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.

Sorry to hear you're all poorly Silkiecatz and hope you make a speedy recovery.

We've not heard anything about any exam modifications yet. We've received letters about the vaccines though which will take place mid October.

Ds struggling a bit to knuckle back down to work plus he has a music grade exam in November. Mocks are as soon as they return from the Xmas break. Not going to be a fun Xmas this year!

DD has tested positive now. She’s in bed, but she’s no more ill than she would be with a chest infection. DH, DS and I now waiting for our results. DS not allowed back to school until it comes back, hoping we get a speedy reply and he can go back in tomorrow; one day at home was enough for him, he really struggles to focus at home.

Thanks Lightsabre

Sorry to hear your DD has covid HelloDulling and hope you don't get the plague.

We are still plague hit here though DS escaped and DD is now back at school after 1.5 weeks ill. DH is on his fourth week of it, I am on my second but being very dizzy and sick this week. All good fun.

I think DD has managed still to keep up with work throughout it but now is not allowed the vaccine as there is a 28 day rule. She is 16 early though so should be eligible for a walk in. She is just out with a plague hit at same time as her friend outside.

DS seems OK and has been in school, he's in year 10 and now going to 8 subjects but still no science. But he is talking in school and going off happily. EHCP being finalised. So some progress but science was his strong subjects and he is in weaker ones. Also not doing his homework but that's not too bad as it tends to just repeat lessons and its pick your battles atm. I'm not well enough to pick any battles either and he is very anxious so leaving it.

Sorry to hear about the positive tests hellodulling. Just what you don't need at the moment but I guess it's just ripping through schools now. There really should be some sort of firebreak system once the school has a certain number of cases.

Ds seems to have a heavy homework load this week. I'm worried about how he'll fit revision for Jan mocks in if it carries on at this pace. He finally received his report too. Yr 10 subjects he did no revision for (English and Music) reflected in the grades. History he did revise but ran out of time in the exam, also didn't reach his target. Still good grades though so not too upset. The penny is dropping though that effort pays off. Just don't want to put too much pressure on at this stage - marathon not a sprint and all that!

He's been complaining a lot about his writing hand hurting. He had physio when he was very young to strengthen his joints. They thought he might be hypermobile but was never diagnosed. He does find writing fast in the essay subjects hard and I've brought this up with his English teacher in the past but nothing came of it as he's achieving 'well enough'. I might get this investigated further.

Ok, question re an AQA history paper. Explain why …. In this case Elizabeth’s Privy Council was important.
I’m only just getting involved with revision now, so perhaps I’m just very ignorant about all this, but I thought GCSE level was just about regurgitating facts - not really any original thought. I cannot for the life of me find any answers to this question…
Any amount of info about said queen and her council and their roles, but not about why it was important. Are they supposed to be able to infer? If so fine, I’ll start looking at that with her, just thought it was just more about memorising at this point?

I think there is some analysis needed to get the higher grades, at least when I was in DSs y9 history lessons the higher marks included analysis of events and trends and opinions backed with evidence, sometimes for and against then a conclusion.

I’m not a history teacher but a history PhD student and yes, I’d read that as we know the ‘facts’ of the role and it suggesting why each of those duties are important. I think they teach PEEL paragraphs at our school. I think it’s a useful way to think of it.

Ds has tested positive, I knew it was very unlikely that he was going to avoid it but still a bit of a shock.

Sorry to hear about all the new Covid cases, hope everybody recovers swiftly. It's sweeping through the school here but so far all our lfts are negative. We have all had the rotten cold that is going around but recovering now.

@Lightsabre if your DS wants to use a different method for exams (e.g. typing, DS uses his chromebook for English) then it needs to be his "usual way of working" - I think the school may be able to be more flexible about things like rest breaks? It's certainly worth a chat with the school, don't let them fob you off!

I've had no reply from the SENCO to my email (sent on the 14th), I know they have been having some IT issues and she only works part time but it's a bit rubbish. I suspect it is a very busy time of year with the new Yr7 intake all needing to be assessed and supported. I am wondering about sending a follow up email tomorrow just incase there was an issue and it didn't get through.

That’s 9 working days, I think it’s fine.

I guess it's not that bad given that it is the start of the academic year. As I said I'm slightly nervous that there was an IT issue and she didn't get it (they switched systems and email addresses over the summer holidays and I know they've had quite a few issues.) I guess I should just give her a bit longer.

I realise I didn’t clarify what I thought was fine. I think it’s fine to send a chaser. I quite often tell people (and others have said to me) if they don’t reply in a week a polite chaser is fine because in all likelihood your email is now buried under so much more.

We've had a letter home today, the school are using the covid catch up money to provide some mentoring sessions. DD is having 6 sessions in the run up to the mock exams as she under performed in the last set compared to her ability.
Hopefully, this on top of the intervention sessions she is doing will mean she gets more confident about exam technique and question answering.

Thanks for clarifying, I think I'll send a polite chaser tomorrow, as you say it's probably dropped off the first page of her inbox by now.

