Science concerns year 10

[DinkyDaisy]

Hello,
My DS good at science but seems to be getting little work over Lockdown. Just revision type stuff with no real impetus to do work from science teachers.
He is at a school where only a few in his year were going to do Triple science. He thinks that won't happen now.
I know all up in the air but what do others feel about science?
I don't want to pressure my ds as notice he is down at the moment and beginning to flag with homeschooling.
However, need to pep him up a bit...

Fairly certain our school will be running triple science but top third do that and it's a strong subject for the school. Maybe e-mail his teacher and ask but I would have thought for year 10 it would be exams they were planned to enter for originally though maybe there would be more flexibility than usual re adjustments.

Mine are y9 and y8 - year 8 is ASD so I don't everything with him, y9 is secret squirrel but believe she is keeping up with science. I'm leaving my y9 to it as she seems to be working. My y8 has moments of no-one else is doing anything, only a couple with mothers who make them. I then ask him what he thinks will happen to people who treat it as a holiday, does he not think they will fall behind. He agrees and I continue with it, first day is normally growling and throw yourself on the floor as he's ASD. Next day he is fine and back to learning happily. Overall he's quite cheerful.

It's hard to know what to do when they are down but I would e-mail teacher and get confirmation course going ahead. That will give him or purpose. I would encourage him to learn even if it's not exactly set work - my DS will often reject the set work and we do seneca on same topic. It's hard though not knowing what will happen next year, we don't know with year 9 what GCSEs will be - they are supposed to sit 2 in year 10 and some subjects are much easier to do from home.

I read all the work myself for my DS but it does take quite a bit of time but he prefers me reading it out and doing work interactively - probably an ASD thing but sometimes I find he will work with one method not others. Hope you can find a solution.

don't = do or = a

Yes I wondered whether our school would drop the triple science. My daughter is in year 10 and the teaching has been similar, with just revision style tests on Google classroom. I know when she started triple science the school said it was very content heavy and they'd be teaching right up to Easter of year 11 to fit it all in. I'm sure she's missed a lot of new material already and not sure how she can catch up.

Sorry - to clarify - when I say 'drop' I mean go to the trilogy (dual award) instead

Doing double science does not impact on your ability to take a levels etc. It's always a stretch to fit everything in if you do triple in a double amount of time. I'm wondering if a lot of schools will drop triple to make up for lost learning time

It seems like a sensible compromise to me. Better to get two good GCSEs than 3 poor ones.

Thanks, everyone.
I shall double check with him what he is supposed to be doing as he is not keen on me emailing his teacher!
He had very high predictions for double and I guess that will do if school goes down that route. He would just have fewer Gcses...
He may do sciences at A level and I know that option would still be there with double.
I think may just encourage him to watch science youtube on stuff he has a real interest in to keep him engaged with science, if not with the actual gcse content.
He feels bogged down at present with subjects he finds less engaging but that are piling the work on.
A tricky time for our teenagers...

Seneca is something he could perhaps shake the dust of as well!
Thanks, Koalas...

My DS is only year 8 so it may not be the same for year 10 but he wasn't engaging with the science work and I e-mailed the science teacher and she said to use seneca and he said he wouldn't fall behind using that and he could do triple if he kept up with that. It is very fact based.

Ours also have Kerboodle from school which is largely textbooks for their subjects - its the same as the books you can buy for GCSE science relative to their exam board from a bookshop. I think Pearson have put their online for free though quite hard to read.

Oak National Academy have a lot of subjects on:

www.thenational.academy/online-classroom/year-10#schedule

Lessons are excellent, issue I've found is its following curriculum in completely different order to school.

I would imagine next year's GCSEs will be adjusted in some way but as no way of knowing how yet though they are always done on a curve so if everyone has gone down will be adjusted for the average. Not sure how much the average child is doing compared to normal - our school have given impression top set are as before. Would imagine there's lots not engaging though - I do everything with my DS and some of it is complicated to follow and would imagine some kids have given up or prefer to just be on phone etc.

If the school haven't sent an e-mail out saying subjects are dropped would assume they are going ahead though I don't think schools know yet what will happen next year - if its 15 per class again presumably there could still be part home learning until a vaccine. You can do science A Levels with double but you have to make up the extra third you've missed per A Level. I would take advice from teacher before going down that route though it probably is best option for some if they can do well in double but struggle in triple.

