Going under from GCSE coursework

[mumofteennotfun]

My DD is in year 11 and took both DT and art GCSEs. If only we could ago back in time!
She is really struggling with the coursework workload and deadlines. She is a bit of a perfectionist which doesn’t help and work is taking her hours and hours when I am sure it shouldn’t be.
She hasn’t even started revising yet as she is just drowning in coursework!
Just wondered if any other teens are going through similar?

What does make a difference is how many lessons they have. They really need a minimum of 3.

Or rather 3 hours. But that is the minimum. 4 is better.

@ArseInTheCoOpWindow Do you mean 3 hours a week? My DD has 2 hours a week so that might explain why she’s had to do more of the written work at home.

@Hamofthesea

Yep, that’s why she’s got so much to do. 2 hours isn’t enough. 3 is better, 4 is ideal. The exam boards suggest 3 per week. That’s an extra 4 per month.

Lots of schools do have that much. It used to drive me mad. How can the grades be equal across the country?

DD is another spending a lot of time at the weekends doing her Art and I'm concerned that her other subjects are suffering as a result. She does want to do Art A Level though and most likely pursue it further. Thank God, I stopped her from doing another coursework heavy GCSE such as Music. DS did DT at GCSE and at A Level and that was also extremely time consuming but not as time consuming as Art!

Yes DD spent so many hours on art last year. It dominates for a while. Then thankfully stops.

Not much consolation to give really but we're definitely in the same boat.

Yep, DS is the same at the moment. Exam is next week, though, then he gets to finish bits on the rest of his coursework!

I had the same experience - my daughter who is naturally gifted in art has had the joy crushed out of it by the appalling amount of coursework and some really bad teaching - literally hundreds of assignments, it went on and on and on, completing it prevented her from starting revision until the last minute. No real guidance or mentoring from her teacher. It’s all about the process, showing your workings, opening up your mind into your sketchbook, yet they were being asked to produce pages and pages of presentation, it wasn’t a sketch book type situation. I looked up the ed Excel criteria (because although she worked her heart out for some reason it wasn’t enough and internally they gave her a 6 - I was raging - I’d seen how hard it was) and it seems they consider learning to draw and paint not adequate for a gcse, they have turned it into an academic subject, have twisted it so that a non-artist can judge an art gcse. It will rob this country of our creative edge, to make gaining an art gcse into a desperate and unhappy experience. I’m horrified. it’s all part of a drive to force kids towards STEM subjects and away from the arts. Identical situation I’ve heard of with another girl who’s passion was drama.

I think a lot of kids take art as they think its an easy option but it's not at all. There were several kids on results day saying they hadn't passed Art. Ds is so talented in Art and got a 9 for his pieces but ended up getting a 6 as his sketch books/artist research wasn't thorough enough..

It's a desperate situation. I am drafting a letter to the government, about this and about my nightmare trying to get my DD into a good sixth form! Art is just a natural place for some people, it should be a pleasure. I worked really hard at art O and A levels, learnt all the skills I needed to go to art school. What are they trying to get the students of art GCSE to prove, with the huge burden of tasks, so much work about and riffing on famous artists, trying to make them do conceptual work when they're not ready and a complete lack of teaching them the basic skills of drawing and painting?!

trying to make them do conceptual work when they're not ready and a complete lack of teaching them the basic skills of drawing and painting?!

Thats a schoo problem not a government problem. We always taught all the basics. Tone, form, colour.

Yes I think you might be right but I've seen it in a lot of schools we've looked round. My DD's art teacher was particularly grim. Tone, form, colour, perspective and life drawing is all you really need at this stage. It seems this system is deliberately trying to not favouritise the kids who are naturally good at art?

No it’s not at all. It favours exploration of ideas. If a child has been taught correctly they can get an 8. Everyone can draw. It’s all about being taught properly. Some will always be better than others of course, but it’s just like any other subject. It needs the building blocks in place.

y7, tone form colour, application of colour techniques.
y8 one point perspective, portraits
y9 2 point, landscape

So many kids I’ve taught who said ‘I’m rubbish at art’. Then gone on to art college.

