Why is there such a big difference between English GCSE results and all other subjects

[Cobwebs5]

This is a super selective grammar. Good results for sure. What do you think of the English results ? I have a feeling that this pattern isn’t specific to this school. What is so different about English ? I have a friend whose daughter got 9 grades 9’s and a 6 in English language.

Those results match my sons! All grade 9 except for 7s in English Lang and Lit. In his case, they had "old school" English teachers who were obsessed with the classics and completely disengaged the pupils by the old fashioned method of analysing the shit out of Shakespeare, Dickens, and the Illyad! My son loved reading UNTIL he started secondary school and then the teaching turned him off and he literally never read another book, not even for fun! He only did the bare minimum he needed to do in English lessons and had no enthusiasm for it at all.

There was one bright point - in year 9, he got a younger teacher who had a completely different teaching attitude and he not only enjoyed it, but he got much higher marks, but sadly back to the oldies for years 10 and 11.

He never even read the set books for his GCSEs - he just waded through York notes to pick up the general themes/trends and characters, etc. To be honest, he was surprised to get 7s (as were we!). Such a shame that the way English is taught turns off so many kids! Now since leaving school, he's still not read a single book. Despite that, he's highly literate, sailed through Uni to get a First, and now works in the UK's biggest insurance firm, so ultimately hasn't hampered his education/profession, but as avid readers ourselves, myself and DH are really sad that he was turned off by the school/teachers.

Edit to add something else just remembered, his teacher continued to "teach" the background of the authors, despite admitting herself to the class that the background/context was no longer required to be known for the exams. She told them "she" thought it was important to teach the author background regardless of whether it was relevant for the exam! What a monumental waste of valuable teaching time! Like I say "old school", who sounded as if she couldn't be bothered teaching exam technique, mark scraping, etc., but wanted to continue teaching the way she'd always taught!

The marking seems to be completely off these days 🤦‍♀️

I would consider analysing Shakespeare, Dickens and Homer the only proper way of studying literature and would be immensely grateful to the teacher 😁

Such a shame that children are being turned off English and literature by having to drill marking schemes, key words, quotes and all that Gove's mechanistic, almost robotic rubbish.

LOL and authors' background IS hugely relevant for understanding the texts. What an excellent teacher you had and what a disappointment it must have been for her to have pupils (and families!) who cannot value the quality of teaching given to them 🤦‍♀️

Depends on HOW it's taught. If it's taught in an interesting and lively manner, then absolutely agree, but sadly, a lot of teachers are dour and boring and are incapable of "enthusing" their pupils.

Yeah I agree with @Ubertomusic's last post and yes @Badbadbunny context is indeed required at GCSE Eng lit. Even at the most basic level, a grade 4/5 student will be expected to flag some of Dickens’s concerns about the poor in Victorian times in an essay on Christmas Carol, for example. It's not profound but it is context.

Edited for hideous typo!

Presumably she went to English Language lessons and learnt how to answer questions. You can’t revise language like the others. She also has a mother who is so keen on her education that you even requested and analysed the paper she got a 9 on in such detail that you could tell exactly why it was a borderline 9. I expect you had input to her success, even it if were subconsciously. Having a mother so keen on furthering their daughter’s education is a bigger factor of academic success than which school they went to. That, of course, is also dependent on the child accepting their mother’s advice.

The grammar school entrance doesn’t get the top 5% of pupils at age 11 - the test isn’t that perfect. It gets smart kids, yes, but misses lots of equally smart kids too. It’s naive to think that the children scoring the top marks in an 11+ type exam age 10/11 are going to be exactly the same as the children scoring the top marks in their GCSEs years later. Sure there’ll be a correlation, but not a perfect one.

Having the attitude that “anything less than a grade 8” is “something going wrong” is pretty unhealthy. I’m all for hard work and high rewards - my child got an outstanding batch of GCSEs a year ago - but they’re allowed to be better at some things than others, and to take some subjects because they love them.

I agree that the relative English results at the school are interesting and worth asking questions about.

