GCSE advice for Sen child

[TheMoonAndTheSun]

My son is autistic and at secondary school, he is doing his GCSES soon and needs to pick his subjects, his senco has said she thinks he should do life skills and is pushing this a bit but it would mean he does one less GCSE, he wants to do photography but his senco thinks he would not enjoy that as he can be quite quiet and might struggle approaching people to do that. So it would be instead of photography as he’d have to remove that, would he be better off doing life skills? Has anyone’s child taken life skills in stead of a subject? Not sure I want him to include that? Has anyone’s child done it?

Not done that course as such but my ds with LD took one GCSE fewer - spent those lessons in the SEN hub working on CVs, extra maths and English or HW. It was deffo a good thing. Having eight GCSEs instead of nine (or seven instead of eight) is not going to be an issue unless you end up excluding ones they want to continue with - so make sure he can still opt for geography (or whatever obvs).

It depends on his issues, would he benefit from lifeskills longer term, or whether photography is a good outlet for him. I doubt it necessarily involves approaching others to take pictures so if he feels strongly about it it is worth a discussion with the teacher about the projects involved.

Very common to do one less gcse and spend that extra time on support - my DS did study skills/extra maths and English in this slot but if life skills would be helpful for your DS then this is also reasonable.

don’t see why he can’t do photography aswell. My DS dropped languages.

Thanks it’s because he has chosen other ones and he doesn’t want to get rid of any of them they are in category at his school so he has to pick them from different sets and it’s one or the other, his senco said he’d be going round the school taking pictures of people?

Unless you want to go to cambridge or oxford, you only need 5 or 6 gcses to do alevels and go to uni. It is far more sensible to do less gcses and get higher grades than to do more and get lower grades.
What do you think he will want to do long term?
Will he be able to live and work independently or does he need help with that? What job would he like to do?

I would suggest speaking to the GCSE photography teacher before making a final decision.
I agree with others that less GCSEs might be a good thing (mine are both academically able but in specialist school and will take 7 GCSEs) - you don't need loads unless you are aiming for the top universities/medicine etc.
But equally if he really wants to do photography I wouldn't rule it out - I'd be surprised if he has to go round school taking photos of people - my sister did photography at A level and mostly took pictures of trees!
That said photography is quite heavy in coursework terms so he may find it quite challenging depending on what other subjects he's doing and might find having a few spare lessons to do life skills a welcome break from a more intense academic timetable.

I would say it depends on the skills/needs of your child.

I agree with the suggestion of talking to the photography teacher.

DC considered photography and went to the information talk on it as part of the options evening. From that they decided that there was more emphasis on the digital editing and manipulation of photos than they wanted. They were more interested in taking photographs.

Does your son already know the teacher/ or the teaher know your son? Discussing things may be a bit easier if the teacher already knows them as a pupil.

Does your son know what type of thing he wants to do after gcses? If so is photography a subject that is relevant to that? B

I’d speak to the photography teacher and ask to see exactly what the course involves, in our experience GCSE photography hasn’t involved a real camera or taking pics of people at all. It comes under Art & Design with the AQA exam board, and is actually mainly about composition, effects etc. Taking pics of objects and using editing tools on their school iPads, then analysing them, comparing them to different photographers styles. I’d definitely check exactly what’s involved first and then let your ds decide

I’d have a good look at the spec for the life skills and photography to help you make an informed decision.

I’d also be wondering if school’s reticence about photography GCSE is less about that qual in particular and more about trying to reduce his workload overall?

Is he very passionate about photography?

Find out more about the photography GCSE.
Also ask for details of this "life skills" course. Do they have a planned curriculum for this? Is it suited to his needs? At best, it might be something really useful for him; at worst, they might just be wanting to make up numbers to provide something very general for those who will struggle with a full GCSE load.