If you could sit the GCSEs this year instead of your DC ......

[SomersetBrie]

.... would you do better than them in anything?

My DS is doing nowhere near enough revision and I reckon, given there's a couple of months to go, I could probably knuckle down and do well in a few of them.
English Lit - well, he can do that one! Also product design. And maybe French.

I'd be prepared to have a bash at English Language, maths and science.
We could maybe split geography as there's quite a lot for me to learn there.

Anyone else?

<this is lighthearted by the way ..... unless anyone knows a way that I can actually sit a few of them ????? >

God I wish I could! I’m frustrated by the lack of strategic application of revision and learning. Copying notes rather than hammering the practice questions. But all these are hard lessons to learn. I can’t fault the effort in, but it’s just not effective.

I'd sit my 18yos GCSE maths in a heartbeat. She's only entered for Foundation so I should be a shoe in for 95%+.

hahaha
No
And I got all As in my GCSEs apart from drama
It has all gone
Might be able to scrape through French with some revision, but he would do better
Definitely couldn't do Latin or maths
I only did biology so couldn't do triple science
Music absolutely not
English - maybe.
History - I'd need a lot of revision and probably wouldn't do any better

Id probably do better in several subjects simply because I'm not dyslexic like DD and have a better processing speed.

Shes a lot harder worker than I was though.

Most of my GCSEs were coursework based or modular - with an exam at the end of each 6 week module and all the grades were added up towards the final grade.
If I had to do modern GCSEs I would do terrible. I never did well with homework or revision at home because my mind just wandered off. (I am still the same now for some things).
I would be doomed basically under the current system.

When DD1 sat hers I did revision 1-1 with her. I'd have done better in all subjects except her 2 MFL I think, perhaps not Eng Lit as I didn't know the poems.
DD2 didn't sit GCSEs.

haha good thread OP. Well I am an MFL teacher so I hope I would get a 9 in French and German. Spanish is not my forte but I could pass foundation with a bit of revision.

Eng lit and eng lang no worries, tho would need to look over the texts a bit! Maths should be OK to get a decent grade (nowhere near an 8 or 9 without any revision tho).

Without any work at all I would have no chance in science or geog or history. Some subjects would be a total bust even if I had time to revise - art, CS, DT, never done any of those beyond about a year. I guess I could have an intelligent bash at business.

Erm....nope!!!

I was clever at school, I still am reasonably clever.
At GCSE, I Got a* in my maths, a and a in double science, and b's in the rest. But my god some of the stuff I see my Ds doing just blows my little brain!!!

I'd give maths and science a go tomorrow.
I could possibly do Geography with a bit of notice and work.
English, German, computer science - not a chance.

No way I could do better than her in anything she's taking.
Child is brainy. Mum is menopausal 😂

I'd have done as well as she did in English, French, Latin, maths. DH would have done as well as she did in physics, chemistry and biology.

We'd have done much worse in history and German.

I wouldn't do well in anything without revision, but we have all the revision books! I'm a scientist with a decent maths background so I reckon I could bone up on those over the Easter hols.
He's not expecting 8s or 9s and would be very happy with 6s and 7s (or 5s).
I would be OK with English Lit but I thought it was too late for me to learn the texts now, I'd rather refresh my geography.
I could probably sit the product design theory paper, but the actual project is due the week after next - I assume he's done that at school!

History. She's terrible at remembering dates but she had to do it. Everything else is fine. I loved history.

I feel fairly confident that if I had 2 months to revise I could get at least a 7 in every subject. It’s not that hard!

Great question, and really useful to consider as a fellow frustrated parent of a gcse student!

My answer depends on whether I'm allowed to attend school and follow dds timetable. Can I pause employment, parenting and housework etc while I focus on my revision?

There is a lot of content. I couldn't do a full set from a standing start in 2 months.
I know a lot of the science already, but the humanities would be tricky. The RE I could do as I revised most of it with DD2, but I would need to work at the Islam side, especially the terminology.
I'd really struggle with the Geography & History, masses of content and not my kind of thing to learn either.

No, I'd not do better, but probably similar looking at recent past papers, revision guides, etc if I spent a bit of time reminding myself of the content (assuming they were exams I'd previously studied for) and some revision questions/past paper questions.