It doesn't stop at A-level, DD is at art school and is mildly annoyed at the essays she has to write (not many of them, thankfully) so that it counts as an honours degree. She'd rather just be drawing, but it's part of the big "everything must be a degree!" push.

She puts in very long hours, the 'coursework' element really doesn't get lighter!

@ArseInTheCoOpWindow No sorry I fundamentally disagree, not everyone can draw, not everyone has been encouraged to draw from an early age, not everyone has the motor skills or the visual eye. Yes of course you can encourage it and teach it to a degree, but some people are just better at art than others. Why shouldn't they be rewarded? it's like saying that everyone can be an elite athlete.

I am hearing that a lot of British kids are turning up at art school unable to draw and paint. That's why they are full of foreign kids - I went to the degree show at RCA - 90% overseas students. Maybe you are a good teacher of line, tone and colour, but you might be in the minority right now.

Favouring exploration of ideas is all very well but they seem to be solely concentrating on that and ignoring the quality of the finished pieces that my daughter has turned in. Those pieces seemed to count for nothing. She did a beautiful oil painting riffing on the Vanitas painters, with huge amounts of preparatory photos. My daughter, like me is a person who goes away and thinks intensively about a project and then produces something almost finished, she's not a put every thought down kind of girl. Anyway, they hadn't set it up that the kids got a sketch book to work in, they gave them three A3 presentation books and told them strictly that X item was only allowed one or two pages. The tutor said she'd been marked down because there was work missing, but we went back to her and pointed out that only three pieces out of like a hundred were not there and other kids in her class who'd missed many more got higher grades. despair and fury

I was teaching Art for 27 years. We had phenomenal results year after year. Ofsted we’re blown sideways.

Way above target levels every single year. Massive take up at A level.

Because all those who thought they ‘couldn’t draw’ realised they could when taught properly.

As l said, some will always be better and may have inate talent. But it can all be taught just like English and Maths. The difference between talent and being well taught is about one grade. Talent will get you a 9. Being well taught will get you an 8

It's bonkers, they don't use sketch books the way we used to use them. In my day (on the Ark!), your sketchbook was for experimenting, notes and messy ideas, DD used to obsess over hers. Now they have to be so perfect as they are your main piece of work and the writing aspect of it is so important too. She did 2 art based subjects and got top grades in both. The sad thing is there were far more talented people in her year, who didn't do as well, as they couldn't jump through the hoops with all the annotation etc. DD did it, but said it was all bollocks and box ticking. She enjoyed graphics GCSE far more than her Art GCSE, but hadn't gone on to take them further

There are YouTube and Pinterest videos of people's sketchbooks showing what grade they got and the amount of work needed.

The government has made it all much harder for all students. Gove changed it all when he was education secretary.

Annotation is an assessment criteria. He made it all much more academic.

And also coursework amount is the general guide to ability. The most able students are economic in their course work. So not reams of it, but what is in there is relevant, detailed and imaginative.

I know, it's so unfair on the students who are so talented, but struggle with the written aspect.
For art, DD readily admitted to making some of the written stuff up to fill in the blanks at the last minute.
Graphics she found far more enjoyable, but the teaching was totally different and she learnt so many new things, so there was always plenty to note down.
I don't remember writing anything for art and I got an A.
A level was different there was a lot of written work, even then.

These subjects like Art, Music, Drama, Food, PE should be BTECs not GCSEs.
There is nothing for 'doers' anymore.

They can all be done as BTechs or diplomas, but most schools don’t run them.

Both are needed, but GCSE is better as it is more relevant to today’s economy. There are no subjects for ‘doers’ as there is very little ‘doing’ in the economy. There is lots of design hence DT but not much manufacturing.

GCSEs may be 'better' but where does that leave kids who are weaker academically but confident practically?

Nowhere. What is wrong with having some qualifications that are 80% showing and 20% writing rather than the other way around?

Ir’s ‘better’ because it’s more relevant to today’s society.

There is no manufacturing base in the YK anymore.