Hi there, I am a Science teacher and have been using www.coresciences.co.uk with my students. It has GCSE required practicals virtually. So students can pick up objects, pour things, measure things and collect data just as they would in a lab, but it’s all online. The site also has revision PowerPoints, questions and games. My students like it as it is so different from the theory/fact based online resources (although there is some of that in there too). I like it as I feel they are learning skills which they can use for real when we finally get back in a lab. Core Sciences are currently offering free trials, you might want to speak to your child’s school to get the whole school signed up. If not, parents can sign up for an individual account. I hope this helps!

Royal Albert Hall Sea Shambles live stream last night available here. Looks a great line up, going to watch tonight with DS yr11.

Thank you for the links.
Will check properly tomorrow and also sent to ds who is now in bed.
Feeling a bit bogged down generally I think.

I shall double check with him what he is supposed to be doing as he is not keen on me emailing his teacher!

This raises red flags to me as a teacher- I have had a few emails from parents concerned about lack of work for home learning etc and they have all come from parents who's children aren't completing all the work set.

Are you able to see what work he is being set and check what he has been submitting? If not, I would email the school to start off! We have been told not to chase, as some families are really struggling and we don't want to put extra pressure on them.

It's pretty unusual that the triple vs double decision doesn't seem to have been made by Y10. There's quite a lot of triple only content in the topics I teach in Y10, so for us, the decision is set in stone at this point.

We are teaching new content (although we've changed the order of teaching to avoid practical heavy or too difficult topics) as there's a lot of content to get through in even double science. However, equally, revision of early concepts will be useful- the first topics taught at GCSE generally underpin a lot of the stuff that comes later on, and knowing this really well will help him a lot! It also means that no student will be left behind completely, which is a good thing IMO.

Seneca is great, and there are lots of good videos on Youtube as well. Lots of people like freesciencelessons and primrose kitten, and I think fuse school can also be pretty good. You can also find past paper questions with mark schemes at physicsandmathstutor.com - this covers all three sciences and has past paper questions organised by topic, so he can test himself on what he has learnt.

I'd send an email to his teachers, asking if there is anything extra they recommend he could/should be doing and checking his current work is up to standard.

Our school use showmyhomework (SMHW)/ SatchelOne and you can get a parent log-in to that. I had to request one but they are useful to have as you can see what's being set - sometimes it says not submitted when they have done the work, it's just they haven't submitted it via SMHW though quite often it will show what they aren't doing.

I also find teachers can be discreet if you e-mail them and say please don't mention to my child they won't. But I've found it useful to contact teachers and see the work and you can identify where the problem lies - like can they not be bothered, is it too difficult, do they not have the technology, is there too much / too little work. Our school is setting for all subjects though in the practical ones (art, drama etc) it's nothing like what it would be at school but the academic ones are similar (humanities, sciences minus practicals, maths, English, languages) to at school.

Our school isn't chasing either - they ask kids to fill in a survey each week saying if they've done all the work or not. Would imagine most kids are putting yes to that and telling parents the same and whether they've done the work is an entirely different matter. But teachers have access to SHMW and you can get it as a parent and it gives some idea of the reality.

Science just set a load of work.
Think realise we are in for the long haul and changed tack from revision [which my ds not been doing as far as I can see...] to lessons/ PowerPoints and work to give in.
Will have a look at it tomorrow as not had a chance yet and ds now in bed.
He got 9 9 in Double science mocks and was going to do Triple and having extra lessons for it before Lockdown. Will have to wait and see how things stand after Lockdown- whenever that will be.
I may email science teachers before the holidays/ by Friday.
Fed up with what this Lockdown doing to ds...
He is not coping with it as well as he was....

That's good they are now setting Powerpoints. Our school appeared to have a we need to prepare longer term for this today moment as well and we got an e-mail today saying no year 7-9s back in medium term and hardly any year 10 lessons before summer. Not sure what will happen in September but I'm just trying to make sure online is as workable as we can make it. I think they will adjust next year's results and possibly following years if it continues but hard to know how atm so would just see what you can do with teachers and online. Sorry he's feeling down at the moment.

Other one I've heard mentioned is Taossami but that's very pricey at £45 a month for all 3. More than I would spend though it's on free trial to schools atm. If works coming through now though it should hopefully be OK. That is late for shifting to triple - ours gets decided mid year 9 and basically only top set can take it and all done except one or two.