Yearly warning not to take A-level maths with less than a 7 at GCSE

[noblegiraffe]

GCSE results day and therefore A-level sign-up day is coming.

So with that in mind I just thought I'd post the table of conversions from GCSE to A-level results for maths to show that there is a strong correlation. This is because A-level Maths basically starts with a quick review of grade 8/9 GCSE algebra content and then gets more difficult. Students starting with a 7 will have to work very hard to keep up, students with a 6 often flounder.

There are sixth forms and colleges that will accept students with a 6 onto A-level maths, but from many years of experience, this is not a good experience for the student. Many will drop out and switch courses early on (and therefore not appear in the results table), but some will struggle on for 2 years and then come out with a grade that really doesn't help them with university applications.

If you take A-level maths with a 6, even if you manage to complete the course (and a lot won't), about three quarters will get a D or below, with E the most common grade.

This data is from 2019 because obviously more recent data has been screwed up by covid.

If your child is keen to do maths, but gets a 6, please consider Core Maths which is designed to be taken alongside 3 A-levels and provides supportive maths content for A-level sciences and social sciences (e.g. psychology, geography).

If your child is going to do A-level maths (particularly if they are on a 7 but also 8/9), check that they have done summer bridging work so they hit the ground running in September.

Hah, @Teaandcustardcream I was about to say the same thing!

Thank you!

I've been on this thread a while (when working out options etc!) and now my duaghter is waiting for results on Thursday!

She's expected to get a high 8 (sometimes got 9s but wasn't expecting that) but worried that somehow it might not be on the day 😬.

She wants to do physics chemistry and Maths.

How many points is considered a high 8?

A 9 in maths was 217 and a 8 was 186 - a strong 8 would be between 200 and 217 then

would that be enough to take further maths too?

@babylone the best discussion would be with your child and school. On the surface of it, yes, it sounds fine (our school asks for a 6 for maths, 7 for FM). But if that 8 was obtained through tutoring, blood, sweat and tears, it's worth considering how tough it might be.

Congrats on the 8.

This all so interesting - just spoke with the head of maths at my daughters school and asked how many A level students actually have a 7 in Maths GCSE in their classes - turns out only 3/60. Looks like they are very good at persuading and putting off many students - I find it quite sad actually.

Absolutely agree with the op

@DoublePeoniesthank you - yes lots of sweat but not too many tears and his own independent work… i guess we can decide in September?

DD’s school is 7 min for A level maths and 8 for further maths. DD said lots of people have dropped out of further maths or told cannot continue to year 13 as they are scoring so low on mocks. Someone got less than 10% and this is someone who got an 8 in GCSE maths.

Both mine are maths wizz’s and DS got 97% in both his A level maths and further maths exams and won an award for highest score in country for one of his final year degree modules. I got a D in GCSE maths and so did their dad, we would have been resitting!

No one should be doing A level
maths if they needed extensive tutoring to get a 7/ 8/9
A level maths (along with Physics) is one of the toughest A levels imho and you need to have a flair for maths to succeed

Perhaps we could apply this to other subjects too? I’m not sure Maths or Physics are inherently more complex than some subjects like Chemistry, Biology to name a few. I would quite like to have a class full of super high achievers..

It seems that commonly students find the jump from gcse to a level hard - sometimes insurmountable - for maths, physics and chemistry. I don’t think I’ve heard other subjects mentioned as often as suffering from this. Some kids who are bright in other ways somehow just don’t seem to get the concepts, whereas to others it may be a lot more obvious.

So another factor may be what is the attrition rate - if they’re allowed to start more than 3 subjects, which is most likely to be dropped? Which ones more often result in students having to change tack and redo a year? I don’t know the answers to this, but it might be interesting if there were stats available.

Just realised, that last post I thought I was on a different thread, the one comparing stem vs humanities grades.

DS1 got a mid 7 at GCSE Maths pre COVID, he sweated blood and tears and got a B at A level Maths. Very hard work.

Why sad? To me seeing students really struggle with maths A-level and not enjoy it - is more sad! Dissuading some students from maths A-level can be kind to them!

