Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

Teenagers

Parenting teenagers has its ups and downs. Get advice from Mumsnetters here.

Flip

Original poster

GCSE study leave

24 replies

Copper · 22/05/2004 16:15

My dd has just had her last day in school - I can hardly believe it. Wish I'd taken a photo as a pair for the one on the first day, all small and cuddly and holding on tight to her teddy for courage.

Anyway, she is now on study leave. Is this a con? I shall be interested to see how much study actually gets done - and she is a really motivated kid. Has anyone any tips or views on making best use of study time?

OP posts:

Janh · 22/05/2004 16:33

Thanks for the nudge, Copper - I've been wondering about this too.

BBC has a whole list of revision links here. I shall point DS1 at it the next time he's on here!

His school hasn't been much help as far as revision preparation goes but his older sisters have, and what revision he has done has been fairly well organised with a lot of note-taking.

We have also bought some of the revision & practice guides from CGP - he has been using them a bit. If you order online they come next day IIRC. (This page from CGP has some games and revision tips, from teachers apparently, but only English, Maths, Science and French.)

luckymum · 22/05/2004 16:41

ds1's school don't actually finish until 25 June - they are supposed to keep going in to to revise at school up until their last exam. I do think he'll get more work done this way - if I can get him to go in that is!

Janh · 22/05/2004 16:47

IKWYM, luckymum! I am very glad that I will be at home during DS1's study leave so at least I can stop him watching TV all day! He will be revising at the library some of the time, allegedly, not sure how reliable that is...

However, as I remind him occasionally, it's his own future he's doing it for, not for us. So it's down to him in the end.

tammybear · 23/05/2004 16:52

Both my brothers are on study leave. But everytime I see them, they're sat in front of the tv playing the Playstation. I keep saying to them that they've only got one shot at this (unless they re-do their exams at college) and they should be revising as much as possible. They dont seem too bothered though. Men!!!

hmb · 23/05/2004 17:47

the CGP books are excellent, we sugest that kids get a copy (for science)

Re the is it a con? For some, yes, some kids will do alost nothing. Some will work very hard. In general the kids who need to do the most work are the ones leat likely to do it.

We let kids come into school for extra revision if they want it. Some come and find it very helpful.

In the end it is down to them. What they can't then do is fail and blame everyone else (but lots try )

suedonim · 23/05/2004 20:52

Dd1 is taking Highers atm, thus on Study Leave. She's been very good, not lounging in bed till noon, organising her studying in 'shifts' with a little bit of playtime in between etc. Tonight she went to sit by the river to revise - apparently, even a blank tv screen is too distracting when compared to mugging up on "Care of The Elderly"!!

Having been through the exam process previously, with boys, their attitudes do seem to differ. The boys' noses had to be held to the grindstone of revision, but they didn't spend much time fretting over doing exams. Dd beavers away at the work without any nagging from parents but she's made something of a meal of the prospect of exams. We had a wobbly patch a couple of weeks ago, but managed to calm her down with judicious use of Kalms and Minadex - don't ask!!

I'm not sure if this just my experience of boys and girls or whether it's a fairly common difference between boys and girls?

Janh · 23/05/2004 20:58

I think in general girls are more sensible and better organised than boys, but I wouldn't care to comment on the distribution of wobbles.

DS1 spent about an hour this morning working out his timetable, hour by hour for the next month or so, on the BBC website (something to do with Radio 1?) - he did it v carefully, lots of colour coding, worked really hard (I can see that doing a revision timetable is more appealing than actually revising, but anyway) and now appears to have miskeyed his id and CAN'T FIND IT!!!!!!

(6-character id - how long, mathematically, might it take him to find it? Would it be quicker to start again?)

suedonim · 23/05/2004 21:49

Lol, Janh - what are they like????

Janh · 23/05/2004 21:51

suedonim!

luckymum · 24/05/2004 09:50

Ds1 has his first exam today.....yesterday I asked if he'd got all his equipment together.....'yes, mum (said in a Kevin-type voice), its in my blazer'. This morning he can't find his blazer, turns out its at his girlfriend's, been there since Friday. Dh takes him to school via said gf to pick up his blazer. He texts me at 8.30 'I haven't got my candidate number can you find it and text me back' Aaarghhhh - talk about good luck he's going to need a sodding miracle!!!

lemonice · 24/05/2004 10:26

Ds priority over the weekend was to get £10 off me to buy pencils and a transparent pencil case (isn't this a bit, well, girly?) And of course i did point out that a plastic bag would be good enough. As I work on Saturday i can't police him and he managed to persuade dp to pay him to dig weeds up from our back "garden" (think team effort between steptoe, diy sos and how clean is my garden so hardly really essential work) and I think he started revision ie has belatedly discovered bbc bite size. I'm not at all optimistic as he thinks each exam will be easy (far from supported by the facts of his progress so far) and he was discussing whether or not it's cool to leave before the end. (as we have negotiated him extra time for all his exams this point is both worrying and irrelevant if he actually wants any gcses.) He will be home from Weds with no supervision 6 days of the week and I doubt he will do anything much revision wise except run up a huge phone bill.

