Sitting GCSE early

[Shoeshelpplease]

Hi can anyone offer insight into children taking GCSEs early? What are the positives and negatives?

How early can they take them? He is at an independent senior school and I haven't approached them yet but sure they will be supportive if they think him capable.

Is there a minimum age?

It's computing he's interested in.

Hi,

I'm currently sitting the Computer Science GCSE and I would highly recommend not sitting it early. It has one of the highest grade boundaries of all GCSEs and it is on average atleast 50% of the marks to get a 4 (Low grade C) it has a lot of content and goes past just programming, atleast 1 of the papers if fully based on theory as well as the 20 hour NEA. It is much better to sit it at the end of the course.

My friend took her GCSEs a year early (all 9s) and this will result in her taking her a levels a year sooner than she would have. However she didn't know that NOT ALL UNIS TAKE UNDER 18S. This provided an extra stressful time when applying for her Unis as some that's perfect for her course won't take her but as hers is 6years long she doesn't want to wait. This is something to consider greatly before taking GCSEs early. If it will hinder the results then probably best to leave it. If it will progress then definitely worth it in the end.

Alyx You have a valid comment, but it sounds like your friend was accelerated in school (or HomeEd) by a year which is a whole different issue compared with taking 1 or 2 early because the child or school think it sounds like a good idea.

He'd be much better extending his interests outside of the limitations of a GCSE curriculum - sounds like the GCSE will be too basic for his interest and abilities anyway!

paper qualifications (particularly in computing) are overrated - my brother did a degree in it and by the end of the second year, most of what he'd studied in the previous year was already obsolete!

There might be some university summer courses or opportunities he could investigate if he wants a bit of higher-level guidance...

I assume that she is applying for medicine Alyxbear17?

DD was looking at medical schools a couple of years ago, and they were all very strict about students being 18 at the start of university.

Isn’t it more to do with needing to be 18 for clinical placements than the university as a whole?

It is, but we were told at the universities we looked at that DD would have to be 18 when she started.

Dd did GCSE maths early, year 6. It worked out well for dd, as she was allowed to sit and do A level work in maths classes in secondary school and so was not finding maths tedious any more.

I would only recommend it if you know he stands a good chance of getting the top grade, otherwise it counts as a retake if they take it again later.

I would talk to the school though and think about him doing extension work as others have suggested. The only reason dd did maths early was that the school kept telling us she was not ahead and dd was getting upset having an hour a day of boredom in her favourite subject.

I’m not aware of any good universities worrying about the sequencing of GCSES so let’s have some hard evidence for that please. “Our head said...” doesn’t count as it is probably some drivel to do with league table stats. Schools have become unreasonably obsessive with the all at the time time rule. If a kid is likely to get top grades taking some in fourth form there is no reason not to do so. Maths, music and for native foreign speakers MFL are all potential targets for sitting a year early. It can lower the stress in the main GCSE year or allow additional stuff like astronomy, further or add maths etc.

Computing varies between syllabuses and my DS had no project element. On this particular subject there is a history of unis not caring about whether kids had a school qualification, but that mostly stems from the ghastly ICT courses. They got labelled quite rightly as Playing with Office. I reckon unis will take the new computer science syllabuses much more seriously. My son did a lot of CS theory as well as coding in both python and pseudo code. It’s a world away from the previous garbage and should be taken seriously as a school option. If a school offers a proper CS course a coding fan should take it as well as doing club and other projects.

My daughter sat a language GCSE this summer (at the end of year 8). It was in my husband's mother tongue, a language she has been learning out of school for many years. She got a 9 in it. Why not get GCSE early if you think they will enjoy it and will excel in it? I would encourage it.

I see the GCHQ stuff has been mentioned. I would also recommend the national cipher challenge (this year's is just finishing); and I'm sure there is another cipher challenge run somewhere with different timing that might be coming up soon. Have a look at the british informatics Olympiad, and agree ++ extend his mathematics as much as you can, look at nrich and the maths trust pages.

Some of these are "goals to work towards" that will be more effective than school exams for his interests. Enjoy the ride!

My brother worked as an IT analyst for Goldman Sachs straight out of university, then did his Masters in Advanced Computer Science at Cambridge and is now doing his Phd at Harvard (in something coding related that I have no clue about).

IT and coding has been his passion for as long as I can remember, but he always did it on the side in addition to school rather than focusing too much on it at school. He did his IB in mainly maths/physics and other sciences and his undergraduate degree was in Engineering. However, his insane passion for coding led him to write some programs/do really cool projects on the side and once he finished his engineering degree he got offered an internship at Goldman Sachs as an analyst straight away. They then kept him on and he has been in the IT world ever since.

I guess in my experience if a child is passionate about coding and computer science, there is a lot he can do outside of school rather than rush to take his GCSEs.

And by the way, if he does decide to go into coding - it's a very smart career choice! My brother (he's still only 24) had been inundated with offers from the largest corporations all fighting over those coding guys and the salaries are astronomical.

Isn't it the case now that universities want to see the best 8 GCSEs from one sitting?* If so there is no advantage to doing one early, unless i suppose you want it out of the way or to free up an additional option (eg if fluent in one language do the GCSE in yr8 or 9 if ready for the highest grade and then pick up a new language?)

*disclaimer: i could have imagined this.

My son is sitting a GCSE in ICT this year (year 9). He sat his mocks in November and achieved an A*. The whole year group does this.
He will still do a Computing GCSE in year 11.
I believe ICT is the 'easier' of the GCSEs (happy to be corrected though).

While he is very pleased and we are proud of him

• which is testament to his hard work, I feel 13 is too young. It's a lot of pressure on any child and seeing a 13 year old studying for a GCSE is not something I'd recommend.

I'm dreading the GCSE revision over Easter when he could be out playing. There are no expectations from us, but at 13 my son
is not emotionally mature enough to deal with the results if they are not 'positive'.

If I were you I'd explore other avenues - coding clubs (can he set one up in school) competitions etc.

There will be plenty of time for GCSEs and I don't think I realised just how intense even a standalone GCSE (three exams here) let alone for a year 9.

My ds took maths early (year 10) and then AS maths in year 11 - quite common for the top set at his school and I don't see there were any disadvantages:
maths lessons continued with AS work in year 11
not seen as less demanding to take the AS with the remaining GCSEs and he got offers from all 5 universities he applied to so no apparent downside re uni applications
He also took one GCSE in year 7 (got an A*) and that was trickier - it was a foreign language) and he had to wait a few years to take the A level as he was not really mature enough to write a more sophisticated essay answer that the A level requires.

Middleoftheroad there isn't a GCSE in IT any more, not for a while now, I wonder if you ds is doing a different qualification?

perhaps IGCSE IT?

Apologies. It is indeed IGCSE

And that's been full on enough!