@Hermyknee - DD wanted to see all her GCSE papers because she just wanted to know! I only looked at the Language one because her friend who is much stronger at English got a disappointing result. Have had zero input into the actual GCSEs, it is child No 3 going through these pointless exams. My role is to provide food and encouragement from the sidelines, like you would if your child is training for a marathon. And no, sadly none of my DC take my advice very much post 11 years old. All very head strong and know what they want.

But you made it about the method itself in your previous post, not the teacher's personality :)

How do you suggest studying literature without analysing the classics?

Actually, I think the problem is deeper than that - most exams are going to be marked by AI fairly soon, to cut costs, and children will be increasingly taught in a way that would "please the machine". In literature that would mean emotional dimension would become gradually eroded from understanding the texts. It's impossible eg. to comprehend what Dostoevsky was writing about without knowing (and emotionally relating to) that he was made destitute, faced execution, had a gambling problem, was an unpleasant and troubled personality and suffered a lot in his life. Same for practically any other great author or composer or artist. Knowing that Tchaikovsky nearly committed suicide before composing his only violin concerto definitely helps to understand and play it better because performance is all about emotions, not the notes, the same way as literature is not about certain key words in essays.

AI cannot emotionally relate to anything and making human beings akin to AI via teaching to test and "ticking boxes" throughout years of education to get higher grades in "AI opinion" presents a massive civilisational problem.

I notice this at A level too when looking at the local papers or schools' results day stuff with the kids holding up their grades or throwing them in the air. The ones with four or three A stars are always doing maths, FM, physics, chemistry and off to study engineering/medicine/maths at Bath/Imperial/UCL/Oxbridge. The ones who have done humanities are mentioned only if they're off to Oxbridge, but almost always have one or two A stars and the rest As rather than the full suite of A stars.

I know people on MN will now come on and tell me that their child got A stars in English Lit, history, geography and RE, but I wonder of the 4000 kids who got 3+ A stars in 2025, how many of them were doing arts/humanities and how many were doing STEM.

I would think you’re right, the a star grades are likely skewed towards sciences / maths. But then so are the required grades / typical accepted grades for universities - I’ve been looking at eg the Cambridge admissions info stats, and for English last year, about 1/3 of the accepted students had three a stars, with others two a star one a, one a star two a, etc. But in engineering 84% of the accepted students have three a stars, maths sciences and medicine all over 80% three a stars.

Some very interesting points here. I believe it's particularly hard to get A* at A level in the coursework based subjects like Art & Drama. It could be because of the demographic of the children taking these subjects perceived as v an easier option than the sciences, but I don't know.

I agree that language seems harder to revise and harder to teach well. Dd1 is at one of the super selectives and English was her strongest subject particularly in years 7-9. But I think now a poor teacher and boring material is putting her off it which is a real pity as she's naturally very good, and a reader. At the moment I think she's likely to get 7s rather than the 9s that I'm sure she is capable of.

I mean surely there are more interesting and relevant texts to read than An Inspector Calls? And the lack of diversity in the GCSE curriculum is also shocking.

I mean surely there are more interesting and relevant texts to read than An Inspector Calls? And the lack of diversity in the GCSE curriculum is also shocking.

There are certainly IMHO better texts than AIC on the list - and in fact some are by authors who are not white (AQA for example offers texts by Chinonyerem Odimba and Winsome Pinnock).

Unfortunately schools do not choose them, I suspect bc there is such a volume of resources for AIC (and ACC/J&H, and R&J/Macbeth) that that is a much easier option. Teachers will have taught it before, they know that students can get the gist of it easily and answer a question at a basic level.

My DD studied Animal Farm which I thought was at least a more interesting choice. She got 9/9 btw but a 6 in maths (first year of any numbers) so bucking the trend somewhat! Obvs I understand that that proves nothing (except that DD revised hard for her English)

In some Grammar Schools in Kent and Lincolnshire, around 70-75% of Grammar School children attain grade 5 GCSE in English/Math's meaning around 40-45% of these Grammar school children do not attain a grade 6.