I did mine 40+ years ago when exams were a lot harder. I did actually did English A level (for fun at an evening class - 1.5 hours per week term time for a year) around 20 years ago and got a B grade with minimal reading/revision - all my A levels 40 years ago were D grade and that was with lots of studying/revision!

When I've looked at DS's homework, etc., I recognise most things and can pretty quickly get back up to speed. I've certainly helped him with Maths and science homework/revision and didn't find it particularly difficult. In Biology in particular, I was pretty surprised how superficial it is now - back in my day, we had to learn a lot more parts of the eye, heart, etc to label diagrams and explain functions, but modern GCSE requires a lot fewer "labels" on diagrams, just the basics really!

The big difference between myself and DS would be that he's not particularly organised, doesn't really know how to revise effectively, etc. He'll happily spend a few hours copying out notes from textbooks etc., but when I ask him a question on it, he's not got a clue! It's a bit of a battle to get him to use effective revision techniques such as making mind-maps, revision cards, doing past questions, ticking off the syllabus, reading mark schemes and examiners notes, etc. We did lots of that at school back in my day, but I don't think teachers today do it - I remember DS being shocked that you could actually read examiners comments on past papers and marking schemes - so his teachers havn't mentioned it to him!

Can I pause employment, parenting and housework etc while I focus on my revision?

excellent @DianePemberley let's do it

I agree that if I was given a couple of months of a few hours per day to study, I'd also be able to get grade 7 or above in most subjects.

Re subjects like History, you really don't need to rote learn all the facts anymore - the modern subject isn't like that. It's more about cause & consequence, evaluating source data, bias, etc. It's enough to know the order of events, i.e. who succeeded Henry VIII and why, rather than the date he died! Same with Charles I and II - the exact dates don't matter so much as what they did. Far better not to get bogged down with memorising dates and detail if you're brain isn't wired to remember them easily. More important to think of such events in a "cause and consequence" manner which links things together.

My "action plan" for getting 7s or over in a couple of months would be to forget about text books and just go straight to York Notes (for English) or CGP books for other subjects - they're more "straight to the point" so you spend less time reading lots of waffle. CGP do a range of books, including the "complete revision and practice" which is basically a dumbed down text book with each page/topic full of the core basics/facts followed by exam style questions. Once you've worked through those, you go onto the revision question books which are basically books full of questions which lead you up from the basics to exam style questions, with full answers at the back. If you work through all that, you're all set for the exam. Yes, you don't "know" the full syllabus in the way a teacher would like you to know it, but you know enough to get a good grade - it's basically working backwards from the exam rather than knowing the subject inside out!

I really struggled with DD2's Geography in y10 mainly because the case study stuff didn't seem to be covered in the revision guides. Then Covid hit and she stopped education so it became irrelevant.

I also struggled with DD1's history because I couldn't get my head around Northern Ireland, though I was pretty good with 7 uses of a buffalo.

At my school we had to choose between Physics & Chemistry O level or Biology. So I've found the Biology GCSE stuff very interesting. I found it hard to get my head round DNA though and some other bits though.

I reckon I could pass Eng lit (have read all the texts) and Eng lang and French (degree, albeit 30+ years ago) but nothing else- not any science, RE, computer science, geog or history etc, not because I'm not intelligent enough, I just don't have the information.

I was going to suggest that you need to continue employment, and use your evenings and weekends to revise.
Obviously housework, shopping and cooking would stop as your kids would be doing this for you.

No way ! Have you actually at the revision guides? There is a fuck tonne of content in there and the maths is really hard.

I’ve read the science guides, the computer science revision cards and looked at French and English. It’s no joke.

if I had my work ethnic now and two year then yes of course I would do better but 15 year old me would have really suffered.

After doing quite a lot of quizzing my daughter on geography, revision guide in hand, when she sat down to do a pair of past papers, I had a go too, and she used the markscheme to mark both. I was quite pleased with a 6 - I didn't do geography past year 9, so it was general knowledge plus what I'd picked up quizzing her. Oh, and oxbow lakes, which I did remember from school.

I think it depends when we, as parents, took our exams. The standard and content has gone up and down over the years. Some of the Maths I did at O level is now in A level, and some I did at A level is now in degree level, but I did my O and A levels back in the late 70s. I think there was a "low point" maybe 20 10-20 years ago where they were a lot easier than they are today, but today's are still easier than 50 years ago!