Teachers of year 10 students: how is your school handling projected grades?

[ElephantsAlltheWayDown]

Hi,

I posted before coronavirus about my concern for DD's predicted grades. We got the first round in December and were meant to get the second round in May or June. Her December grades weren't high enough to get into her preferred subjects at the selective sixth form, but she's been working really hard, has regular tutoring and has basically turned things around, which her teachers have confirmed.

I emailed her teachers recently to ask if they knew when the next predicted grades would be released, and was kind of surprised to be told that they were "neither advised nor obligated" to release them. What??? Surely they have to give them to us at some point so she can know where she qualifies to apply for sixth form?

Can any year 10 teachers let me know how you're handling predicted grades at your school? Do you normally release updated predictions in summer, and if so, will you be releasing them as normal or waiting? If you can shine any light on this process, I'd be very grateful!

If DD can't get in to her first choice sixth form then we're going to have to go private, which I would really rather avoid.

Year 10 dd here. We don't have any predicted grades at all. Is that a concern?

Year 11 dm here. DD didn't even start to think about which 6th forms she could get into until first term of year 11. She had mocks in November and on that basis knew that she'd get at least 1 (more likely 2 grades higher in real thing) so went based on that and applied to one in December and another in January. Schools have open days for 6th form Autumn term of year 11 so you're not late and they will be testing them a lot come the new term I'm sure as this last term is unprecedented.

Make sure she continues to work over the summer - that really helped my DD as her school surprised them with early mocks in core subjects in September and she did well so was off to flying start for Nov mocks. Also had February mocks which her GCSEs will be based on.

She's still had options of applying to 6th forms still now - deadline May 29th so plenty of time imvho unless your DD's school does things very different.

Hi @Travelban, did you not receive any in the autumn term? Presumably they will have to be released at some point or how will your DD apply to sixth form?

@AnneOfCleavage thanks, that's very helpful! The application deadline is usually in December but I would be very surprised if they don't push it back given the current circumstances! I wish her teachers had said something like that, but instead I felt like they were shutting the conversation down. I complained in my last thread that I felt like I never really know what's going on with DD's education, and I still don't!

We had predicted grades at Easter and they will be updated every term based on school work and end of year exams (moderated and sense checked to account for cheating potential). Independent school though.

Do you mean year 11? Lol

My dd1 thinks that they would have got them this term but didn't because they didn't go ahead with exams..

They are schedules to do mocks in autumn so hopefully we will have a better idea then? I am getting worried.

We won't be doing formal assessments with year 10 this summer though we normally do but with limited time in school I think our SLT feel (I agree) the time is better spent reviewing content from the lockdown, doing new content and also getting them back into study habits. We also do exams in early autumn so I think that's likely going to be the plan for students assuming year 10 are back as normal (hopefully). Predictions for sixth form will be based on these and mocks (late autumn) - our sixth form applications don't go until Jan so if yours are earlier this might not work for you.

I'd recommend your dd keeps working over the term, and maybe a bit of the late summer (not all- don't want her to burn out!!) Maybe ask teachers for past papers and mark schemes? We usually hand these out later in year 11 but I would be happy to send them now to students who want them.

"neither advised nor obligated" to release them. What??? Surely they have to give them to us at some point so she can know where she qualifies to apply for sixth form?

They are not obligated to at the moment because of the pandemic. Majority of schools provide predicted grades after their Year 11 Mock in the Autumn term and those are usually used for Sixth Form applications.
Some schools might release them after end of year Year 10 summer exams but as they won’t be taking place, this will not be a problem for you.
I wouldn’t be worrying about it now.

Year 11 dd here, at a selective independent, but we applied for a grammar sixth form and she has a place.

Her school don’t really seem to do predicted grades - not that they release to parents anyway. In the end she asked her head of year to obtain predicted grades from each subject teacher and send them to the grammar school. We still don’t know what they were but they got her a place!

Regardless of that, she knew what she was capable of from regular tests, not just end of year exams. Surely your dd must have some idea now? Also, bear in mind that she will likely make significant progress between now and Christmas.

