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Secondary education

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Original poster

year 10 GCSE science exam on thursday?

20 replies

rosiejoy · 15/11/2009 11:13

dss has just announced he has a science exam on thursday. He is in yr 10, he says it is a real exam, counts towards the final grade, although he hasn't brought anything with him (lives with his mum in the week) and claims he doesn't know what the exam is on (!!), although "probably just what we've done so far".

so, i am planning to look at school website to find out exam board, then go to their website to see if i can magically divine what the exam on thursday will be on so we can set him down to do some revision, and hopefully get hold of some study guides to take to his mums.

anybody else's kids doing science exam on thursday? can you please tell me what the exam is? or where he can find some good resources to help his revision?

thanks in advance!!

OP posts:
Snorter · 15/11/2009 12:14

It could be a science ISA exam, the date of which is set by the school. (Is he doing AQA?) As I understand it, not a lot of revision is required!

Merrylegs · 15/11/2009 12:35

rosiejoy - are you looking after my DS???? He is in year 10 and has a science exam on thurs also. He is being irritatingly laid back about it. When I ask him if he ought to be revising he says he will go to the revision lesson at school next week. BUT I have just pulled some info out of his bag which may help us both:

KEY Science GCSE Dates:
19 November 2009. Triple Science (Module 1a) multi-choice examinations in Biology, Chemistry, Physics.

It is worth 12.5% of actual mark.

Now, it doesn't say what they have to revise, but I do know a few weeks ago DS was looking at AQA GCSE past science papers multiple choice. Think it is on the AQA website.

If you get any further down the road with this today, perhaps you could let me know. DS is out at the moment, but there will be some SERIOUS nagging happening when he comes back.

Good luck!

JustGettingByMum · 15/11/2009 17:17

Just spotted this thread - we have downloaded past papers from the AQA website and DS is playing on the PS3 studying hard

Good luck to all Y10s on Thursday!

Original poster
rosiejoy · 15/11/2009 17:29

Merrylegs im pretty sure hes not your son, but you never know!

ok, weve managed to find out that this exam is 2 papers- 1physics 1chemistry.

in physics this year he has been doing energy- how it is transferred, energy wastage, how to have an energy efficient home...

found this link we he said was exactly what theyd been doing...

as for chemistry we didnt really get anywhere, apparently theyve been doing "limestone and co2 and stuff"

OP posts:
Original poster
rosiejoy · 15/11/2009 17:37

hmm, and just reread merryleg's post, so maybe there is a biology paper too that has not been mentioned by him?

we all went out in the rain for a few hours to give him a chance to revise and came back to find him on facebook!

am giving up now. apparently he has some study guides at his mums he will be using (unlikely but thats another thread i think!).

i expect you'll be seeing more of me on this board though

OP posts:
cat64 · 15/11/2009 17:41

This reply has been deleted

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Morosky · 15/11/2009 17:58

I have a key stage 4 tutor group and there are a lot of modular exams on at the moment and over the next few weesks.

lazymumofteenagesons · 15/11/2009 18:17

DS2 has these science modules on thursday.

He says " AQA website has all the past papers up until the 2009 ones which should have been given to his teachers. They are multiple choice with half an hour papers on each science the questions range from factual recall to data interpretation. The past papers contain all the types of question you should expect but be warned many of the questions are written in a very wordy way which can be deceptive as to what they mean. also my teacher gave me a revision guide which summarised each topic that could come up in your paper and they can be found on the internet (CGP). there is both higher tier or foundation in these tests and you do either it is important to know that certain topics are more likely to come up in foundation rather than the higher tier papers.
DS2 typed this in, so sorry if punctuation is a bit iffy. I hope it helps and doesn't make things worse!

cat64 · 15/11/2009 18:22

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BecauseImWorthIt · 15/11/2009 18:27

Thank you so much for this thread! I had no idea but have just established that DS2 has two biology papers on Thursday.

(I also discovered that he sat a Maths exam on Friday and that he 'forgot' to tell me about that one)

At least I have a few days to enforce some revision!

cat64 · 15/11/2009 18:32

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Message withdrawn

glinda · 15/11/2009 18:43

My dd sat the Maths paper on Friday and has 3 science papers on Thursday. Must say I'm not impressed by the schools you are talking about. DD has been to after school revision lessons over the last few weeks for all subjects and I have received letters telling me when the exams were and giving advice on how to support dd in her revision. They also sent me a text on Thursday to remind me that dd had an exam the next day.

I don't know if all schools are doing the same module on Friday but for dd Chemistry module covers Oils, earth and atmosphere, physics is Radiation and the universe and biology is Human Biology.

BecauseImWorthIt · 15/11/2009 22:14

glinda - we have had letters from the school, but they were so efficient that we have had them for weeks. So it is, in my part, my fault for not noting the dates.

DS2 has also been going to after school revision classes for his maths, but I had just assumed these were general ones.

Bellabellabella · 15/11/2009 22:35

The Science modules can be re-sit I understand so do not be too worried.

Bellabellabella · 15/11/2009 22:36

Re-sat, re-sat - too much wine !

Original poster
rosiejoy · 16/11/2009 09:12

Dss doesn't live with us full time so any letters would have gone to his mum's. We were a bit worried looking at school's website though- % of pupils with 5 A-C GCSEs in 2007 80%, in 2008 49% !!!!

So it is easy to believe the school are being a bit slack unfortunately

OP posts:
lazymumofteenagesons · 16/11/2009 11:46

Possibility that 2007 stats did not have to include english and maths, but 2008 did. This could affect the figures in this way.

Original poster
rosiejoy · 16/11/2009 15:25

Yes you're right

With maths and english included, then the results are 54% for 2007 and still 49% for 2008. I can see that the school has made an effort on the maths and english front, so subjects that had excelled in previous years suffered, but I guess that's a fair approach to take.

OP posts:
golgi · 16/11/2009 22:21

AQA core science revision on BBC bitesize here:

www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/science/aqa/

Makes a change from revision guides.....

Merrylegs · 16/11/2009 22:28

Thank you golgi, that is a great link!

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