GCSE’s summer 2020 thread 5 - And then there were none..

[FoolsAssassin]

Once upon a time there was a group of year 11 students who had spent the last few years preparing to sit their GCSE exams in the summer of 2020. Then one day they woke up and found themselves as characters in a real life disaster movie and as if by magic the exams disappeared.

What lies next for the Corona Cohort?!

Thread 4
Thread 3
Thread 2
Thread 1 (Year 10)

Anyone lurking please feel free to jump on in .

Thanks Piggy.
Knew I could rely on you.
You're like Proff Chris Whitty - utterly confidence inducing and calming in a totally intelligent way!

How funny that you teach 2.

Ds1 I think favours eng Lang and sociology.

Thanks oblomov

As I said to Piggy.
Our school (very very pushy catholic school) ask students to do 4 A'levels until Christmas. Before dropping one, if struggling. Most students don't.

Will that continue this year though? Seeing as we are all now abnormal?

I don't know what the fuck it is for the kids round here they seem absolutely dedicated and incredibly bright.

In Ds1's maths class they have 6 Malaysian boys who so far haven't got less than 98% in any test/mock exam they've done!

@Wheresthebeach I’m could swear we’re at the same school if you didn’t have DD. Same letter same words.

DD is outraged at the thought of not getting a long summer holiday, she’s concerned they will make them work til the end of term, rather than the end of exam period. We’ll see.

@Shimy I guess the schools have a similar approach. I wonder if they’re all chatting and agreeing locally.

@Oblomov20 we have the same setup at ds’s school. 4 A’levels mandatory till after Xmas plus a mandatory research project that can be converted into an EPQ if they want (most including DS want) I don’t see that happening in light of recent developments infact I think that would be completely mad. We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.

I guess the schools have a similar approach. I wonder if they’re all chatting and agreeing locally.

@Wheresthebeach I wouldn’t be surprised at all.

Same shimy. Plus EPQ.
Like you say, I just imagine this coming year being the same!

Paddington:

"If they want to take the exam in the Autumn they should continue regular revision. "

Was talking to Ds1 about this earlier. It's ridiculous.

Say you're a crammer who who studies really hard last minute and revises really hard and does really well in the final exam. But your mocks weren't quite as good.

Say you're predicted a 6 or a 7. But you hoped to get an 8?

So, you get a 6? And you think : I could've got an 8 - I'll sit the exam in the autumn.

but the trouble is : you haven't been studying for nearly 7 months by this point ! so how are you going to get an 8 in the autumn exam anyway?

EPQ mentioned by DD's school too...

Even today Beach?
As in, they plan to continue as usual?

Yep @Oblomov20. Full on line lessons and continued assessments after Easter. Then onto Pre A level and EPQ. Full steam ahead although they did point out that there was no need to revise over Easter....

Bless them Beach. Aren't they soft and forgiving!

And promised there will be not be any online exams ............

I'm wondering what schools your year 11 dc go to if they are being set so much work? My dc (grammar school) has been given no work at all since closure - they were told any work set after closure date would not be taken into account. Teachers are focusing on other years as well as administrating the vast task of evidence gathering ..(or looking after their own children, self-isolating etc). The other state schools in the region appear to be the same. I can't understand how home-working after the school closure date can be used as part of the assessment criteria, if some schools are setting it and others aren't?

I am guessing that the independents will be more structured in setting formal work and structuring lessons for Y11 and Y13 post-Easter, for the simple reason that they will need to justify the £££ they'll be charging for next term's fees. Which, to be fair, makes business sense. And arguably it will do those DC a favour because if they carry on with a degree of formal structured work until the end of June it will help their transition to A levels in the longer term.

I am fully intending to (try and) get my state educated DS to be structured about A level prep and study after the Easter holidays. The difficulty will be that although his school have committed to providing study materials and suggestions, there won't be any lessons as such, so it will be harder to motivate him.

Given the recent announcement, is anyone else wondering- no matter which sector their DC are educated in - if the ‘centre assessments’ put forward will be ‘blind’ about the students that are hoping to progress to Sixth Form at that school and those that are moving elsewhere?

We have just been told to continue revision and there will be assessments once 'back' in May. They will be open book and at home and won't make a massive difference to 'predicted' grade but presumably could be used by the school in case of borderline grades or for those kids who pull it out the bag??

After that the rest of year 11 will be spent in pre-a level prep. Private schools need to justify fees for next term hence the above I suspect.

@ProggyMat

I hope so - I know we will be. A lot of our year 11s have several options at post 16 and don't always decide til (ironically) results day.

I think the rank ordering IMO is going to be hardest with a big year group. Estimated grades not so much.

Something that struck me whilst taking my daily exercise a bit earlier - how will teachers come up with combined science grades?
Will they be given a formula to work out the 2 grades? Or maybe they’ll give individual science grades in and Ofqual will come up with the overall 2?
I ask because when I asked one of DD’s science teachers how the 2 grades work at a recent parents evening, she said she really didn’t know.

Alsoplay from what I remember from a meeting I attended last year it goes on a points system. So each paper gets given an amount of points and collectively they work out what grade it comes out at e.g if out of 200 points then if you get 180 you get a 5.5 but if you got 175 then it would drop to 5.4.

Note these numbers do not represent the real grade boundaries but just as an example.

Of course how they work out when no exams have taken place is anyone's guess but I guess they look at mock grades and class work in each science area.

@Oblomov20

Oblomov20 my DD has no intention of continuing to revise it’s just what the school communicated.

I wish we knew an actual results day date, as mentioned earlier up the thread the ‘before the end of July’ has now changed to ‘won’t be delayed until after the date they were expected in August and ideally a little earlier’. If they’d just stuck with the original date I don’t think people would have even questioned it.

Ds wasn’t planning on doing an EPQ (as he is planning to do Further Maths as an additional subject so has enough to do) so hasn’t done any research on it but I think this might be a good thing to keep him occupied over the next few months. Has anyone got any links I could send him so he could start researching topics?