Current Year 11 2021/2022 support thread pt II

[StColumbofNavron]

Thread for those with Y10s finishing July 2021 ready for Y11 in Sept 2021.

All welcome.

My DS had his COVID vaccine at school last week and is due the flu vaccine on Thursday. No side effects thankfully.
Parents evening was okay although DS cried after it as he felt like all the teachers were piling on the pressure about revising for their particular subject and the importance of the upcoming mocks. I told him not to stress and that I wasn't expecting him to get straight 9's which he appears to believe are the only acceptable results. That's the problem with selective schools in a way as obviously a lot of his friends will achieve this. I do wish they hadn't changed the grades to numbers as it makes it seem like 7 isn't a decent grade when obviously that's not true .
We have two sixth form college open days this weekend so will be interesting to see what they are like.

We had parents evening online last night, I am glad I booked the appointments with 5m between each one as last year any technical issues meant it impacted the next meeting.

DD needs to put some more effort in, less chatting in some subjects and we need to work on her overcoming her fear of exams. I have told her that if the mocks in November don’t show the result of some extra effort then I am blocking Discord via the router and taking her phone away.
I am of course the worst parent in the world but she will do the bare minimum if she thinks she can get away with it.

GCSE Results Day: 25 August 2022!

Totally first world, but I feel like we can now plan our summer holiday.

I was waiting for the gcse dates as well though summer holidays will still be complicated as ideally we want to get to France to see relatives (as well as holiday elsewhere) but needs both kids to be double vaccinated ideally. Not even sure DS will let them vaccinate him as he is very anxious but DHs Mum is mid 80s.

Mid lots of work being done all over our house so bit chaotic here, had to clear one room entirely and they are in every room to do radiators.

DS and DD went to a 6th form open day together on Tuesday, DD said no parents which worked for us though apparently one teacher told DS off which made him very anxious (he's only just stopped being mute and pulled a face). DD explained about her brother and the teacher said sorry, she was a lovely big sister.

DD has just said to enter her for French as well though that takes her to 13 GCSEs, well possibly 12 plus 1 AS level if she takes Economics which is a maybe atm which I think is too much but agreed with school for her to do mocks. Not sure how she will get on as she stopped end of y9 and has not done any since and I think was getting 5/6 border then so may be tricky to make work.

DS was apparently most interested in the Economics A level which is my degree. Would be good if he does that though concerned about writing content. No issue for the maths.

With the changes to the GCSE and the children being provided a formula sheet for science and maths is that all the formulas or do they still need to memorise some?

@GhostTypeEevee I don’t know but part of me still thinks it’s good to know them which just makes it quicker in the exam, that said memorising with far less pressure.

@Silkieschickens we have DS3 likely to have a week summer school at his new secondary at the beginning. I am very fortunate to be able to spend the whole summer away (family abroad) and we haven’t been for 3 years so leaving a week late and having to come back by mid August was stressing me out, particularly as this is my last summer before I need to work properly again. I know I would have been lucky to get two weeks though. DS1 could have got results by email in an Internet cafe but there is something special about opening your envelope with your mates isn’t there.

Why does DD want to do so many subjects? Obviously if she is keen and can do it it’s fine isn’t it, but there is no material benefit other than her wanting to which is good enough, but is she not spread really thinly?

@StColumbofNavron that's a good point, I like that there will be the reassurance there if needed. I really don't know how they remember everything.

Yes DD really wants to attend in person and it is nice, if scary, to do. Thats great you can have a good summer break StColumbo

I dont know why DD keeps adding more subjects. She had 10 gcses plus 1 AS level at old school which was the standard number there for people in top set science so triple and the top 10 or so at maths then she moved schools and could do all 10 subjects and either further maths gcse or possibly the AS from before, she was fine on grades with those and exam boards are similar content though some different order teaching but she is on top of that. When she moved they put her in 10 subjects and she added 2 after school ones, the new one is Economics and she is doing that in daytime lessons so she will have half course as lessons anyway. She can decide in January whether to enter for it or not. If she has time that is not too bad as I am an Economist so she is used to economics being discussed but leaving that up to her as it may be too much. Now she has asked to add French as well, was very surprised by that as she was reasonably good at French but insisted on giving it up end y9. I think that one is quite risky but again will leave to her, I dont think it risks her other grades but her French grade may be weak compared to others unless she has secretly been doing French but doubt that.

