What would you do in this situation please?

[GraySILK]

(If anything)

DD (Ella) will be sitting GCSE’s in a few weeks. Target grades always been high. English Language is an 8 and every term when you get the report since year 7, it always says ‘on target’, suggesting she’s on the right path to get an 8.

So I was surprised to hear she got a 3 in her mock English Language. We had a meeting with the teacher (Ella and I) and whilst the teacher was personable and nice, the answers were quite wishy washy in how DD needs to improve. She said a few times capture a moment in time and not the whole text… and kept mentioning structure.

DD says she’s lovely but she’s not very helpful because she doesn’t go over examples to help highlight where they are going wrong. She had her second mock and got a 5. She said she ran out of time and didn’t do one of the last big questions because she was spending so much time trying to get the structure right for the first two questions that the time disappeared. She basically completed 2/3.

I said you can keep practicing the structure then you’ll be able to do it quicker, but she still doesn’t seem confident in knowing what’s expected and I’m between a rock and a hard place because DD doesn’t want me to email her. Part of me thinks Ella should speak up in class and say can you give me more examples but as she says, she’s asked but the teacher repeats concentrate on struggle and pick a moment in time and structure

I don’t know what the heck is being asked but I do feel frustrated that the teacher doesn’t seem to be much use? Surely it’s in her best interest to make sure all of her students are as confident as possible and know what’s been asked of them. DD just doesn’t seem to know fully. I’m sure she’ll pass but her target is an 8 so surely it’s not good for the school for student to get a 4 when they could potentially get a lot higher?

We tried to get a private tutor but there was no availability- but she’s always been strong at English but the most important time, she doesn’t know what ls expected of her.

Help - What can I do?

I realise you've tried but is there not even an online tutor? Or YouTube lessons?

sorry if that isn't helpful. She clearly needs something, it could even be just one session to clarify something. DD was struggling with one of her A Levels and one session was all she needed to go from predicted B to A*.

Thanks for replying. I’m going to have to do something because it’s just awful. Well I emailed asking about a particular app that dd was going on about and she said she’d look in to it and never got back to me.

I’m going to post this in AIBU for more traffic - incase you see this post poo up there and are wondering what’s going on 😂

https://www.youtube.com/@mrbruff

You need Mr Bruff - really helped mine. There are CGP books that you can buy as well.

Also look at the examiner's reports - they give examples of different levelled answers and are available on the specific exam board websites usually.

In that situation, I’ll prioritize quality sleep to reset my mind and body.I’ll lie down with a supportive mattress and a comfortable pillow.A good night’s rest always helps me think clearly and bounce back.

Thanks for the link, we’ll definitely have a look in to this

I'm an English teacher.

The GCSE Language questions are prescriptive and even very good students can fall down by not ticking the exact boxes required. This is why exam technique needs to be very explicitly taught to students as they have to understand exactly what each question is asking of them.

Your daughter's teacher should have given loads of modelled examples and she should know exactly what to do for each question to maximise her points. This close to the exams, I'd say you are very right to be concerned that your daughter is confused about what to do.

As you've not found the teacher forthcoming, I would email the Head of Department outlining your concerns. Your daughter is several grades below expectations and in my department, if we had students falling this far behind target grades at this point, it would have been discussed extensively with the HoD and we'd have put interventions in place ages ago. The HoD - if they're any good - should have an overview of how everyone in the year is doing and your daughter's grades should be ringing alarm bells with her already. I'd ask the HoD what interventions can be put in place for your daughter and don't back down until you get her some extra support.

I agree that The MrBruff videos online are good for students who need help with structure - if you can't get a tutor, he is a good alternative.

Thank you so much for this information- this is really helpful. Wish you were her teacher!! I definitely will get in touch with the head of the department because it’s not on

I also agree with Mr Bruff.
I think a few hours with a tutor will work wonders - if she can get a 5 without answering a chunk of the paper, the main thing to work on is exam technique. My DC had it drilled into them how much time they should spend on each question (nothing radical, just total time split by number of marks on each question!) as otherwise you are wasting time and not getting extra marks. I appreciate you say no private tutors available, but one option would be to ask on local social media to see if you can find a recent student who did well in English GCSE to share their experience. My daughter worked for Explore Learning (other centres are available!) and she spent a fair bit of time as a sixth form student working with GCSE students to share her knowledge of how to get maximum possible marks.

You may find there are other English teachers running revision sessions that she could go to.

Try MyTutor - we have a couple of tutors at the moment with them and they are brilliant, and my DD really likes her sessions with them.

And I totally know where you are coming from. We're Y11 as well and I am horrified by the way GCSEs are structured and so prescriptive. It feels like the opposite of education and learning to enjoy learning.

And similar - great marks in case, disaster in Nov mocks. Bit better in March, but grades won't be anywhere near targets (SEN is having a big impact, her teachers are actually brilliant). The systems is honestly terrible.

DD has a BTEC as one of her options - and I have been seriously impressed with the way that works. It's no easy option, but is much more like real life scenarios and just far better in terms of what she has learned and the assignments.

We need a serious rethink on our current system. What kind of education is spending Y6 revising for SATs and Y11 learning how to jump through the exam board hoops. 3 years of GCSE English and they come away having read 4 books... how much better would it be if they came away having read 8 or 12?

if she is doing AQA then paper 1 has a specific question on structure. This is q3. It is like a language q but your daughter needs to look at three different uses of structure so think of it like a film. How does the piece start - wide view on a setting, or close up on a character or a tiny detail, or an action. When and where does it change - how? Narrative shift? Time shift? Location shift? Focus change? Dialogue. Then how does it change again. Remember, to always include the effect on the reader - what is the author doing and why. Remember to point, evidence, analysis, link.

the second question, the focus is on language so three or two well developed points, with evidence, technique, language zoomed in on and analysis on the effect and links to connotations.

mr Bruff or Mr Salis will help.
it’s very late in the day. However if you can find some one to one tuition - two hours for each paper, that should do it.

Drop me a PM and I'll see what I can do - I hate this kind of thing!

Which exam board is it? They're all slightly different.

There's a revision guide book you might find helpful, its written by somone who had 3/4's in mocks and went onto get top marks in GCSE's and A-levels and went onto become an A-level examiner - its more about planning and revision technique than specific subject revision

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1911382195/ref=as_li_qf_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=byeblo-21&creative=6738&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=1911382195&linkId=4f64d68993a4d323cc7c8b860ba58d0d

If AQA mine have been told to answer the paper in reverse as the last question has half of all the marks.
My twins are in year 10, so we have a year to go but I couldn’t understand the exam technique till recently so I have been learning what I can from Mr Bruff, Mr Salles and the current one I am finding helpful is Mr Everything English m.youtube.com/@MrEverythingEnglish/search

Thank you so much for this reply, it’s very much appreciated

We found good online tutors on Spire tutoring.

What is her plan? Is she planning on staying on for A-levels or leaving school? Will the grades she got in her mocks be enough to get her on to the A-level course?

We put so much pressure on kids to get the highest marks when really all they need to do is to get the mark that moves them to the next level.

My daughter was focusing so much on getting straight As she was becoming really stressed so we re-framed why she was doing it. She want’s straight As for the bragging rights, but is entirely satisfied that if she misses some she’ll be ok, because the grades aren’t important until she gets to highers. She now has a study plan that makes sure she is addressing anywhere she lost marks in her prelims which makes it all so much easier to manage.

She had a similar issue in one class where her teacher was vague in what she needed to pay attention to, so she went to the head of the department to chat it through.