Also, most selective sixth forms will have some places to give out on results day to those who exceed their predictions or missed the deadline - this is what we’ve been told by two grammar schools anyway.

Thanks everyone, it seems like there's a variety of ways different schools are handling this. I was hoping we'd get the updated predicted grades as usual just to get an idea if she's on target or if she needs to put more effort in. I hate to wait until autumn -- at that point it's too late to make changes.

I'm from the US where students get grades for every subject every term, so the idea of not finding out where students stand until they're ready to apply for sixth forms is alien to me (being judged on performance from a single exam baffles me too!).

Do you mean year 11? Lol

No, I mean year 10.

Has she/does she have tests and homework marked regularly? If so, that will tell you where she stands.

Has she/does she have tests and homework marked regularly?

Yes, well, homework at least currently, but I'm not sure the extent of marking at the moment. Nothing is available to view on my parent account with the school; I shall have to ask DD what she can see on her account.

What reports do you usually get from school? We get 3 a year, roughly in December, March and July.

My sons' school only start to give target grades for GCSEs in year 10 and not before. They list a minimum grade that a child should get and an attainable grade if they work a bit harder. In year 11 it became the attainable grade only but if a 7 or higher it just said 7+.

What I will say is that predicted grades at this stage can seem too high. A student is entirely responsible for how much effort they put in both at home and in class. As demonstrated by my own child, they can come out with some spectacular results if they want to.

Applications for sixth form don't have to be in for quite a while yet and you can apply to more than one and make a choice at a later date. What are the minimum entrance grades for where she wants to go?

I'm from the US where students get grades for every subject every term

Ah. I didn’t know that so my post above would not be relevant.

@ChloeDecker I meant I grew up there -- I live in the UK now. Just a very different experience of education in general.

So sorry OP-oops!

My school don't do any predicted grades out to students or parents until year 11 when college applications need them, even then most colleges and 6th forms give the standard conditional offer.

I'm intrigued as to how some schools think they can predict a GCSE grade in year 10 given students less than half way through the course and haven't say exams that are marked and norm referenced.

For example, I'm on some teaching groups and regularly see samples of 'top set' writing with others commenting on how great it is, and I know that would be a middle of the road response in my school. A child doing that work in my school would probably be deemed to be around a 5/6 candidate, but there's others saying definitely push the student for an 8. Clearly they don't have the same strength at the top end in their schools so their idea of what is an strong top end response is much lower than mine.

Most 6th form application deadlines are mid Jan/Feb, so most Year 10s won't have been thinking much about it yet and many schools won't be giving formal predicted grades other than regular "predictions" in reports (which are based on continuous assessment not exams). So it won't be unusual for most Year 10s not to have anything formal yet.

DD just finishing year 11 at an independent school the first grade predictions were at the very, very end of year 10 after first mocks. Then a second set in Feb this year after second set of mocks.

@LolaSmiles that’s a bit concerning if those teachers will be submitting actual grades for year 11s this year!

DD got some predicted grades at end of first term of Y10 but the school says they are always conservative and they don’t predict 9s due to the pressure, this is a selective school too.

Perversely i have a better idea of how DD is doing due to the pandemic as all marks (Where they do give 9s) for work during lockdown are being posted in Satchel One (was Show My Homework) rather then a workbook left in a locker at school.

School say they will get an end of term report, how detailed it will be I don’t know. Normally the winter and spring ones are just progress, with the summer one having more detail.

crazycrofter
Not exactly. There's measures in place to prevent over generous gradings by placing this year's grades in the context of overall school performance in recent years.
I'm no data queen on that sort of thing, but it would mean they couldn't say lots of students were getting 8s if the last few years almost nobody got 8s (and there's no way work of their 'grade 8' quality would get an 8 when put against a national bell curve).

Excluding schools that are on a rapid upwards/downwards trajectory, I'd have more trust in the overall grades statically approved this year than I would almost any internal assessment spreadsheet.