DD is in year 8 and we have just had the parents GCSE options evening (where they lecture us about what the options are, without our DC), and then they tell the DC in assembly. We are then supposed to put in our options by Feb half term so they can generate the pools.
If you want to swap after that, that is fine so long as it works with the pools (they try and engineer the pools so everybody can do what they initially pick).
Problem is, DD does not really want to do any of the options. She is quite able, but does not like school. Current ambition is to be a wildlife photographer, and is very upset that the school does not offer GCSE photography, which is the one thing she really wants to do.
She switched to being a wildlife photographer on being told that her previous ambition, to be a naturalist, they recommended chemistry and maths! (before that, it was a zoologist - but then she discovered that zoologists study specific animals, and naturalists study animals more generally).
She does acknowledge that she really wants to study Geography, and do it for A Level, except that she dislikes the two Geography teachers who take the GCSE geography (particularly the one she has this year). She has always said history is boring, and refused to engage with it, no matter how hard we have tried, but is now saying that the only nice teachers in the school are in history, so maybe she should do that. I think that is a dreadful reason to do the subject, and given her interests (and what she researches out of school, i.e. anything to do with animals), she really ought to be doing geography. I said maybe take geography and history, but she rejected that out of hand.
She supposes she will do French (and then perked up, and said - they speak French in Canada, don't they - she currently wants to do her wildlife photography/naturalist studies in Canada amidst the polar bears, seals etc - the oral talks she has had to give over the years have generally been on polar animals, about which she knows an inordinate amount).
But they have to make another choice (RE is compulsory, as is maths, English language, English literature and at least double science, and if you are in set 1 science, which she is, you can do triple science, which she wants to do, as she wants to do biology on its own).
There is nothing else she wants to do. Drama is not being offered this year, and watching her brother has put her off art (she is quite artistic, but she has seen what a toll art GCSE puts).
She has toyed with Food tech, but the teacher has recently changed and she dislikes the current Food tech teacher.
And so we are stuck!