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 .

Oo just found a report - she got 6 in maths and 6 in parts of English but a 5 in the reading. So 5 in English overall. No subdivisions a b c on the report anywhere.

DD also got a 6 in Maths but was one mark off in reading (sad that I remember that!). She barely ever reads now though, maybe she'll pick it up again over these next few months. She was thinking about English Lit A Level, but I think she's settled on RS, Psychology and History now.

Ah yes of course ! Thanks @Piggywaspushed.

@FoolsAssassin I'll swap you a toastie for some cake! Your DS did amazingly well then given his difficulties, you should be very proud of him.

@ProggyMat I asked him he told me my idea was 'dead' and then laughed when i made a sad face, he's such a meaner but I'll work on him. I got my toastie though.

You're welcome!

Anyone else starting to get nervous again about the Ofqual decisions this week? I assume they will have made some decisions, it could all just be more vague advice of course.

Me popcorn! When are we expecting that announcement?

I thought it was to be out this week?

Yeah I’m getting nervous. I’d hate KS2 results to be a guide. DD is dyslexic and without extra time, increased print size etc she struggles. With the access arrangement she flys. I really don’t like the system of predicting based on tests at 11. I think the results should be about that moment in time, rather than a guide for how they’ll do in Geography or History. Secondary is so different, and kids develop so much.

I’m not sure what more they can say than what we’ve deduced already? I guess they will set a deadline for schools to submit their grades and a date for ‘results day’.

I don’t think SATs will play much of a role @Wheresthebeach except for at a whole school level, eg to demonstrate why the distribution of grades for this year 11 in school X should be higher than what the same school achieved the previous year - because KS2 results on entry were higher overall.

They can’t play a massive role because private schools don’t do them. My ds (not in this cohort) didn’t do them either because he was home educated at that point.

I think the teachers' unions are currently coming up with some workable suggestions to present to the DofE.

Since many teachers feel that snapshot GCSEs are not the best way of assessing students, the current situation can be take as an opportunity to show that Teacher Assessment can work fairly and that it won't turn into a mad grade inflation.

You’re probably right @crazycrofter. I was shocked when I discovered that targets for GCSE’s were based on KS2, and KS2 targets based on KS1. Seems like the system is designed assuming linear progress.

I presume DfE will be giving guidance on how much proof is required to back up a grade, and maybe some sort of weighting eg mocks v classroom? Be interesting to see.

I think 'm just looking for reassurance that no further assessments are going to be made.

As our school is still hinting at this.

A couple of exam board websites have crashed today which makes me wonder if mad updates are being done to pages.

I am very interested in seeing how this plays out. My yr 11 child has been told by school to carry on doing 2 hours revision a day over the holidays (less obviously than would normally have been expected) and they will do open book assesments after Easter. This seems pretty unlikely to me though.

As we are now mid week, here’s hoping further news on how grades will be determined is imminent.

I haven't read this thread but i feel the only fair way is to ask the teachers what the absolute maximum grade that child could have got in June and award that . They will have so much admin and re sits otherwise . My daughter did level 6 sats and is predicted 8/9's across the board so I think she will be fine but a lot of her make friends have only just started to excel in the last few key assessments being much more interested in football at age 10.

Ooh that's interesting Piggy. I know our school were hoping/expecting to be able to advise Yr11/13 parents of what was going to happen before the Easter break this Friday.

I am picturing the big Zoom rows between Ofqual/DfE / exam boards and teachers' reps right now!! All muting each other's mics, no doubt.

Like everyone else - slightly nervous here and just wanting some firm clarification!

My DS, like many other posters' DC, has made huge amounts of progress since KS2 SATS, in part due to correct DX of SEN and in part to general maturity. I am really hoping that as @crazycrofter has said the SATS, where applicable, can be considered at whole school level only.

I also really really hope that they confirm that no work or assessments completed post 20 March can be used in any way as part of grade justification. Numerous posts on this already but even as a non-teacher I can see how it would just not be fair (thinking about potential challenges different students may be facing across all sectors of society) to even consider it.

Selfishly I'm hoping they will look into SATS, DS got a level 6 in Maths, spent yrs 7-9/10 being predicted an 8 ( but probably a 9). In the last year he seemed to hit a wall and plateaued and the most recent predicted grade was a 7. His last mock was a solid 7. His teacher wants him to aim for an 8 - but wasn't yet quite there.

He needs a 7 to get into college to do A Level Maths, but really could do with an 8 as it's a popular college

@Piggywaspushed and someone will have forgotten to mute their mike as they call someone else an idiot (or worse).

As others have mentioned no SATS in private schools and seems insane to me to use those as a basis for gcse grades. A lot changes between age 10 and 16 especially for summer born children.

Honestly, I would rather the whole thing was just scrapped this year. Schools know by now if your child is suitable to do an a level in whichever subject they were planning on. I am guessing if they were going to another school/college for further education then references would have been submitted and places offered??

But also not fair for some children to being told that work they will do after easter will count and they should carry on revising where as other schools have told their students to stop revising.

The guidelines need to come out asap.