GCSEs 2019 Support thread 3

[myrtleWilson]

Welcome all - just went to post on thread 2 and saw it was at 999 so quickly did this

Hello all, up late here - my DD missed all of year 11 due to depression and anxiety. She only returned to school about a month ago part time so she's doing 6 GCSEs now.

She could not study at home and isn't really capable of revising as we might understand it but she wanted to have a go. I cannot imagine how she walks into the exam room every time she is so brave (and yes it does make her even more anxious )

Of course we are talking about top of the top here, if your DC have no Oxbridge ambitions (or even vague hopes), this is all irrelevant. I keep an eye on the A level threads, just to get a sense of what is coming, and DC predicted good A levels have got excellent offers, outside of Oxbridge, even if their GCSEs weren't so stellar. There is one DC on that thread who got knocked back from both Oxbridge (after getting to interview) and Durham, but has an offer from Exeter, and the feedback from Durham pointed to his less than stellar GCSEs, but his twin got an offer from Durham with similar GCSEs. On the medicine threads (because DS is thinking that way), there are apparently medical schools that place a lot of weight on GCSEs, and those that don't and the suggestion is, if you have really good ones, apply to the schools that do, and if you don't apply to the schools that prioritises other things. And that is medicine.

Sorry DishingOutDone your post crept in between mine on Oxbridge, which feels a bit inappropriate given what your DD is facing. I agree, very, very brave to give it her best shot in those circumstances.

DishingOutDone sorry to hear of your dd's circumstances, I am in a similar position with my dc.
She has an offer at a good local Grammar for 6th form if her grades are good enough, but she has just announced she won't be going back to school as her mental health can't handle it. We are trying to be positive but it's bloody hard.
I shall be wishing your dd lots of luck.

Interesting threads. I hadn't realised just how different exam boards were from one another.

Oxford sometimes ask for slightly fewer A at A Level than Cambridge, but loosk much more closely at the GCSEs.*

Not sometimes, always: Oxford's standard offers are lower than Cambridge's. (AAA for arts, A star AA for sciences generally. Same number of A stars for maths, but Cambridge also want STEP.)

Dishing You must be so proud of her, hope she can feel proud of herself for doing them.

Two RE papers this morning. Needs to go well after last weeks effort. DS just getting up for a 7.30 start in school. Tomorrow is a big day, Maths and Geog, both likely Alevel choices. Feel more nervous than last week. Good luck to them all.

Dishing what a tough year you guys have had - hope your dd is getting support from the school, despite everything she still has grit. Good luck with her exams and her recovery.xx

nothing today, ds has been warned that I will wake him up though!
Not a huge amount of revision over the weekend

RS this morning for us - neither of them wish to take this to A level so it's a relatively easy start to the week - they are feeling it for the Maths Geography combo though. And not looking forward to the Physics either!

Dishing best wishes to your dd x

No exam for ds1 today but ge was complaining of a sore throat last night :(

soursprout dd does edexcel maths, she’s told me the same in that they could put any topics on any of the three papers but there are recurring topics that are most likely to come up on specific papers judging from past papers- eg. She says that tricky vectors questions usually appear on paper 1

But then again I haven’t seen her make notes or anything for maths- her method of (minimal) revision for it seems to be past papers

RS here - an A level choice so fingers crossed. Had sudden panic though on reading Cptartapp thinking I had missed another paper...

Hi, my daughter does Edexcel maths and has said the same. Could be on any topic. Maths is really spread out isn't it? French is now ticked off here and RE by the end of this week.

Edexcel maths here too. Really don't like them as there seems to be a huge difference between the level of the practise stuff and the almost impossible exam papers

DS should be on for a great mark according to his class tests but the mock papers were dreadful for him and has stopped him wanting to do A level...I can't wait until they are done.

Good luck to those taking papers today....we are waiting for maths and geography tomorrow.

Maths structure is a bit odd. Ds1 is doing edexcel IGCSE which has two papers which are again, as far as I can see, identical. They are even both with calculator, which seems really odd - surely most boards have a non-calc paper? Or am I just rather old fashioned?

Good luck for your very brave dd Dishing

Nothing for ds today, he's revised maths and was telling me trig functions on the way to school, but has done nothing for Eng Lit and physics which he also has this week

We're Edexcel Maths too, 3 papers, first non calc.
The thing I have seen is that every Sixth Form I visited around here do Edexcel A'level Maths. This might influence which GCSE schools choose.

Hi there. I've been lurking on this thread for a while. I hope all DC's with exams today will have good experiences.
I've not got my own DC sitting GCSEs but I'm a tutor teaching sciences and maths to GCSE. I hope you don't mind me butting in but thought I could help a bit.
I'm most familiar with the Edexcel maths papers as most schools seem to do these. Your DC's are right that any topic can come up on any paper. The new 9-1 maths is also much more likely to mix topics within the same question than the old GCSE did.
However. If you wait a day or 2 after the first paper and then Google something like " best guess paper 2 GCSE maths" you will find that several really kind maths teachers will have published practice papers that include questions on the topics that have not come up on paper 1 so are more likely to come up on paper 2. Then they do the same again after paper 2 for paper 3.
They should not be relied upon as anything like a predicted paper of course and topics that came up on paper 1 may appear again on paper 2 or 3 but they can be useful when you have limited time for revision and need to choose things to focus on.
My advice would be to alternate focus on these practice papers with revising topics your DC know they need to put more work in on.