School have just said they may be able to let her go into small exam rooms, tbd but nice of them. They may change their mind when they see how many she has signed up for plus her Further Maths teacher said to me yesterday she should take gcse and the AS level which would add a 14th one but no idea why you would do 2 of those. She is doing A level Maths in her gcse Maths class and has finished the first year of it.

Sixth Form 1 visit, complete. Successful and he is going to apply I think. Seems to have helped him work through the choices for number 2 and 3.

DS2 has his mock exams 2 weeks before the Christmas holidays.

Mocks in January here, ds currently revising (he says)for a test. He's not sure what A levels, probably politics & economics - does anyone know how good maths need to be for Economics? I'm not sure he can get the high grades needed for current school, but I don't want to undermine him by pushing him to consider other places. Unfortunately we don't have other good options and he's not keen on another school so going to visit a massive localish sixth form in November. It's very hard to figure out, I thought secondary admissions was bad!

For A level Economics you do not need that much maths, for a degree you would need Maths A level nowawdays and more options again with Further Maths. I read Economics years ago and then you could just get away with no maths A level but over the years it has become increasingly mathematical for the degrees and the jobs. I would look up university entrance requirements of where he may be interested in. Politics goes well with it though, I did politics and was very useful and fun. Economics at A level was quite dull, very theoretical, much more interesting at degree level especially ones were you can specialise. Maybe check what the A level spec says re maths requirements to see if there is one and how high, would have thought a 6 or so for A level but just a guess.

That's very interesting and useful thank you

DD has her mocks in November. She had a pre mock Maths paper today and another on Wednesday. She said it was really really hard and she has to guess lots of the questions.

Useful to know the GCSE results day. I just put it in my calendar and notice that it’s Reading festival that weekend, for which DD has already got her ticket for. So celebrating or commiserating that weekend!

DD has done the rounds of 4 sixth form open days and has confirmed that she wants to stay on at her school sixth form. They choose 4 a-levels and drop one at the end of first term of Year 12. DD thinks she’s going for English Lit, History, Philosophy & Ethics and Psychology. She will drop one of the latter two.

Does anyone know when the exams finish? I know AQA had provisional dates but I've had a look and they don't seem to be on the link anymore?

We’ve been told a provisional date of 28 June which is the provisional date that children must be available until - it includes exam board contingency dates in case any exams need to be moved.

That's really helpful @StColumbofNavron thanks for that. I was wondering about a weekend away first weekend of July so it sounds like that might be ok - possibly clash with Prom but not sure DS will want to go to Prom anyway.

Just had an email from school "strongly encouraging" DS to come to school early twice a week for French revision, hmmm, not sure he is going to agree to that! We are getting more information about the mocks in November so that is helpful. Still heard nothing about our request that DS be entered for statistics GCSE (he has been working through the revision guide at home), wonder if I should try to find out who the exam officer is. Not sure who actually makes the decision about these things.

My DS is struggling with this maths question. Does anyone know how to do it or what type of question it is so he can look it up? He doesn’t remember covering it in class.

@zighead it's algebra but to do with indices.

You have two equations for y so they must be equal, substitute the formula for z into the second one and you get
a x2 = ak (a2 x3)^w

So does he know how to raise things inside brackets to a power and expand it out? How to multiply powers together?

Hope that is helpful.

Thank you so much @IThinkIMadeItWorse
DS seems to understand and will have another try in the morning

Mocks supposed to be in January for Ds but he's just found out that the creative writing paper mock is early Dec. This has sent him into a spin not helped by me ordering the wrong revision books )ordered for Aqa and he's doing Pearson Edexcel

Surely the revision will be the same if it's
creative writing? Anyone know...

For English that should say..

It's funny, but DD's school seems convinced that Ofsted/Ofqual or whoever it is who is deciding about GCSE/A level exams this coming year are requiring one set of mocks each term (in case exams are cancelled again). They were going to have them for Year 11 in December anyway, but they have pulled the A level ones back from January to December, and have now scheduled a new set for both in March/April (by which time we should know if exams are going ahead or not, presumably).
So I am really surprised about that the DC on here seem to have mocks in January?

DS2 who is year 11 has mocks in December and DS1 who is year 13 has his in January.

Mocks here are November and February.

Re creative writing I would have thought different exam board guide would be fine but you can check syllabuses online, would have thought that one is more about learning the skills rather than specific topics.