff? Give them basic skills to be workers who'll not question too much but don't fill their heads with learning stuff.

That'll really allow our state educated children a level playing field with their privately educated peers.

Many students lose interest in subjects where they cant see what they are for

Children are the worst people to ask when designing a curriculum because they haven’t a bloody clue.

Let’s spend our time teaching them to floss or play Fortnite, because that’s what they’re really interested in.