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!

No envelope malarky for DD. Grades just filter through in lessons.
Sending positive vibes for those in the midst of mocks.
After today's exams DD has 6 left-Friday clearly in sight!
I'm impressed at how she has managed to put revision and mocks into context. In her words, she has 'spent too long on 'stressy' subjects and not enough on 'cocky' subjects . The latter category has been framed as 'collateral damage'. Maths and FM are in this category, soo lets hope she is of the same mindset when the results are in .
On another positive note, she has decided to drop one humanity and surprisingly has gone for History. I'm hoping that this can be done swiftly with minimum hassle.
I'm advocating a rest, apart from homework, and for her to 'pick up the reins of revision' at half term.

We got our O level results (real not mock) by going to school and scanning a huge printout of everyone's results which was stuck to the inside of a window. No data privacy then

DS has two mocks today but in ok subjects. Going to sport practice tonight to let off steam.

No idea how our school does it. A friends did the full reveal at parents evening!

Which reminds me...need to go look up the parents evening dates...

DS had mocks in November/December and has more in February (after half term I think). They’ve been given results as they’ve been marked - can’t see why they need to be given out like results day - it’s not something you need to practise!

Had a text from school telling us the date of the prom. June 18th. Will need to find him a suit by then I suppose...

DD had mocks early December. Had most results back during lessons, still waiting on a couple. Mainly 6’s one 4 and one 3. Hoping they’ll be further feed back during parents eve next month. DD did some revision but not nearly as much as school were suggesting as they were still setting homework for topics still not covered all the syllabus! So hoping she can build on these and improve the ones she needs to.

Justherewithmypopcorn thank you, yes there are various stress management help tools offered by DS's school but he refuses to use any of them unfortunately! We have managed to work out a routine at home that seems to work for us though.

DS1 also had a special Y11 assembly where each child got their results on an individual stapled sheet of A4. I am absolutely sure that this is to drum home the importance of the fact that these are mocks and not just random assessments, and will also then form part of reading the riot acts to the kids who really haven't bothered. I am an exam invigilator at a local state school and whilst the vast majority of a year group tend to be focused and diligent and at least try, there will always be the mavericks who clearly don't take exams seriously. In one exam last term we had at least ten Y11s who wrote their name on the paper then put their head on the desk and went to sleep (despite checks from invigilators that they were ok and did they want to actually write something etc etc). Sounds unbelievable but it does happen!

@dietcokeandwine
On last year’s GCSE support thread it was mentioned that a DC had fallen asleep in the exam proper and that the invigilator did not check if they were okay.
Whether the sleeping was deliberate or not, obviously , could not be ascertained in this circumstance.
In your capacity as an invigilator, what would happen in an exam proper?

caveat it may not have been on the GCSE support thread but falling asleep in an exam proper was highlighted.

DD’s school also doing mock GCSE results day early Feb with envelopes.

Mocks ongoing. I think it’s been a good experience so far in terms of timekeeping (not finishing in time). She’s also borderline whether to do higher or foundation science so having a go at higher and although finding it hard thinks physics and chemistry went ok but will see what the results are and make a decision then.

ProggyMat in the public exams there would be a cover sheet for each exam session that all invigilators present sign, and anything that happens during the exam (ie toilet breaks, student illness, any unusual event or disruption) is recorded on that sheet. The school’s exam officers would report issues to the exam board as necessary.

That is what happens where I work anyway but we would always check when a student appears to be asleep. In the vast majority of cases they are just disengaged and glare/ shake their head at you (though this happens far more in mocks than the real thing) but of course there is always the possibility that a student might actually be ill or very tired.

As is par for the course with DD’s school, we haven’t been told anything about how/when mock results will be given. Some of her teachers are REALLY slow at marking stuff, so we could be in for a wait.
In the same vein, year 11 parents’ evening is the night before A level choices have to be submitted, and the outcome of bursary applications haven’t been given yet, despite the fact that closing date for the acceptance of places in the nearest competitor school was last week.

Can you tell I’m a bit fed up with it all?

DD seems to feel the mocks have gone ok so far, except for one maths paper which she found hard ( but she’s not a natural mathematicians and says others found it hard too; it was a paper written by the HoD)
Having said that, I’m not sure how reliable DD is at judging her own performance - it’s possible and quite likely that she will have made a hash of some things but be oblivious.

