Taking 2 languages

[Sunshine1239]

Hi

Dd is choosing her options and is in all top sets. She’ll be taking 10 GCSEs

She wants to do both gcse languages french and German but currently these are her lowest grades - not necessarily low just lower than the rest of her subjects

MFL teachers say this is normal as they’re relatively new to kids until secondary and that kids and their levels catch up. Anyone have any experience?

Just wandering if she’d be better choosing a creativedge subject for a better grade at the end rather than two languages -but she genuinely likes languages!

She’s also taking a humanities and PE

Thanks

My eldest opted for art, product design and French. She really struggled with the 'creative' subjects, because of the volume of work involved, whereas French was something of a relaxation. For her, because the work had a definite end. She got A for French and art and B for product design- which was actually her strongest subject, she just couldn't get to grips with the quantity of work, verses quality.

My second daughter took both French and German and got 8 for both. Typically for the exams French is at the beginning of the exam period and German is at the end, so there's no overlap.

Daughter number for is also taking both French and German, as she loves languages.

I suspect female MFL grads who are not teaching is a small group, who may well, some of them, be freelance so not earning huge declarable salaries not long after graduation. Quite a few may be foreign nationals as well.

Fab thanks for all the replies - she’s handing choice form in today for both languages 😊

UCL is one uni I know of that won’t admit you onto any course unless you have a language at GCSE.

I understand this is wrong. They will admit you no problem. But if you haven't got a language GCSE they require you to take a language module whilst at the uni.

If it helps using actual GCSE grades for anyone else, Ds1 got a 5+ at the end of Year 10 in German which I believe they sat GCSE papers to determine the grading.

In year 11 he got a 6 in November mocks, a 7 in February mocks and an 8 in the final exam.

Predicitons are just that, this comes down to how much your child loves the subject and how much work they are willing to put in to increase their grades. The two don't necessarily go together. You can dislike a subject but try to improve your grade in it.

Ds1 was a determined student in all subjects and came out with incredible results, way over what his year 6 SATs predicted. Incredible teachers and a can-do attitude go a long way.

It’s really heartening to hear he did well. These threads are usually full of DC giving up MFL!

I’m not sure why foreign nationals shouldn’t get decent jobs with an MFL degree, Piggy. The low earners cannot be a small group to put MFL grads virtually at the bottom of the post graduating earnings table. Freelance and part time work could account for it but then many other women work part time such as nurses and teachers. It is very odd. However as I don’t think it’s typical, I would encourage MFL. Adding one to another popular subject for university application can result in a decent offer for an oversubscribed subject.

No, what I meant is I think they (the foreign nationals) either go into teaching or go back to Spain etc.

All of my DCs have sat or are sitting at least 2 languages at GCSE. DD is not super bright but last year she achieved a 9 and a 8 in French and Spanish respectively. I think it does help doing 2 because the topics are the same and the same types of questions will be asked just in a different language so they know what hoops they need to jump through. DS1 is very bright and he took one of his two language options a year early (french) and completed GCSE Italian as a third "challenege" language in a year and got an A*.

I work on a Brexit project for a financial services company and the lack of language skills in this country is going to be one of our biggest challeneges so I would expect to see the post graduation salaries for MFL to rise substantially in the future.

When they say a pupil is at 5/6 now, do they mean:
A)If they sat the exams right now, today, they would likely get 5/6?
B) they are working at a level that if they continued, they would likely get 5/6 by the time they sit their GCSEs?

I think it must be B) anxiety.

Apart from anything else, other than possibly in English Language, there is no way a student would have covered enough syllabus to get a 5/6 on an actual GCSE paper.

Although as various people have pointed out though, it's nigh on impossible to predict B) based on a student's work in KS3.

Actually from experience they tend to mean a) which is as much use as a chocolate fireguard IMHO, especially with MFL, for reasons stated upthread.

It means A

Dd is sitting gcse standard papers now and is getting 4s but in year 9

She says herself she hasn’t covered a lot of the paper

She wouldn't have covered a lot of the paper because she's in Y9. She is already getting a pass, she has two and a half more years of teaching to improve those grades. It sounds like she will do very well and as parents, and assuming that your DD does not already have another language, we should encourage our DCs to learn languages.

Actually I've figured it out. It is obviously B). Because my year 8 DD is getting lots of 7/8 (as are many other students) including maths and some languages and obviously, In year 8 they haven't covered anywhere near the work needed to get a 7/8 at GCSE so it is B) if they work as they are, they are likely to get the stated grade when they sit their GCSEs.

It varies from teacher to teacher. My daughter's (y10) art teacher gives no higher than a 6 predicted grade now, even though when I talked to her she expects my daughter to get a 9 if she progresses as she has done up to now. Her history teacher gives GCSE questions but only on the syllabus they have covered. She grades them to that level but obviously it's not a complete exam. Her language teacher predicts as if they were taking the exam today. Not very helpful!
I think you've done the right thing in picking GCSEs she's really interested in.