Janh · 24/05/2004 10:41

The transparent pencil case is a requirement, lemonice - so they can't smuggle crib sheets inside a solid one! Yes, a plastic bag would do it but the case is sturdier. Come to think of it we have had transparent ones in the past but not sure we have one currently...

Sympathy about the lack of supervision at home ...could you insist he goes into school to revise? (They are allowed to do that I think and then you could check if he'd turned up or not?)

DS1's legendary revision timetable doesn't work. It said he was to get up at 9 on revision days. His alarm went off at 9.15, I heard grunts and a thud and nothing more!

lemonice · 24/05/2004 10:51

Ds can't go into school because he is a weekly boarder and refuses to stay at school now study leave is an option. It's extremely annoying because his self discipline, organisational skills and motivation are all nil. It seems a shame to have sent him to a school with learning support and then for it to leak away at this stage.

Janh · 24/05/2004 10:53

If study leave is optional, can't you/the school insist that he doesn't get it? I agree, that seems ridiculous at this point.

luckymum · 24/05/2004 10:56

Oh! and another classic.....he's also asked if he can have party on 26 August to 'celebrate' his results and his 16th birthday the day before. Will there be anything to celebrate and will he even reach his 16th or will I have strangled him before then

To parents of teenagers everywhere....break open the Prozak!

hmb · 25/05/2004 16:18

And the problem will be that his teachers will have been asigned to other tasks, like supervision of examinations, cover lessons for cillegues who go on school trips this time of year because there are more teachers to take up the slack. We are continuing revision lesson swith the sixth form, but have to 'ring fence' the lessons to stop being used for cover.

And if the behaviour I have seen from some y10s in the recent revision lessons I have given is anything to go by, I doubt if they would do much more work in school

And they are supposed to be capable of self study at this point, yeh, I know!

Original poster

Copper · 25/05/2004 17:24

So when did self study/study leave come in?I don't remember it. And I'm sure I saw a report of a school recently that had abolished study leave and its A-C grades went up from 35 to 58% straight away.

Anyway, dd has done a small amount of revision that I can see, interspersed with really important things like buying highlighters. I have a nasty feeling it's all going to be left to the last minute.

Loved the timetable story, Janh: anything to postpone the evil day of actually having to revise...

OP posts:

Hulababy · 25/05/2004 21:05

Me and DH are 31 and 30 and from same school year. Did GCSEs in 1989 and A levels in 1991. Both os us had study leave.

suedonim · 25/05/2004 21:21

I had study leave for my exams, and that was back in the early 70's!!

Janh · 25/05/2004 21:33

I didn't (mid 60s) - in fact we not only had no study leave, but were expected to go back into school after O levels until the end of term! WHAT FOR?????

My mum, in one of her very few moments of humanity, signed me out for 2 weeks "holiday" - my friend's mum refused to do the same for her and my friend was furious, and said I was a spoiled brat.

Copper, the timetable story was good, wasn't it? He has redone it now - said it was much easier to do it second time round, and has actually followed it - a bit!

Hulababy · 26/05/2004 09:00

As hmb says many of the teachers will now be being used for other stuff in schools - cover (instead of paying for supply) or exam invigilation. I have three release lessons this week and so far have lost the first two to Y9 PE. Please send my Y11 back to me!!!!!!!!!

Janh · 26/05/2004 09:39

PE, Hula? They can't make you take PE, surely? Aren't there insurance restrictions and whatnot?

Hulababy · 26/05/2004 21:13

No idea but had to do it twqice now. Supervised tennis on my own today with a few girls. TBH I just let them get on with it. Yesterday I did rounders but with anothe rmember of PE staff and a student teacher. One of pupils fell badly and has possibly broken his wrist Glad I wasn't on my own then.

Original poster

Copper · 10/06/2004 16:43

Been agreeably surprised so far at amount of revision done - but can't wait for them to be over

OP posts:

Flip