How many GCSEs is your child taking?

[Alpacasoup]

My DD is in Year 11 and is taking 10 GCSEs. She is a bright girl but does not have a great memory and really struggled with the retention of information for her Year 10 exams and is already worrying about January mocks. I'm hoping that the actual GCSEs will be easier in some respects as even though there will be more content to cover, they will have longer to revise. For the Year 10 exams they were getting homework and learning new information right up to the exams so it was really tough for her as she needs time to absorb it.

Anyway, I was wondering if 10 is the norm? It seems like a lot, especially if it includes the three sciences. If it gets too much I'll be tempted to persuade her to drop one so am holding that thought in reserve at the moment. She's on track to get 6,7,8s.

Just to add he’s at a relatively academic selective school and the 11 included Further Maths GCSE.
I think it’s a lot but he did very well.
My younger son is at the same school and is taking 10.

DD is doing 9, 5 core and 4 options. I think she has the option to do a 10th, but it's an after school option

What an interesting thread, I’m surprised there’s such variation. My dc school everyone seems to do 9 unless doing triple science when it’s 10. School I teach at normally 9, a few do triple science and a few do heritage language so a few may do 11. We also allow a select few to drop an option and do 8 and get extra study time or additional teaching in English and Maths. 1 or 2 in a year will do less due to significant learning or health difficulties.

Interesting that you mention ADHD as that had been our suspicion for a while as she was doing really well and then just fell apart in Year 10 and has had lots of issues with concentration and focus. She has actually just been diagnosed and we have a follow up appointment to discuss medication. I think it does make it really hard for her to juggle so many subjects and the retention of content is a real challenge. Thank you for sharing your experience. It's really helpful to hear.

Dd is doing 9 actual GCSEs but the equivalent of 11 (the school doesn’t do GCSEs but instead runs its own courses in art, history of art, drama and music). Selective indy. The school courses are timetabled the same as the GCSE courses, though I’m not sure how they compare otherwise.

It's usually 9 but if they take triple science and further maths then it can be 10 or 11.

DS did 9 last school year, plus one year RE in year 10. State grammar.

UCAS requires all results to be included on application form:

DD's school has 9 as standard and doesn't allow dropping anything unless you are on special provisions.

DD does 10 as she is bilingual and does a community German GCSE on top of the mandatory Spanish one. But luckily that doesn't need a lot of revision.

She is predicted 7s on average. She is just in the middle of mocks and we will get her results end of November. They then do another round of mocks in February. She totally swapped her revision tactics since end of Y10. Flashcards are absolutely out and mind maps basically as well. She does a lot of past papers, we got her workbooks where she has to answer questions in writing and they have access to websites with additional tasks and lots of vocabulary practice.
She finds she can memorise topics a lot better when she actually does the work compared to just reading and memorising flash cards.

Dniece is doing 3 subjects- english lang, biology and maths. No stress, she's looking forward to the level 3 course she's doing next and feels confident in herself.

The DCs school does 9. Everyone does English Language, English Literature, Maths, a language (bottom set do more English instead) , double science then they have 3 choices so DD1 is doing triple science, history and art. Middle class school so pretty academic.

Most do 9 at my dd's comp, apart from the ones who do triple science who do 10.

I did 12 and was severely overworked.

DD is doing 8 and seems similarly overworked.

DD is doing 11 - state comp - she is doing triple science so most of the children will be doing 10 at least.

For those doing 8, how does that work if 6 of those are the compulsory core subjects (if triple science)? 4 optional subjects doesn't seem that many to me if you want to have a reasonably broad curriculum, especially if 1 is a language which is pretty much compulsory in many places.

That said, I hope you can get something sorted out for your DD to take the pressure off.

DS is taking 13, none of which is in a ‘light’ subject. I worry if it’s a bit much but they come in clusters- triple science, triple MFL, Gratin, M/FM, EngLit/ EngLang, History. I’m hoping he’ll take a couple this year (Y10) to lighten the load In Y11.

Mine did bloody loads but we are in Wales where things are a bit different. Their school taught GCSEs over 3 years, so the curriculum narrows a year earlier but not by as much. They take a few papers in Y10 and numeracy in the November of Y11. They have 8/9 compulsory subjects depending on double or triple science plus 4 options, plus Welsh Bacc. Top two maths sets do maths early and then study additional maths. They can choose whether or not to sit the add maths exam. So 13-15 qualifications in total for most of the school.

DS1 took 8 and passed 6. Enough to get him to the next level and 2 more than me!

@Hameldown what on earth is Gratin - typo I presume?

Ancient Greek and Latin.

Greek and Latin. Two subjects but they tend only to undertake Greek if already fairly strong in Latin.

10

This is an interesting thread, I just counted up and dd I’d doing 10 GCSEs, possibly 11 if she does Religious studies.

She has autism and adhd and I am really worried she won’t meet her potential.

The concept of triple science seems mental to me as a standard thing! What’s the need for it?
I did 8 “standard grades” (Scottish equivalent at the time I went to school!) with only 1 science. How do they fit that many subjects into a timetable?

Dd did 12. It was a ridiculous amount of work and she ended up resenting school and hating learning. State school, no idea why they insist on so many. In hindsight she'd have been better not working so hard in earlier years as expectations wouldn't have been so high and she wouldn't have been in the streams which had to do everything. Bonkers really!