What changes would you make to GCSE`s

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If you could make any changes to gcse`s what would they be ?

What subjects would you remove from the curriculum and what would you add ?

I hate how low ability students can go through 12 years of education and leave with nothing. That’s so wrong. There should be something as a baseline.

@ConnieTucker I agree. There should be an alternative route to show what they can do and give them self worth.

Graduated papers - they start with functional skills and progress in difficulty so that it's normal (and not a sign of failure) for students to not answer all of the questions unless they are the highest achievers. No gambling with foundation and higher tiers.

Dividing formal assessment over the year - not quite coursework, not controlled assessments, but properly invigilated, external examinations carried out, so that the overall grade isn't reliant upon a single day in May/right in the middle of Ramadan/the week a girl is due on/hay fever/flu/bloody ridiculous levels of heat/etc. Also takes away the all or nothing element of pressure. Then the totals are totted up to come out with the final awards. They could also be shorter examinations because they are covering a part of the overall qualification, rather than the entire course in three hours.

Grading to the functional requirement, so that somebody who would now get a 5, for example, is awarded a functional skills qualification in its own right, whilst somebody who would get an 8 is awarded functional skills and a GCSE automatically.

Spreading the mental and practical load over the duration of the course, providing multiple secure, graduated, less intimidating opportunities to accumulate knowledge and credit, minimising pressure upon resources such as space and creating a feeling that it's just the next assessment, rather than OH MY GOD THIS IS IT IF IT GOES WRONG WE'RE DOOMED.

A paper with scenarios that asks the child to problem solve or give an empathetic solution….
would show those that aren’t ‘academic’ that they can try other career routes

Yes - I get rid of the all or nothingness of exams. it doesn’t have to be full coursework just an acknowledgment that some people don’t do well exams but still know their stuff and in reality for many jobs you don’t have to have exam like recall of information.
I’d love a life skills qualification - sort of pshe but not - how to budget/basic money mgt etc

I'm a maths teacher. I would scrap GCSEs altogether - the concept of rigorous testing at age 16 is outdated and unnecessary.

I would look again more seriously at 14-19 pathways. The current core GCSEs are not accessible for a significant minority, and there's just no point. Most people don't need to understand pythagoras, or factorising, or laws of indices. They should be offered a course that covers genuine core skills that they need for their future steps, be that apprenticeships/ T Levels/self employment etc. This course would be studied and assessed up to age 18, there might be 2 levels within it (but not like higher and foundation tier - a pass on level 1 would be significantly easier than a pass on level 2, rather than having so many different fail grades on the current foundation tier).

There should also be a more academic curriculum, and everyone on this pathway would study maths til 18,like most other countries. But rather than splitting it into GCSE at 16 and A Level at 18 we could use a system where at age 18 you can chose Level 1,2 or 3 maths, with level 1 being basically current GCSE, level 2 being AS and level 3 being A Level. More like a baccalaureate style assessment.

Basically, I agree with the principle of everyone studying some form of Maths up to age 18,but they should all have AN exam that they have a realistic chance of passing.

@Dragonwindow wow that is an excellent post I have to say.

Also very refreshing coming from a teacher who is at the coal face day in day out i have to say.

Bring back coursework. This was a huge part of making it a more level playing field. A lot of the less academic kids loved this, and the more academic kids that thrive under exam pressure hated them.

Reinvesting in alternative vocational qualifications. At the moment it is only the lucky few that go to a school with lots of EHCP kids that have access to this. It's criminal.

I would also scrap grade boundaries and the masses of exam boards. Its criminal that this year there's kids that would've passed if they had lived across the Welsh border and seemingly all have the same qualifications.

Fewer papers. My eldest has just sat GCSEs and the exam period was exhausting. She was pretty ruined at weekends, half term, afterwards. They can still learn the same content without being tested to the nth degree on everything.

This course would be studied and assessed up to age 18, there might be 2 levels within it (but not like higher and foundation tier - a pass on level 1 would be significantly easier than a pass on level 2, rather than having so many different fail grades on the current foundation tier).

But that's what we currently have. We don't have many different fail grades on the current foundation tier, we have level 1 passes and level 2 passes. The only fail grade is a U.

No bloody external exams at 16 and an end to the idea that you leave school at 16.

Teach a similar curriculum that allows them to specialise a bit in Year 10-11 but with teacher-marked assessment with a degree of moderation.

Then a broader curriculum at Y12-13, with the option to leave at that point to go into technical education or an apprenticeship, but without the nonsense of having to chase a 'qualification' in English or Maths to be able to do so.

It's criminal that we're making kids who are 15 or 16 make choices that will dictate their futures by having such a narrow senior school curriculum that then dictates their university choices.

One exam board so there's consistency of everyone sitting the same exam (or at least most of the same papers).

It might be marketing bollocks but our school prattles on about picking 'harder' GCSE boards as a better stepping stone to A levels. Which seems silly to me as you're dropping most of your subjects.

Sorry, i was referring to higher tier and lower tier at GCSE. A Grade 4 pass is officially equally difficult on either paper - the exact same grade 4 and 5 questions appear on both papers. If you only answer the easier, foundation questions (ie the ones that aren't on the higher tier paper) then you would only get a U, 1, 2 or 3, which are all considered fail grades for every purpose I'm aware of (but I don't know everything about everything! I mostly know about 6th form in school, 6th form colleges, and university entry requirements).

