Anyone up for a GCSE handholding thread?

[BaconAndAvocado]

DS2 has his GCSEs in June. He had mocks in November and more (why??) next month.
He needs to get 5 6s to stay at his current school (IB, not overly keen) or to transfer to another local 6th form.
He said he’s going to start revising this week......
Think his school will be helping him devise a revision timetable this week. I’ve bought him flashcards, he just needs to knuckle down now.......

Ds on study leave after half term. No incentives from school here either!!!

That would probably be enough to even get DS going!

My daughters second set and their teacher keeps saying she’s expecting mainly 8’s with a few 7/9.

Her school really focus on maths though - they have 15 minutes or so of gcse style questions every morning in tutor time since the start of y10.

I think the school overall gets 70% 5+. She has a great teacher though - she was originally set 1 but struggling and since being put down to set 2 she has really clicked with the new teacher who takes stuff a bit slower.

That sounds good.
Its only the last few weeks they've had papers sent home to complete.

Dds school promised them money off their prom tickets for attending 6 after school revision sessions.
It's been announced as 10%. A whole £4.50. Kids are very much not amused.

I think the GCSE maths papers need a complete rethink. The current papers seem to cater to either end of scale when most kids are somewhere in the middle. If you are an average maths student you have the dilemma of aiming to get a high mark in the lower papers to get a 5 or taking a higher paper, much of which is too hard for an average student, to hopefully get a much lower mark but a higher grade. It is a big risk, illogical and completely disheartening.

Totally agree with everything you said!
I don't think most people know how hard gcses are especially Maths and English.
My ds is borderline, could go either way and he really wants to do A levels.

Marks for last years Maths required a score of 71/240 for a level 5 in the higher or 173/240 for a level 5 in foundation. To get a 5 in foundation which is 72% requires a high degree of accuracy and lots of correct answers yet only 29% in higher equates to the same grade in theory.

Yes they have overlap of questions between the Foundation & Higher tier and use how candidates do on those to ensure fairness of where the set the boundaries.
It must be incredibly disheartening to be faced with a paper you can only attempt less than half of which is what you might have if aiming for a 6.

It must be incredibly disheartening to be faced with a paper you can only attempt less than half of which is what you might have if aiming for a 6

Very much agree @TeenDivided and the same is true in MFL, which is why a candidate whose genuine best effort will be a 5 should always take F. Being able to answer most of it often gives them the confidence to do even better iyswim. Whereas I have known candidates give up and not even attempt an answer on a paper writung task that felt too challenging.

DD (18) is taking foundation tier maths. But she makes simple mistakes and also runs out of stamina. She is also better on eg algebra than basic number work. Part of me thinks she'd have a better chance of passing with the higher tier. This is her first full sitting of Maths having been ill in y11 and not entered last year.

If the Intermediate tier still existed I'd have asked for her to do that.

School called us recently as DS was around a 5 and said did we want foundation or higher. We stuck with foundation, he only needs a 5...a 6 is unrealistic for him anyway so it's seems pointless.

@TeenDivided I agree, intermediate is probably where most students realistically sit. When Rishi Sunak spoke recently about the 'anti maths mindset' and proposed making it compulsory to 18, I was just so annoyed. The current system is creating the anti maths mindset, let's get kids to a good level of maths at GCSE before we add in any more lofty ideas.

That is indeed one of the flaws in his plan.

Another gaping one is where he intends to find all the additional maths teachers from.

Plus then you need a syllabus for DC who are approx scrape grade 4-low 7 at GCSE that is meaningful but probably not just top GCSE / early A level.

Then you need to decide how many hours a week teaching + homework you are going to insist they do, and whether you expect this to have any knock on to the level 3 courses the DC are doing.

Then whether you will 'care' if they don't bother much with it. e.g. will you insist / encourage they 'pass' the course somehow?

Plus if you have all these extra maths teachers, would they not be better deployed enabling smaller classes in secondary or in college for those who have to retake?

Or, and it pains me to say this, provide teachers in FE that speak good quality English so DC with processing difficulties (who are more likely to be resitting) can concentrate on the maths rather than deciphering the accent.

Does anyone else think English literature is ridiculously hard? I just don’t get how the average kid can analyse a passage from Macbeth not to mention the unseen poetry.

Interesting reading about F v H in Maths. I really wish there was a F option for Eng Lang. DS is strong in Maths but not English. He's doing F in an MFL because he struggles to write enough but is not bad at understanding.

Back in my day we had CSEs ....

I wish there was a foundation tier in English Language. DD has dyslexia, dyspraxia and slow processing. She can do individual questions well but not a whole paper all in one go! She especially finds the questions where she has to compare 2 texts hard as she has to switch between the two. I have requested that for y14 she does functional skills instead.

Agreed @filchards, DD also struggles with Lang but does otherwise very well in essay based subjects. We discovered quite recently that the teacher has never worked through the paper fully or even been through the mark scheme. Hoping quite late in the day tutoring will bridge the gap.

Totally. It's hell. Knowing quotes from 15 poems too, it's ridiculous

I can't understand the logic of needing to memorise quotations - when I sat my GCSEs the English Literature papers were all open book exams so I just had to concentrate on answering the questions and not memorising quotations that may or may not be relevant to the paper on the day!

I'm working on the basis of introducing a single quotation each day up to the exam. Hope that way, they will be retained?

Absolutely this. DD1, who is sitting GSCEs now, happens to be keen on English, so it's not a total nightmare for her. But I'm already panicking about DD2 (Year7) who doesn't read for pleasure EVER, and how on earth she'll get through Othello and unseen poetry...I'm praying that they don't change the set texts as I'd really like DD2 to have access to DD1's annotated copies .

DD is pretty much OK with both English and Maths and I think she will do fine on both. I even think she might manage a 5 or 6 on Additional Maths where she didn't do half the course because she got put up a set. It seems impenetrable to me (I appear to have forgotten the entirety of my ancient Maths A Level). But oh my goodness, the pain that History and Biology are causing us. I was rubbish at Biology and didn't take History (on the grounds that I was even worse than rubbish at it) so am no help whatsoever. I suppose it's to be expected, if somewhat irritating, that I am basically good at all the things DD is also good at and doesn't need help with!

I agree that English Lit has become far more about memory than really getting to grips with the text. When I did my o levels we got to use fresh copies of the book in the exam so you sent your time learning therms and characteristics rather than quotes. I feel sorry for her as she hasn’t got the greatest long term memory so ends up cramming so she retains it for a short while. There just is no need. She does well - predicted grade 8 but it’s unnecessary toto how well you know the text.

the unseen poetry is her week area - sometimes she just doesn’t let the meanings being a poem and just ends of waffling ! It seems so much harder than when I did mine !

Aargh, DS1 has done the sum total of 30 mins prep for his English language exam which is on Wed and Fri. He is really mad at himself because he got distracted - he knows he needs an ok grade in English and so almost freaked out from the stress of it.

I was away the last couple of days (family) and now I wish I’d been here to chivvy him more (he doesn’t really fess up to DH when he’s stuck)