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Secondary education

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Original poster

Foundation or Higher - Maths GCSE

19 replies

RachelGreensHair · 09/04/2023 19:31

DD (year 10) is a happy bright girl. She excels in the essay based subjects such as English, History etc. She is struggling with Maths, despite being in Set 1. She has a maths tutor and that's helping but come exam time, Maths causes her the most stress. She's studying for the higher paper, and her teacher did say to me they'd be happy to revisit if they enter her for higher or foundation. She knows what college and university she wants to go to, she knows what courses she wants to do - none of them need more than a pass in Maths. She will do well in all her other subjects. Psychologically she feels like she's letting herself down by doing a foundation paper but having done some past papers we know she will sail through foundation and get a 5, and struggle to get more than a 5 in higher, maybe a 6 with more tuition and time. What would you do? Enter her for higher or foundation?

OP posts:

Strictly1 · 09/04/2023 19:34

Put her in foundation and take the pressure off. She doesn’t need above a pass so do what’s needed to get that and take it as an opportunity of managing stress and taking control and frame it positively. She sounds like she’s got her head screwed on.

noblegiraffe · 09/04/2023 19:50

She's in set 1 - does set 2 get entered for the foundation paper? In some schools it would be a big drop from set 1 to foundation.

Students find the higher paper difficult because you don't need to get very much of it right to get a grade 4/5. That doesn't mean it's the wrong paper for her, particularly if you think she will find the foundation paper easy, it's about mentally adjusting to how you approach the paper rather than getting stressed about not being able to answer it all.

20% of the marks on the end of the foundation paper are the exact questions that appear at the start of the higher paper.

I would certainly wait until she has sat her Y10 exams at higher and see how she performs gradewise there, compared to how she thinks she is performing. Sometimes, particularly with girls, there's a mismatch.

lanthanum · 10/04/2023 13:18

It's a long way off yet. If she's already sailing through the foundation paper, then with another year she'll be able to do more, and she might actually be rather bored if she doesn't have a go at higher.

As noblegiraffe suggests, rethink the mindset - she does not need to be able to do everything at higher to get a 6 or 7. Being towards the bottom of set 1 is a difficult place - inevitably, there will be some kids in the set who just get it all, and she needs not to compare herself to them. That can be difficult if you're top in all your other subjects.

(I do think the abolition of intermediate tier was one of the biggest mistakes ever. People shouldn't have to do an exam where they can pass by being able to do less than half of the questions. It leaves too many people feeling like they're no good at maths.)

CatOnTheChair · 10/04/2023 13:36

Set 1 of how many?
I wouldn't make any decisions yet, but tell DD you will get her entered for foundation if that the right thing at Christmas.
If she is easily getting 5s now, I'd expect higher to be right for her, but foundation might be better for her psychologically.

kairi1 · 11/04/2023 15:51

A long time ago now, but when I was doing GCSEs I was in a similar situation with a choice between higher paper and intermediate (a shame this doesn’t still exist). I was getting Cs in the higher papers and I made the choice to go for intermediate and save myself a lot of stress. I got a B in the intermediate paper.

Perhaps with a lot of work I could have got that A grade on the higher paper. What I did was get a first class degree, did a PhD and am now a Professor of Literature. Beyond the required grade for university entry no one has ever been interested in my Maths grade. And I have never been interested in the Maths grade of anyone I employed. If your daughter is set on a Humanities route she’d be much better spending her time focusing on those grades rather than working on higher Maths content that will possibly leave her with the same result but at the expense of other subjects.

TheMathsGuy · 25/04/2023 11:38

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Dodgeitornot · 25/04/2023 11:55

@TheMathsGuy You're not allowed to advertise on here. £25 for a session with 10 other students is extremely expensive.

IglesiasPiggl · 25/04/2023 11:59

I guess it depends on the school but at ours Set 1 is for very able students who will get 8/9 and sit Additional Maths in Y11. We have 5 sets with two classes in each though. Could it be that she would be happier in set 2 or 3 (for example) but still sit the higher paper? Perhaps being in the company of the best maths students is making her think she's worse than she is.

Dodgeitornot · 25/04/2023 12:04

I agree, sounds like moving down one set would help. My DDs school set 2 does the same as set 1 just at a slower pace. Set 3 is kids that may be doing foundation or higher, set 4 is all foundation. There is also an SEN set that does an entry level in Y9 and 10 and than foundation for the actual exam.

Justlittleoldme123 · 25/04/2023 12:11

Hi I'm a tutor and had a student in a similar situation before and it was decided it would be better to enter her in for the higher paper. In the foundation paper you need a higher percentage correct to get the 5 compared to on the higher paper. I'd let her do a number of papers over the next few months and see what she is getting. You don't need to decide to really close to the exam. I hope this helps!

JingleBellez · 25/04/2023 12:25

If it was me (and this was me in 1998) I choose higher. It paid off.

It's ultimately her decision.

JingleBellez · 25/04/2023 12:26

I've since taught and realise it's much easier to get a pass (5) on Higher.

JingleBellez · 25/04/2023 12:26

Maths guy ...nice!

Easterbunnywashere · 25/04/2023 12:31

It is generally thought to be easier to pass the higher than foundation if you have good basic knowledge. To get the same grade at foundation you need to get a lot more correct answers.

Intergalacticcatharsis · 25/04/2023 12:32

She sounds very mature and driven. What you want to avoid is her spending so much time on Maths that she ends up neglecting her top performing subjects. I would be guided by her and talk it through clearly.
I think it is helpful to explain that you don’t need to get that much correct in Higher to get a 5/6. However, depending on her personality she might prefer to do Foundation and get most things right. If she already knows what she wants to study at uni, I assume she can make a decision on the Maths paper quite easily too.

pointythings · 25/04/2023 12:47

I would second waiting until end of year exams. WIth foundation you need to get pretty much everything right to get that 5, with higher you can afford to drop some balls, especially because some of the higher content might just get you marks. A friend of DD1's made that choice in collaboration with her maths teacher and got the 5, whereas she was getting 4s on the foundation practice papers. Consult with your DD's teachers nearer the time, it's just too early right now.

Changes17 · 25/04/2023 15:00

We had this, but with French. DS wanted to take the pressure off, do Foundation. In the end, he didn't really get a choice (the school just decided) since he was getting 5s and above in the mocks and is now taking higher French. I think he could well do better than a 5 in the exam, but we shall see.

This is his weakest subject by some way – as sounds to be the case with your daughter – so he's not used to the uncertainty of being less able. I think it's not a bad thing to do something you won't necessarily do brilliantly in but still do as well as you can. After all, both a foreign language and maths are pretty good life skills to have, and to do as well as you can with them is by no means a waste of time.

JingleBellez · 25/04/2023 15:52

I recommend the GCSE Bitesize website. Little and often...

Stettafire · 26/04/2023 14:16

I'd always go for the higher paper. The foundation paper is capped at a C, and a C is the bare minimum accepted by most A level programs and universities. I find that foundation papers increase the likelihood of getting a lower-than-C grade. While if doing the higher paper they have a better chance of picking up extra points that could push their grade up to a C or higher. A D is theoretically a pass, but practically speaking it's pretty much the same as a U (ungraded) in the real world.
TBH I think the very concept of tiered papers is old fashioned and disadvantages students.

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