GCSEs Summer 2020 (thread 4) -the final countdown

[PostNotInHaste]

Thread 3
Thread 2
Thread 1(year 10)

Hope OrangeCinnamon doesn’t mind me starting another in her absence , feel twitchy without ! Apologies in advance if I have messed the links up.

The last thread ended with discussion of possible school closures, not really what we want to hear at this point - let’s hope things sound more positive as thread progresses.

We've had an email from school saying 'continuing as normal'. If the school needs to shut temporarily they will use Google Classroom. Any children self isolating will have lessons via Google Classroom.

We're supposed to be going away (all booked and paid for) over the first weekend of Easter Half term. School asking parents to consider carefully any travel plans for those in an exam year...its for a sports event that DD needs practice for so she's desperate to go. I really want her to go to but feeling now that maybe taking the risk of getting stuck in Spain in April is a form of madness.

Did any dc sit French Oral today? DS did, he said it was good but the questions were hard.

Holy moly DS got an 8 in a French listening this week. I'm in shock! His weakest. Apparently he says grade boundaries low in that one. Now needs to get the writing up too.
DS (Gcse one) school haven't sent anything out re contingency plans but DS2 (at a different school) sent their contingency plan out today. Basically VLE, some online video thing they subscribe to and a video conferencing for the gcse and A level kids. The two former for non gcse and A level kids. At least they are thinking about it.

Sims was that his actual exam? What board is that? AQA thank goodness doesn't start the window till April (I'm examining some and I don't think I'm ready yet!)

Excellent Lovethecrown!

I have been reading some of the CV threads and people posting that DC are starting are starting their GCSE’s in 9 weeks or something like that number and found myself thinking , hmm that’s not long!

Yup, ‘tis 9 weeks, Post
For DD, it’s 3 weeks to endi of term, 3 weeks holiday (!) then 3 weeks to kick off.

Sorry my post was to Shimy don't know who Sims is! 😄

We had the actual oral exams last week too, Cambridge here.

Could we reframe that slightly differently please Proggy as sounds a touch scary broken down like that 😀

I’m toting up how many more uniform washes...(hides)

oh yes I see Cambridge iGCSE speaking window is 1 March to 30 April! Wowser, well at least that's one done. 👍

Anyone doing MFL AQA GCSE, which is much the most likely at a state school, the speaking window opens at the start of April so don't panic; it runs until mid May too so post Easter is still possible.

Now thinking in terms of uniform washes takes the edge off

DD doing Cambridge French oral on March 24th according to her multi-coloured wall planner.

clary we're GCSE AQA French and our orals start w/b 27th April so quite a while yet - in some ways it's good as DD needs all the time she can but am wanting to tick off as many as possible before mid May when they start in earnest. She has dance and drama practicals sometime within the next few weeks too.

Our French exam board just says Pearson next to it and no date for the oral yet.

Presumably they mean Edexcel right?

Pearson are Edexcel, yes.

Aqa French for DD (Indie) and for oral her exam timetable reads TBC
I think it will be post Easter holidays, though.
After checking said timetable for French oral, I’ve noticed she has 9 exams in Week 1, 28 in total, 1 triple because French listening and reading scheduled in same day as one other subject and no clashes.

DS is doing Spanish AQA and his oral is end of April. I suspect it will not be a highlight of his exams...

He had second lot of mocks last week and the week before last and also PE practical last week. He’s had maths back - they did the November 2019 papers and got a very high 7. As there were some parts he didn’t attempt then getting an 8 seems possible.

I do hope his school doesn’t get closed as although I work from home. I do have to work and I am pretty sure he would do a lot less at home than at school...

DD did her French Oral on Thursday. She thought it went very well but she has been doing a lot of extra French and is in a small group that meet to do immersive French every week. It’s made an enormous difference to her confidence. Just need to hope the rest of the papers go as well

Ds school haven’t mentioned Coronavirus. I’m hoping they get through the next 4 weeks until the Easter hols and then at least he should have finished the content. He would only have 2 teaching weeks after that then a weeks study leave before the exams but it would mean 5 whole weeks at home before it all kicks off. Lots of potential to lose momentum (if he ever gets any)
His first exam is the food tech practical next week. He’s hated the whole thing and doesn’t really seem to know how to get a decent mark.

DSs school has mentioned coronavirus but only saying things will go on as normal as much as possible. No mention of what might happen with years 11 and 13.

Headteacher (was new last September) too busy with changing the uniform, school day, when they choose GCSE options and staggering lunchtimes to consider something like exams...,

Well done to all the MFL-ers who have done their speaking, hope it was Ok.

Good luck to those with it still to come - key thing is to make sure verbs are accurate, get all those tenses in correctly. Practice generic phrases giving opinions, remember to use "because" to give a reason. Your teacher wants to help so they will not let you drown!

Proggymat MFL reading and listening are always together as they are short exams. Sympathies with nine in the first week tho; ds had seven in week one last yr and someone he knew (doing comp Sci and French) had 10! 😮