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.

@Oblomov24 yes exactly. He is clearly very clever. He went on to Exeter university and gained a first in psychology. He's a policeman in London now, with plans to use his psychology knowledge in the future. So his firm university missed out on an excellent student.

Just been catching up on the thread. Reading about 6th form investigations makes me very glad DDs school has a good sixth form and she wants to stay on. She knows what she wants to study (maths, biology and chemistry as she wants to do medicine) and her teachers are already expecting her to be able to do those subjects. It really takes the pressure off, and there has been enough of that with mocks, which are thankfully now over.
Does anyone else in this group have a year 10 interested in medicine?

Hi @SuperSue77. My dd will probably do maths, FM, biology and chemistry but is likely to want to do biochemistry or bio-medical sciences then medicine I think. Medicine is a whole other ballgame!

Tell me about it! The more I have found out about it the more I worry! DD has wanted to be a doctor since the age of 5 and isn’t budging now. Luckily her A level choices are subjects she excels in. I don’t think she’ll go for Further Maths (I hope!) though her teacher has pushed her to do Further Maths GCSE (I advised against it but teacher was keen and it will help introduce some A level topics). Not sure if she’ll be expected to do a EPQ or not - I read something about extra curricular activities.
The UCAT is my biggest worry as without a good score there you will really struggle. I’m in a few medicine threads in the Higher Ed forum and they have loads of good advice, but the stress of it all worries me. Great that your daughter is interested in a different side of bio-med as doctors are having a really rough time of it, especially the newly qualifieds.

Agree with @Oblomov24 about only doing 3 A levels. I think it’s a bit pointless to start 4 knowing you’ll drop one.

Mine thinks he’d like to be a lawyer.

His mocks are nearly over, a few more days to go.

Ds2 has only got his maths paper back so far. A 6. I guess that's ok.

Just been to an open evening.
Am glad we turned up as seemed to say it had sold out on their website but think that was for the principal talks and you could wander round the subjects without booking.
Was great as meant DS was forced to think what he wanted to do as he chose to go to certain rooms. We went to Maths ,Business & Spanish and has taster lessons in Law and Economics at other open days through school so he can see what he thinks of them.
An evening well spent!

oh my gosh I didn’t even think open evenings for 6th form had started yet!

Wow, yes, I had no idea we'd got to that point! Hugely impressed anyone is that organised!

@SuperSue77 my Year 12 DD1 is determined to go into nursing, so we're looking at various unis with Adult Nursing degrees at the moment. it's not something I know anything about - and her grades meant she could have gone for medicine if she'd picked the right A-Levels, but she's adamant nursing is right for her. we will see. Good luck to your daughter, medicine looks like a huge journey...

@SuperSue77 - gcse further maths here too but no choice in the matter - top set does it as an extra alongside maths in the same timetabled time that everyone else does maths. They're whipping them through it all!

My niece is doing Paediatric Nursing at York, just finishing her first year - well, not really finishing as all her non-medic friends have gone home for the summer and she’s still on placement! She is loving it though and there are loads of opportunities career wise.

@SuperSue77 great to hear she's loving it! I'm still learning about different nursing degrees - DD is thinking adult nursing will give her the most options, and has work experience in the nursing dept of a uni later in the summer which should help. Why do my kids never pick anything I understand?

@minisnowballs - yup I understand that! My a-levels were all humanities subject and my degree also. Ds going for physics and dd leaning towards bio-chem - I'm no help at all!

Mocks finished for ds3. He has a school trip paint-balling thurs. Sports day Fri. Work experience next week. Then we are nearly finished year 10. I dropped ds2 off at the airport this morning. He's en route to Brisbane to do a uni year abroad. So ds1 and ds2 will both be in Oz. Ds3 will enjoy being an only child for a year.

I agree if they’re existing subjects but It can actually be incredibly useful if some subjects are new and you’re unsure. Dropping from 10/11 subjects to just 3 is quite a tough choice for some teens. Therefore starting with 4 gives them chance to try them. DD3 is thinking Business, Politics & Sociology which will ALL be new subjects as none of them taught for gcse at her school.

Hey!! That’s definitely okay! Unless he’s wanting to do A level maths and get a high grade. If he works then there’s a chance of an increase. What are his thoughts?

@SuperSue77 my background is paediatric nursing but you had to do adult nursing first (RGN) back in the day. I’ve travelled ALL over the world and had lots of amazing roles. I’d highly recommend it - even now with the state of the NHS. Good luck to your niece and I’m delighted she’s enjoying it! 😊

@NotDonna yes that's the thought at our school. Start with 4 and drop the one you dont like so much.

@icanbewhatiwant exactly what DD1 did. She dropped English Lit. Politics was her 'new' choice and she loves it SO much (what a year to study politics), and she also does history and biology, because she needs it for nursing. Was glad she got the chance to test English vs politics out before dropping.

At ours they encourage starting with 3 but 4 if some subjects are new. DD1 started Maths, Chemistry with new subjects psych and econ thinking she’d likely drop econ but absolutely loved economics! So psychol was dropped. DD3 will just do 3 new subjects and no 4th option.

Ds1 ended up doing film studies as that was the only one in the 4th column he liked the look of. He said he'd drop it after AS but ended up enjoying it, so he dropped geography instead. Ds1 went on to do a biology degree, but was limited to universities as he only took the one science at A level and no maths. But in year 12 he didn't intend to go to uni. hence not really thinking about subjects. Ds3 knows now that that is the route he wants to take.

@icanbewhatiwant DD1 does biology because she wants to be a nurse. She's not a scientist really in any other way and is certainly no mathematician. No danger she wants a science degree - if it wasn't for the nursing it would history and politics!

@minisnowballs Ds2 is doing a history degree. He did religious studies with philosophy and ethics at A level and enjoyed it. Ds3 will want to do sciences. He's the maths person too. Ds1 only did the lower tier at gcse.

In the chemistry, computer science and English mocks, Ds had the highest mark in the year. I did say he's aiming high. He handed me his citizenship mock paper as he went to school. He said he did so badly. A 6. That's a good grade still.

Not sure at all what my DS wants to do. He doesn't seem to have any interest or inquisitiveness regarding careers which is worrying me a bit, but lots of my friends and colleagues say that they had no idea what they wanted to do at 15, so I'm hoping it'll come to him eventually. I think it needs to involve maths as that's his strength and also geography as he seems to be good at that. He is an all rounder, sporty and musical too, and also thinking of music A/L but of course it needs to be a combination of subjects that works for Uni potentially.
DS doesn't want to continue at his school for 6th form and wants to go to a college as it's less like a school environment.

@DataColour ds1 has a biology degree. He doesn't want to work in a science job, has absolutely no idea what he does want to do, though says he needs a masters for a good science job. So he's gone travelling, been gone since Jan 2023. I think he's avoiding coming home and working. He told me recently he'd quite like to be a barista. Nothing wrong with that. But a slight waste of £60k of debt and a biology degree!