High scoring model answers (GCSE) - where to find?

[ratticus4]

I looked over DD’s history essay yesterday and it looked pretty poor. Without saying too much (!) I asked if she had seen any examples of good or excellent essays but she hasn’t.

I’ve looked on the exam board’s website but there are only a couple of examples there for teachers. I’m after something more for the pupils.

Any pointers, please?

I couldn’t really find anything when I looked online, although, like you I am sure there must be examples out there somewhere! In the end, an English teacher at school provided an example. Hope you find something.

Your daughter goes to her teachers and asks....

It's very simple for her to do this.

Which exam board is she doing?

She has asked but hasn’t got anywhere. His feedback consists of correcting a couple of grammatical errors.

She’s doing AQA.

This seems to be a problem across the essay subjects, English too. I’d like her to see an example of a more sophisticated answer.

I've seen some helpful Edexcel YouTube videos, but obviously only helpful if that's your DD's exam board.

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLjMctHu_u7_xk6IpKJYzYsqxXXGrBblZC

Mr Lewis model AQA history answers.

Teachers have access to past paper answers through the aqa secure site. Your dc's teacher should have a log in to be able to access them. If not, I'd get in touch with the head of department.

For English Accolade press have a series of books Essay Writing guide for GCSE (9-1). They cover different Lit texts and also the English language AQA.

DD1 has definitely got example answers to questions for English but I suspect they are written for teachers. If she'd struggle to understand the marking schemes then would she discuss it with you so you could clarify what they mean?

DD for the paid for part of Seneca really usefully for improving her history marks.

If she is y11 I think you should only be looking for model answers a grade or so above otherwise things are too out of reach. She should have been told / asking for the last year what she missed to get the next marks.

I was wondering if ChatGPT might be good for this. I thought about creating an account to see if it could write a history essay in the style of a grade 9 GCSE student, but I haven't got round to it yet. On the radio yesterday they mentioned that shares in US ed tech companies have dropped because students have started using ChatGPT for exactly this sort of thing.

What you want are the example responses to the exams - aqa have loads of them on their secure site. They're not written "for teachers"... they're real ones written in exams. I use English ones extensively with my students.

I wouldn't bother. We've tried this and they look superficially okay, but they don't hit the criteria

Does anyone know of a similar source to the Mr Lewis video for OCR history?

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=lqUG626zUFc

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=f4TfAA_i4n0

Are these helpful?

Certainly for science, a lot of what it produces wouldn't hit the mark scheme, so I'd advise against this.

There are some examples available on examiner's reports etc which may be useful, as well as the further answers available via centre resources. Her teacher or the head of subject should be able to access and share these- perhaps worth dropping them an email.

Agreed that if she is working at say, Grade 5, then looking at Grade 9 answers may not be so helpful.

Dc's did OCR History but school provided a WAGOLLs (What A Good One Looks Like) for all the different sections ie 3 markers, 5 markers and 20 markers etc. This broke down a model answer with colour coded AO1 Knowledge, AO2 Second Order Concepts and AO4 Judgement so they could clearly see the format. They had this from the start of year 10 to practise their responses. Your DD's school should provide these really. Is there nothing in her class books at all for this?

Mine were even provided previous students' work when they aced out an answer too which was stuck into their books as a photocopy.

I do not think ChatGPT would be helpful for specific GCSE History questions as it relies on what they are taught in school. ie mine did Elizabethans and there might be a question about Catholic threats but they are only meant to cover the things on the OCR syllabus not just anything about Catholic threats. It is far more ingrained and super focused. You need to hit the mark scheme tick boxes to get marks.

Watching YouTube videos for each question on each exam paper in History and English shot my daughter’s final grade up way beyond expectations.
For English, watch Mr Bruff and get his book.

That's rubbish her teacher hadn't shared these with her. (Speaking as a former teacher/HOD.) I totally disagree about just looking a grade or two above. The higher level examples will have a greater impact on students' work at whatever level by showing them what a great answer looks like. I agree to get in touch with HOD if class teacher is not helpful. For Y11s not to have been shown many model answers is very poor IMO.

At DD’s school they would have ‘exemplars‘ for each essay written. These were handed out with results. Sometimes they were past student work, but the teacher tried to pick an example from the submitted work wherever possible.

Clear guidance of what was needed to up the marks, re quotes, context, depth, etc was given.

Thank you to everyone for your replies. DD was given a sheet of the mark scheme by another history teacher on Friday and with that, and the Mr Lewis videos on YouTube, she has been working out how to frame her answers.

It’s interesting to hear how different the teachers’ approaches are. I’m frustrated with myself that this has happened and that I’m only realising now where the gaps are.