@ErrolTheDragon I think if it is an A level and the jump is bigger from GCSE math to A level maths, than let's say the jump from English GCSE to English A level you could argue, quite reasonably that something is a) wrong with the GCSE or b) wrong the A level. As the qualifications ought to be of similar level of difficulty if they are the same level of qualification.

@Pythag while I agree, what I am concerned about is how do you know if that student with a 7 is going to struggle at A level or be one of the exceptions that actually attains higher than suggested- as noted some do? With all this talk about students with 7's more likely to attain E and D at maths A level - how much of that may be impacted by the mindset of the teachers?

My daughter got around the same results. She went on to get two Distinctions in L3 BTECs for Psychology and Business Studies (Distinctions have the same UCAS values as As) and a C in A Level Geography (results last week). There are so many options and lots of kids don't do A Levels as there not right for them

Is your DS1 glad he did this subject?

As my point is people like your DS1 are being talked out of doing the A level when they can do extremely well and that's a shame.

Generally if a student has weak algebra they will really struggle with A-level maths. It is pretty unusual, but if a student had been lazy for GCSE but was naturally able at algebra and determined to work hard at A-level, then perhaps they can make a success of maths A-level. Obviously, the data shows that this is pretty unusual.

I don’t think it is really my mindset that impacts the grades of my students. I think it is how hard they work and to a limited extent how well I teach.

😱

On your first point, anecdotally I think the jump from GCSE to A level has been hard in English Lit too. But perhaps that is school specific. But, only anecdotally.

I am very interested by your second point. My daughter has several friends who started out doing double maths, with either one or two other subjects, and dropped a subject. In every case they dropped something else and stuck with the further maths. I think the drop out rate from FM is quoted as quite high, but the number I'd be interested in comparing it to is the number of students who drop A.N.Other subject while keeping double maths. My suspicion - and I have no data to back it up - is it's not just the 0.1% maths geniuses who find maths, even further maths, easier to see through than say art, or history, or biology when things get tough. But the other subjects they are dropping get dissipated through an eclectic mix of subject buckets, and we don't see the underlying pattern of students choosing to stick with their Maths and FM over one of their other subjects/subject.

I am not convinced that any subject is objectively the hardest. The whole point of A levels is you get to specialise in what suits you surely. Some students are generalists who could pick and succeed in lots of subjects, but there are others who are not maths savants but who still finds maths or Physics a more digestible A level than, say, English lit. I believe Physics has a high drop out rate, but again I wonder if that is partly because it pairs so well with double maths, and is more often taken as one of 4 instead of one of 3. It's pretty rare for students taking eg English and History to even attempt 4. And dropping from 4 to 3 has vastly fewer consequences than dropping from 3 to 2. I massively lack data on all of this though - maybe there just aren't enough double mathematicians for any of my ramblings to make sense.

It's nothing to do with the mindset of the teachers and a lot to do with the fact that A-level maths starts directly with a quick whizz through grade 8 and 9 algebra (like harder surds, harder completing the square, complicated algebraic manipulation) before moving onto even more difficult stuff. The kids who got a grade 8 or 9 at GCSE are already pretty good at this stuff, the kid who got a 6 or a 7 wasn't able to do it at GCSE, or possibly wasn't even taught it. So they are behind from the start. It's not a jump to A-level for the kid who got a 9, it's picking up with a relaxing review of where they left off. For the kid who got a 7, it's starting ahead of where they even finished. And they were already working more slowly than the kid who got an 8/9.

If the teachers has the belief that the students with grade 7's are on track to attain E and D grades in A level - as the evidence you provided suggests this does lead itself towards self-fulfilling prophecy.

Also what your saying also suggests that there is a problem with the qualification or maths GCSE if a student who attained an A grade at GCSE can't access the A level and will struggle from the get go - this is not the case in other A levels from my experience - I wait to be told otherwise.

A kid with a 7 can access the A-level, my OP is about kids with below a 7.

But they will have to work hard to catch up with those who did better than them.

Completing a lot of bridging work over the summer can really help with this so they hit the ground running.

The idea that a kid struggles at A-level because their teacher knows they got a 7 at GCSE and not because they got a 7 at GCSE is just daft. The problems with going from a 7 to A-level are just blatantly obvious from looking at the GCSE syllabus and the A-level syllabus.