The notion of failure needs to be presented when understanding the cohort of Boston High School in Lincolnshire is vastly different to that of Henrietta Barnet. Similarly, you cannot expect comparable grades from Dover Girls Grammar pupils to Tonbridge Grammar pupils.

The concept of Grammar schools is to take the top 5/25% of pupils from a geographic area depending on academic, cultural and other factors.

A grade 6 or even a grade 5 at Boston High School might be a decent result but a very poor one at Henrietta Barnet.

Lol yes I have never net someone from Henrietta Barnett but I imagine they would be a very different person from a student at Boston High School. That's my neck of the woods btw before I am accused of being snobby! We were a very mixed bag indeed at my South Lincs grammar school in the 1980s.

What is the differentiator between grammar and comp then if grade 5 in English is kind of normal for a comp? It's such a basic standard that even my severely dyspraxic DC who is physically unable to write fast enough to score anything meaningful could still attain grade 5 🤔

I believe it's particularly hard to get A* at A level in the coursework based subjects like Art & Drama. It could be because of the demographic of the children taking these subjects perceived as v an easier option than the sciences, but I don't know.

I would expect that is easier to do both very well and very badly in STEM subjects compared with arts subjects, certainly at GCSE, as they are more likely to be right/wrong/learn the method than ones where you have to give an opinion and justify it. Though I haven't seen comparative bell curves, it is an assumption on my part.

Grade 5 is not normal for a non Grammar School in Lincolnshire or Kent. The typical grades for non Grammar schools are centered around grades 3 and 4, hence desperation and focus in such schools around the grade band of 4. This having the unfortunate effect of falling on non Grammar School pupils who may have been capable of a grade 5 or 6 if pushed and not sidelined.

If your dc is dyspraxic then his normal way of working should be to type his exams using a laptop.

@Ubertomusic - your dyspraxic DC should get adjustments typing and extra time? In fact, 30% get adjustments, mainly extra time. Which does mean that those not getting extra time need to write a lot and fast in English, in particular. I think they know that. Mine did run out of time but cannot remember if Lit or language nor which papers.

A grade 5 in English GCSE is certainly not attainable for everyone. I mean obviously, or it would be meaningless.

Well done to your DD; I have worked with many lower-ability students for whom a grade 5 or 4 in English was more than they could manage. I would not call it a basic standard at all.

I do think that if a considerable proportion of students at a grammar school tho are gaining several grade 5s then that is not great; tho it does depend on what % of the students are at the grammar. If it's 25%, say, then some grade 5s is probably not out of the way. Certainly in some subjects, with a spikier profile. I agree tho I would expect the top 25% of students to be gainign higher grades than a 5 as a general thing.

He had no such arrangements and I think that wouldn't work anyway as his dyspraxia is really severe (couldn't do laces, stumbles all the time etc). He did have 25% extra time but that didn't help much either as he was in the bottom 2% of the population for writing speed and would have needed 100% extra but exam boards refused his school's request.

Anyway, grade 5 English should not be a problem for a healthy child.

Apologies for calling your DC a DD – I misread.

I have to say grade 5 English should not be a problem for a healthy child is an odd thing to say. By healthy do you mean "without any SEN"? My DS has SEN but he is pretty healthy tbh. A grade 5 in English was way beyond him though.

Please have a think about what you are saying. It's great that your DC was able to gain a grade 5, as I said, well done. But the exams are designed so that a certain % gain a lower grade (about 30% gain a grade lower than 4 IIRC), and comments like yours are not helpful tbh.

Many children should have some adjustments, especially after covid. The vast majority get nothing though, or at least not nearly enough. That's probably why we have huge problems in mainstream education. DS was at grammar and the school fought with regulators for him but even the schools can only do so much.

It's off topic though, I just gave it as an illustration of how basic grade 5 is.

We're discussing grammar schools, their intake is not "lower ability".

Grade 5 would be a huge achievement at SEND school but my question was asked specifically in the context of comparing academically selective (!) grammar schools and normal comps.

Not attaining a grade 5 English means you are more or less illiterate. If this is normal for comprehensive schools nowadays, then we are in deeper trouble than I thought.