I've actually just had a call from his TA support lady which was nice, I must admit my heart sank when I saw the call was from school (my immediate thought was "what has he done now?"!) She is helping him compose his personal statement for sixth form application and wanted to just touch base with me and say that she will be supporting him through his mocks as well as with the sixth form application. He has a 1to1 session with her on a Friday afternoon and I think he finds it helpful.

Hi again,

I sent a chase email yesterday afternoon and there is a reply in my inbox this morning! One of my questions she has referred to somebody else (fair enough) but regarding the other strangely she said that the school is under the impression that DS is "doing really well in French" and perhaps his yr10 grade wasn't accurate (personally I was surprised he managed to get a 2!) She also claims he told her last year he "quite liked doing French". I suspect he said no such thing (perhaps a mumbled assent to a question he wasn't really listening to) and he is still completely refusing to do any work in the subject, we shall see what happens in the mocks.

Pleased to have had a reply anyway, hope everybody is doing ok and those with Covid are recovering. Only three and a half weeks until half term!

What do we think about this news?

www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-58734418

www.theguardian.com/education/2021/sep/30/gcse-and-a-level-pupils-to-be-awarded-fewer-top-grades-in-2022-says-ofqual

I am not surprised that they will try to bring the grades down, and February for advanced notice of topics is slightly better than I was fearing. Now if school could just get a move on and tell us which English Lit option they are dropping that would be really helpful!

I'm not sure I really understand this properly. They will be measured more against their peers, is that right? DS1 has been on a certain trajectory for a very long time so it will be disappointing for him to achieve what he is in line for based on some arbitrariness but I really am not clear what they are saying.

February is not too bad for announcing topics, but why February? This isn't a surprise so I don't really understand why it cannot happen sooner. In terms of Eng Lit @IThinkIMadeItWorse our school switched out Great Expectations for A Christmas Carol at the end of year 9 when they kicked of the GCSE course because of the time involved in a novel of that size. Not sure if that means that they will still drop something. DS1 is hopeful that history will drop the Normans.

As I understand it for English Lit they only have to do two of the poetry cluster, 20th century novel or 19th century novel. DS really likes A Christmas Carol so is hoping they will drop one of the other two, he hates Lord of the Flies. The Shakespeare is still compulsory. He is doing Geography and I think there is one topic they haven't started so logically that will be the one they drop.

I think the reasoning behind February is that they don't want to discourage schools from covering the whole course but they do want to give them enough time to use the information for revision. I'm not clear about how they will give advanced notice for English Language GCSE? Hopefully we will get some more information from school. Mind you the information they tried to send us yesterday didn't work as it asked you to log in as a teacher to view it! IT issues!

Ah I see. So A Christmas Carol or An Inspector Calls in our case. I would speculate that they will keep the latter as A Christmas Carol isn’t their usual text and was done way back at the end of year 9.

Some good news here today. DS1 has got his drama result (worth 40% of the the final mark I think) - he has an 8 but apparently is able to refine the portfolio and the teacher has given feedback and he was 4 marks off a 9! He is bright, but I would not say drama is his skill set (is that awful) so I am pretty flawed to be honest.

Wow well done to your DS @StColumbofNavron that is fantastic. DS is supposed to be working on his Drama portfolio and devising with his group but two of them were away this week so it's a bit tricky. I'm really not sure he is doing enough work towards it and I don't really know how to help or guide him.

School have send us the consent forms for Covid jabs next week so it will be good to get that done. Has anybody else's yr11 had it yet?

Well done to your ds @StColumbofNavron - nice to have something under his belt.

Sorry to hear about the positive test @GhostTypeEevee and hope for a swift recovery. Covid ripe in ds school now - 5 in his class confirmed positive this week including two boys he sits next to and one in front. Around a quarter of year 7's off! Doing daily LFT's and watching out for any symptoms. Vaccines being given on the 21st in his school.

I'm a bit anxious about the return to 'normal' grades being reported in the news today. Can't help thinking the boundaries will be high and there's still so much disrupted learning.

Sorry to hear about the positive Ghost

The vaccine here got cancelled and no new date arranged. DD has only just recovered from covid as has DH after 4 weeks and I still have it so would have not been eligible for DD as need 28 day gap.

Well done on drama result StColumbo

Not too much happening here as mainly just been ill, DD is back now and DS escaped. DD has a 16th party for a friend this weekend and been out with friends twice this week. DS is in 8 subjects but not going to any science still, seems to be going well in those 8 and 1 is AS level but they are heavy writing subjects and 1 AS is largely teach yourself so quite nerve wracking him doing that few. He is speaking quite a bit at school, back to eating there everyday and goes off happily so making progress just scary his GCSEs are next year, he's y10. DD has been late a fair bit but appears to be getting better. Says she is doing all her work, no grades yet as new school, well a couple which were fine but mocks are after half term. She seems much happier there and got some nice friends. Not sure what will happen with 6th form whether she will stay on or go to the big very academic sixth form but time yet to see. We got told by someone to avoid the specialist maths one for DS that starts in y9 as there are a lot of fights there. We hope there will be a new maths one linked to the university starting for DS's year though need to get him through his GCSEs first.

Oh my goodness - I am ‘floored’ not ‘flawed’ (though expect I am the latter too).

Well done to your DS @StColumbofNavron, nice to have something out of the way.