Year 10 - 2023/2024 Support Thread

[QueenMabby]

Hi all

A new thread for those needing support (or just wanting to chat or rant!) with teens heading into their GCSE years.

I do think yr10 is too young for work experience. So many won’t have a clue what they fancy and like you say at 14/15 very few work places want the responsibility or the faff of DBS, risk assessments etc.
DD1 was very fortunate to spend a week shadowing a medical consultant friend of ours (200 miles away, so even stayed with her) but she had to complete a trillion forms for the NHS - as an August born she did hers after her GCSEs, but still before she turned 16. So I’m now thinking the NHS must be ok with fifteen year olds. There were a LOT of hurdles though!

DD1 had work experience in Y10. She's the very end of year as well so was 14. It was really good for her though I admit hard to get. She's learned she doesn't want to work in an office (one week of financial PR) and that she doesn't want to be a primary teacher. Her Year 12 work experience is with my sister-in-law who is a teaching nurse - which since she wants to do nursing is perfect.

Not sure DD2 will get any work experience however - doesn't seem to be scheduled. I guess, at music school, they probably think the whole thing is work experience.

DD has work experience coming up in the last week of year 10 but we were really struggling to find anything she was interested in so DH is going to take her to work and give her a project to do. I think it is very young for them to be expected to organise it themselves (which is what the school were suggesting), I suspect most have had a parent sort it for them.

Well done to those getting good feedback from parents evening, we only get one per year and it was last term. Feels like DD is doing ok at the moment, she is enjoying the new topic in History (the cold war). She has a history trip at the end of June and there is an info evening about it early May, the school have said we can give them DD's passport then if we won't need it - seems like a long time for them to be hanging on to them! We're not going anywhere in half term as DS is year 13 so doing his A levels.

Well done to all with good parents' evening outcomes. It's a tricky year - GCSEs don't quite feel "real" yet but teachers are starting to put the pressure on.

@minisnowballs - that article was VILE. Whilst I hate the genderising (is that even a word?) of toys - why does a toy need to be produced in bright primary colours for boys then the same toy in lurid pink and purple for girls??? - the rest of it just made me want to vomit.

Dd continues her busy-ness. She's been invited and has joined the physics extension club. She hates physics! But those magic words: Olympiad and Certificate lured her in... 🤣

They do work experience at the end of year 10 at our school. My older 2 ds's work/worked at a local grain place in the lab testing crops each summer for almost 3 months. Ds1 did it for 3 years, ds2 did 2 years, but he's doing a year abroad this year so won't be working there, then he will return to uni next year , so will work there again next summer. So we asked if ds3 could do work experience there and that's what he's doing. Hopefully he will be able to work summers there too. He has to be 18 though for paid work, so not for a few years.

Parents Evenings sound positive!
RS revision nagging continues at pace, despite me saying am going to leave him to his own devices -hey ho!

Am guessing after half term there will be end of year exams but no mention of those yet-the nagging never ends!

We have end of year exams the week before half term. Dd has her second Greek GCSE on the Tuesday so is missing her German and Eng Lit exams so will slot those in a couple of days later when she has gaps.

No work experience here until lower sixth and then we have to sort it for the summer holidays. No clue how to go about finding a chemistry/bio chemistry inspired work placement for dd!

End of year exams are after May half term at our school so no one goes away as the intention is to revise. Shame as it’d be a nice sunny break! I’m so sick of the rain atm!

DS has work experience at the end of Y10 - we've been lucky to sort out something interesting with a friend of ours, but it feels like the process depends largely on who you know, which doesn't seem fair.

I must say he's finding Y10 quite a step up in terms of what the teachers are expecting. We didn't have a great parents evening - he's doing OK but could do a lot better. He has end of year exams and then two lots of mocks in Y11 so I'm hoping the penny will finally drop at some point during that process that there is a direct correlation between effort put in and results achieved.

There's not been any mention of end of year exams here. Although I think the maths teacher mentioned an exam in june/july and the PE teacher mentioned similar, but no formal week of exams. Our mock exams are in /October November.
I'm thinking that DS might need to do some revising of topics, especially the ones done earlier on in Year 10, towards the end of summer, so that's he's not trying to cram everything once school starts in September. Is anyone planning to do any revision in the summer or is this overkill? 6 weeks of absolutely no work seems a bit too long given it won't be long before their mocks.

DS is doing a work experience placement in July for a week in an architecture company which I arranged through a friend. DS has no clue what he want to do as a career, so I just want to expose him to the work place and they have a good scheme, with a project for him to do.

second day of exams for ds today, English language and Maths (his nemesis!). He was very nervous about the Maths, it’s the only exam he ever panics in 🙁.

I struggled to find medical work experience for my daughter who is in year 10 and due to do a week this July. Nearly all the NHS schemes ate 16+ and all the contacts I know said the same thing, even the admin staff based in a building with no patients. But we were lucky enough that an old school friend of mine who is now a GP offered for her to do WP at her practice (unsolicited!) I rasied the under 16 issue and she wasn't concerned, though we've had to do all the usual paperwork and risk assessments etc. We are travelling a similar distance to this practice, so no risk of her knowing any patients - which was a concern of my friendly GP when I asked him about it. Without this friend it would have been online experience only for DD. Though the NHS Blood & Transplant service do a WP scheme for 14+which looks realy good. Lots of my daughter's friends are saying they will do "online" experiences and plan to spend the week chilling out!

Ahh @MissyB1 hope it went well for him!

Two weeks today until DD's first actual GCSE exam. Apparently today's Greek lesson was "wild". I think my daughter has a very strange perception of such things! 🤣

@QueenMabby - not been reading The Secret History has she?

I don't think so - just a bit over dramatic!

Ah - was just checking they weren't staging a Bacchanalian orgy. My greek lessons were, alas, never 'wild'.

@minisnowballs 🤣🤣

No @minisnowballs. Nothing exciting. Word derivation apparently!

Dd is miffed today that for her actual gcse she had to write in black ink. She is a committed blue pen girl and still uses a fountain pen.

She refuses to sully her pen with a black ink cartridge but we're now on our third different pen to try to get one that feels as smooth as her fountain pen. Any ideas??

Buy her a lamy fountain pen with black ink cartridges? They're not wildly expensive

@QueenMabby how lovely to be able to use a fountain pen well - we are a family of majority lefties, and although I know you CAN get lefthanded fountain pens we've all ended up defaulting to biro. Reckon a new fountain pen is the answer - a special GCSE gift?

It's exeat weekend here... so I've got DD2 coming home for Bank Hol so will be able to see how much work she's been doing. Probably not much. It's also Ukrainian Easter so we'll be attempting to ensure it feels like home a bit for our foster daughter by learning to dye eggs and making some easter bread. Not sure how well that is going to go!

Sent DS off for his actual RS GCSE this morning. He got pretty nervous last night as he said it hit him that this was “actually happening “
Exam is at 9 so at least it’s out of the way early and they can enjoy the sunshine at lunch.
I am a nervous wreck-heaven help me for next year! I don’t remember this for my DD but she had teacher assessed during covid so felt safer!
Anyway I have a meeting at 9 so at least that will distract me somewhat.
Good luck to all other DC’s over the coming weeks.

Good luck to your DS @SB1971 It's great practise for the real thing next year! Hope he does well.

Hope it went well this morning for your ds @SB1971.

DD's first actual gcse is next Wednesday. She's feeling ok about it so far.

She sang in the choir yesterday for DS's leavers' service which was lovely.