Thread 3: Continuing to GCSEs Summer 2020 - Happy New Exam Year!

[OrangeCinnamon]

Continuation of previous thread
Thread 2

Thread 1 Year 10

At the end of last thread there was a bit of talk on prom dresses ( recommend Fonthill Rd in London if you can get there) by @proggymat and @crazycrofter

@TigerMum had a query regarding moving to foundation level at this stage.

Sorry peeps thread progressed without me noticing so none can reply to your queries!

DS state high school (we’re still 3 tier) does Classics a-level. There are loads doing Latin GCSE!

The get revising tool works for DS as he can add gym time & training (he rows) and while he won’t be competing in regattas over exam period, he will continue training so it allows him to see & understand how to fit it all in without panic. He is also VERY structure / routing led so it works for him.

proggy :it's Classical Civilisation we offer at A Level. Not sure how many do it but at least 10. Maybe more. It's got higher numbers than any of the MFL subjects.

*routine

DD wants to do Latin and Ancient Greek at A level but I think classical languages appear to be in the same boat as MFL and music in terms of A level provision.

Bizarrely, classics is one of the subjects that attracts a sizeable teacher training bursary : despite there being almost no state schools in which to teach it, and , in truth, few private schools outside of London do Latin and Greek.

DD is taking both Latin and Classical Civilisation for GCSE.

Her (state) school offers them both at A-level but she isn't choosing either.

Both DC's schools offer Latin at GCSE and A level (Indies outside London), and DD's offers Classics at A level.

Right I have emailed second local school to check the online application has actually been received for sixth for, and called current school to find out what is happening about study leave as if there is running around to exams etc could really do with knowing at this point. Won’t go there about it being nice to have a timetable...

While I went down the 'getrevising' rabbit hole (many thanks for the recommendation above), I also ended up looking at the Study Buddy. It gives the DC all the units that need to be studied for each GCSE so that they don't miss anything. Does anyone have any experience of using it? Worth buying?

ksb I think there were parents on last year's y11 threads who were using Study Buddy, so you could search up that set of threads and try there. (It's based on an Agile Programming approach iirc)

We've considered study buddy too. The creator was on the board last year when it was new to the market - it would be interesting to see what those parents who used it thought of it.

DD has come home today with her exam timetable so now I know whether she is doing higher or foundation for which subjects. Looks like her exams are spread over an exact month with half term in between so we'll be done mid June. For DD's Muslim Friends Ramadan is finishing when our half term starts so they'll only have 2 weeks of exams which coincide - I wonder if some families are more lenient during exams as I would have thought water was essential for concentrating.

DD is so exhausted so we are limping towards half term but these next two weeks will drag I know plus she'll be asked to come in to school like she was in Oct half term for some study sessions. She missed her Saturday session last weekend as was so tired and run down and didn't go after school today either but they aren't compulsory now just highly recommended as too many parents went ape.

I can feel myself getting stressed...

Far from stellar mock results with a particularly dire result for French. 4,5,5,5,6,6,6,7,7,8. So, on the assumption that more revision after most of the syllabuses finish before Easter will result in at least one grade upgrade, we only have 2 subjects of concern - one of which DS wants to take for A Level!

Ineffective revision in the form of severe lack of note making is our battle here as well as firm rejection of any help from yours truly. Not a good combination for my attempt at maintaining peace and calm in our household (failing miserably!)

Doesn't help that most of DS's HW is still on new syllabus work as opposed to revision of work covered at the end of Y9 & Y10 so there is a severe lack of time for actual revision of past work!

I know it's all relative sansou and should be measured against each child's expected results but those, objectively, are pretty good results!

I was about to say the same! Bring the 4 and 5s up and those results will be pretty impressive come August.

It feels like mocks are trickier in some ways than the real exams, with kids trying to juggle learning new stuff, revising old stuff AND doing homework.

Yes I was about to say they are pretty good too sansou! Maybe it helps to focus on what she actually needs for the next stage, as opposed to "would be nice"? Definitely not worth stressing over anyway!

Good results for mocks @sansou .

One of DS's teachers reminded me (when I was looking particularly stressed clearly) that the mocks results are revised for over a much shorter amount of time and while they are still finishing off the syllabus, so not to panic. Real thing is much more drawn out. Hope that maybe helps put the grades into perspective @sansou.

Relative is the word.

DH puts it in perspective by reminding me how rubbish his O Level AND A Level results were - NOT that I want him to broadcast that message to DS at this point in time!

DS gets shouty and defensive and is resistant to making a detailed revision timetable. And breathe....

sansou
Those grades look quite reasonable to me, although I guess the response depends on what you were expecting him to get.

We are limping to half term. DD exhausted. Having Jan mocks meant Xmas wasn’t a break. She looks dead on her feet.

I’ve told her if there is any nonsense about going in during half term that she needs to claim we’re away.
sansou add a grade each and you’ve 6 grades 7 or above. Not too shabby I’d have thought.

@sansou those results look pretty decent to me. With a bit more studying they will go up at least a grade and you’ll be smiling all the way to sixth form. Well done to your dc.

DS needs 7's for his subject A Level choices. One of them is a 5 so the pressure is on particularly for that one. He then needs 6's generally across the board so the 4 is a real concern.

A gap of one grade below is reasonably surmountable but two is more of a stretch and therein, lies the pressure. I would love for him to treat French as collateral damage since I suspect his lack of linguistic skills means that on a cost base analysis, he's better off spending the time on pulling up the 5/6's rather than labouring on his worst subject just to gain most probably a 5!

Those are high entry requirements!