I would like a system where a foundation "pass" is easier than a higher tier "pass".

then you would only get a U, 1, 2 or 3, which are all considered fail grades for every purpose I'm aware of

1, 2 and 3 are Level 1 passes, they are not fail grades. Grade 4+ is a level 2 pass.

I'd change any qualifications so students aren't wading through huge amounts of content and then getting a high grade with a score of 50-60%. If I remember correctly that was a problem some years with higher Maths GCSE.

I think we should scrap exams at 16 in most cases, and have functional literacy/numeracy qualifications as valid and normalised, with other academic routes available.

I'd also be in favour of a secondary leaving certificate that gives an average of your time at secondary school. It would go some way to removing the doss around for Year 7-9 and then throw huge amounts of intervention at Year 11s.

Stop putting students who will never pass GCSEs through them - more functional skills qualifications in English and Maths . It's heartbreaking to see some of my year 7s starting off this year with reading ages of 6 or 7 and knowing that they will never get to the standard to the standard to pass GCSE. Set up for failure already !
Go back to grading of A, B,C. All these levels for an A has made children who get a 6 or below think it's rubbish as it's so far down the list .
Have one exam board per subject and everyone sits the same exam across the UK. There's no fairness in the system if everyone is doing different things !
Standardise marking .. this year we have had papers unmarked , huge grade disparities and therefore lots of reviews .

A 'functional' maths and English for all children that is relevant and useful in life and general work. And coursework and smaller exams.

GCSEs are not fit for purpose - 40% having to resit maths and English and being made to feel they have failed is ridiculous. And the exams aren't marked properly so they don't actually reflect ability anyway do they are a load of crap.

A big part of the problem appears to be people thinking that we are entering lots of kids for qualifications that they are failing, they are actually passing them but their passes are being described as 'fails'.

I think some coursework, my DS had none for his this year. I took gcses in their early days and English for example was part coursework part exam. Practical subjects did have some assessments (eg food tech) but academic ones were 100% based on 2-3 exam papers over a few weeks.
Also forcing non academic kids to keep taking maths and English endlessly to try and get grade 4. My SIL works in an FE college and said students doing well on practical courses such as hairdressing were dropping out as they got dispirited by having to retake them every year until they were 18. She said some schools were entering them in Y10 to give them a second shot whilst at school, so for some by second year of a post 16 course it could be their 4th attempt.
I do think the 1-9 marking scheme is an improvement on the ridiculous A A* business. In my day it was only up to A!

Ah I see- I've never heard it called that before (and I'm a maths teacher!). So if a 1/2/3 is a level 1 pass, why do kids have to retake if they haven't got the magic 4?

(I work in an independent school, so our kids in fact don't have to retake if they miss the 4, but they all choose to. Maybe I've misunderstood about the retake system in the state sector?)

A mix of coursework, modular tests and a final exam that all the grades are added together towards the final grade .
Less compulsory subjects. English language is a must, English Literature shouldn't be.
The only compulsory subjects should be Maths and English Language.
Less subjects to be taken in general - drop a lesson and pupils could actually get a proper lunch break rather than the 20 minutes many schools seem to do.

I'm a teacher.

1. Reduce the content, quality over quantity.
2. Bring back coursework and other assessment types to exams
3. More variety of qualification types such as vocational, BTEC etc
4. Everyone does functional maths, GCSE maths is a higher option
5. Everyone does functional literacy, GCSE English is an option as is creative writing (I can't believe everyone has to do this in an exam, surely it's an arts subject??)
6. More emphasis on variety, many are choosing at 12/13, they should have plenty of choice.
7. Less emphasis on separate sciences, combined science is plenty, kids can specialise at a level.
8. More modular assessment rather than remembering everything after 3 years!
9. Use more teacher assessment, we know what we're doing! Exam boards can moderate.

Ah I see- I've never heard it called that before (and I'm a maths teacher!). So if a 1/2/3 is a level 1 pass, why do kids have to retake if they haven't got the magic 4?

Right up until 5 weeks before the new 9-1 GCSEs were actually sat by Y11 the plan was to force kids to resit it if they didn't achieve a 5! The resit policy is actually being scrutinised right now because the proportion of kids who resit and get 4+ is 16% which suggests it's largely a waste of time for the majority.

The 4 is because it is 'equivalent' to an old C grade, and an old C-grade was equivalent to an O-level pass. Below a C-grade was equivalent to an old CSE pass. When the two qualifications were combined into GCSEs, instead of everyone just having GCSEs at either Level 1 or Level 2, people started describing Level 1 passes that were equivalent to a CSE pass as a fail because it wasn't equivalent to an O-level pass. It's a terrible failing of the system - no one used to described CSE passes as fails but now those kids are described as having failed their GCSEs.

So if you wanted to introduce a new qualification with Level 1 and Level 2 passes, you'd have to be sure that people wouldn't start describing Level 1 passes as a fail like they do now!

Maths: start mini tests earlier (Year 9) and have a breakdown of topics. Therefore you don’t fail the entire Maths GCSEs but get scores on fractions, angles, percentages etc. Business maths or those required for economics is different to maths for physics which is different to maths and logic for computing sciences. Get it done like Dr frost etc and marks results in a few days and retakes options.
English: why do all the tests in 1 sittings. Breakdown over terms.
Course work or essays over time. Art and DT maybe earlier in Year 10 so time to revise for other topics.