History is proving to be the thorn in all our sides. There is just SO much content, it feels insurmountable, and they still have a whole component still to study.

dietcokeandwine
Phew! I found it disturbing that a DC would be left to sleep in an exam proper-DD has been known to nod off in lessons after a bad nights sleep!
Alsoplayspiccolo Times are stressful enough with mocks, A level choices and pending GCSE exams. If you spoke to the bursar would they confirm when decisions are to be made?

Am just waiting on DD sending me a message re: results! Don’t know who was more nervous this morning!
Interviews have gone well and now holding 3 6th form offers, so hoping results will support that.

Ooooh seems lots of schools are doing the envelope thingy. At ds’s school, results will come through as and when marked.
3 more papers to go and that’s it..for now.

Does anyone else think mocks are set much much harder than the real exams will be? DS has said that even the ones he painstakingly revised were hard, not to mention French his ‘collateral’ damage.

DD said she could hear the girl being interviewed before her yesterday-clearly thin walls! And she was being told that if her mock results weren’t good enough they wouldn’t offer a place for 6th form-I thought it a bit off to be saying that AFTER they had done them.

Shimy Many schools use last year's papers as mocks. Is your school doing that, or making up their own papers?

DDs school have seen sense! She was told yesterday that the envelope session had been cancelled, as it was felt the time could be better spent! So now she will be able to go straight into going over papers etc. Some teachers are incredibly slow at marking stuff though so goodness knows when we will have a full set of results.

Four exams today and then last one tomorrow.

I think mocks are harder that the real thing in terms of having lots of exams stuffed into a much shorter period of time. Also often less time to prepare (DD was getting homework right up until Christmas). She doesn't get study leave for mocks either. In terms of content though, most of her papers have just been the ones sat in the summer last year, with one or two alterations if topics haven't yet been covered.

Shimy French listening is definitely in DD's colletral damage pile .
DD mention that her teachers have said the GCSE papers are designed to make you think that you have done badly.
I think at the mock stage they won't be fully au fait with exam technique etc and they won't have done a lot of past papers, so they will appear hard.
Hopefully!
DD has found timing was an issue. She has finished papers but would have liked extra time. On some papers she has said even with extra time she would not have been able to answer some questions.

DD reporting on the whole, mocks papers have been harder than she thought they'd be. Biology, for example, she thought questions were more geography or maths material vs actual biology. Frustrated that she couldn't just regurgitate I guess. Not sure if this is a bad thing, but don't know enough about the syllabus changes over the recent years to comment constructively.

On another note, good to hear of O level aged parents on here. I feel really old in RL being surrounded by GCSE only parents

DD said both Geo 2 (urban) and Chemistry were 'hard' but that everyone found them hard so she's not too fussed.

She's now decided that she hasn't worked hard enough for the upcoming Physics mock...which is shame. She'll do lots tonight I guess and we'll keep fingers crossed for an okay result.

I think us 'O level parents' have an advantage over GCSE parents. O level parents went through revising for everything at once, everything being pinned on the summer exams.
GCSE parents of teens would have had much more continuous assessment / controlled assessments, plus modular papers with retakes.
O level parents maybe have more experience of revising for loads of stuff simultaneously and a big exam load.

Are the actual exams in the same dates across England. My dds school have told them they are in June but according to google they start in May.

My daughter has had a breakdown and school have asked Cahms to help.

I’m considering pulling her completely and letting her sit them privately paid for next year, she is the youngest in class but feel it’s me panicking talking.

I did GCSEs - and you're right, English Lang and Lit were 100% coursework! There was coursework in pretty much every subject, except languages - even Maths.

We had dd's parents evening last night. It may well be the last time I go to the school, except to pick up results, as she's planning to leave for sixth form. I can't believe how fast those five years have gone! She took the entrance exam exactly five years ago.

Parents evening was a bit of a waste of time, as she's doing well across the board. The advice was all fairly obvious but good for her to hear. Hope all those doing mocks still are coping!

Another O’Level aged parent here .
@teenplus I’m not sure. I haven’t even thought about it and I don’t think DS knows either. If they did use last yrs they wouldn’t have disclosed it to the students though or did they at yours?
@Proggy it’s not just French listening here, it’s French everything I’m trying to get through to him that having at least one language is very important, considering he wants to study business Mgt.

Seeline - Apart from the point about timing, I also think the questions are set much harder in order to prepare them for the real questions. I’ve gleaned this from my ds’s complaint that he found it hard to even access the questions.