Have schools stopped pupils taking GCSE's early?

onlyroz

When I was at school the only students who got entered for a subject early where those who already knew an additional language (e.g. they had been raised abroad and so were bilingual).

To me, it seems like entering students early is purely for the benefit of the school and not for the children. It was tremendously important to me to get straight A's in my GCSEs and so I would have been angry if the school had put measures in place to make this difficult. I don't think I would have achieved this if I had to take half my subjects in Year 10, because this would have meant rushing the syllabus, and not having sufficient levels of maturity to handle the revision schedule etc.

I was reading an article the other day about how this practice of early entry to exams has contributed towards the recent drop in GCSE pass rates, and I am not surprised at all.

The majority of students should be aspiring to achieve greater than a C grade, and so to me it makes no sense at all to allow a child to take the exam in year 10 and then be content with the resulting C grade.

securityguy

rachbc wrote: »

In my sons school they all take English in yr 10 - if they get c or above they do Eng Lit in yr 11 and if not they do a different syllabus Eng Lang to retry for another C.

And how many of the stronger pupils end up with 2 A*? The chances of getting an A* in Literature from a standing start in 8 months are low.

As DS wants to do A level Maths has been told he will do his maths GCSE exam in Nov then start the A1 after and depending on how well he is doing potentially sit A1 exam at end of Yr 11 meaning he can aim to do A2 Maths and higher Maths in sixth form

It's hard to know where to start on what's wrong with that. It is unlikely that anyone other than a maths prodigy can start from GCSE and complete C1, C2 and one of {S1, M1, D1} in five months' teaching in a GCSE-sized slot and still get an A.

securityguy

onlyroz wrote: »

I was reading an article the other day about how this practice of early entry to exams has contributed towards the recent drop in GCSE pass rates, and I am not surprised at all.

http://www.theguardian.com/education/2013/aug/22/gcse-results-2013-record-fall-c-grades-higher

While 16-year-olds performed virtually the same in maths as previous years, the 15-year-olds did far worse and dragged down the national average.

While 62.1% of 16-year-olds got A*-C grades in maths – a slight improvement on 2012 – only 51.7% of 15-year-olds got the same grades, a more than 10 percentage point margin.

Schools may benefit from this. Weaker students who might need multiple attempts might benefit. But for stronger students, this can only be a bad thing.

Lunar_Eclipse

FBaby wrote: »

Yes, that exactly it. It came about when DD was given a level 8 maths exam. She got all the questions related to the concept taught in class right (or only missed one or two), but then found herself unable to answer the questions about probabilities. These can't be answered by logic (which my DD tries to use), the methods need to be learnt to be applied.

And I think that will do her good. From the moment she went to nursery, she was considered the very bright one. She received the pupil of the year award at her primary school. I thought that moving to a secondary school in a new town, she would start mixing with more pupils of her levels, but if anything, it's been the opposite. She is top of her class in all academic subjects. She is aware that they are other pupils as bright as her, but I think it would be a bit of a culture shock to experience it day to day.

It doesn't sound like your daughter is being taught at a suitable level for her ability. There are a significant number of kids at our local school that achieve level 8 in Maths at the end of Y8 (a third to a half of the top sets, which is 30-45 pupils.) Historically, this group do GCSE in Y10 and the AS in Y11.

FBaby

Have you considered getting a private maths tutor to help with this?

Yes, this is exactly what we plan on doing after Christmas break.

It doesn't sound like your daughter is being taught at a suitable level for her ability. There are a significant number of kids at our local school that achieve level 8 in Maths at the end of Y8 (a third to a half of the top sets, which is 30-45 pupils.) Historically, this group do GCSE in Y10 and the AS in Y11.

She was assessed as an 8b in February (when they did the full reports) and predicted an Exceptional Performance at end of year 9, but hasn't managed to get another 8b that year because of the issue of not having been taught the concept behind some of the questions. She is the only one in her set who has achieved that level. There is another top set in that year, don't know if that other class has students at that level or higher. Maybe that is the problem, the overall level of the school is more average, so the top set is not as high as other top sets in other schools?

securityguy

Lunar_Eclipse wrote: »

It doesn't sound like your daughter is being taught at a suitable level for her ability. There are a significant number of kids at our local school that achieve level 8 in Maths at the end of Y8 (a third to a half of the top sets, which is 30-45 pupils.) Historically, this group do GCSE in Y10 and the AS in Y11.

And then what? So either they do A2 maths in Y12 (which means it may not count for university admission --- presumably, the bright kids are applying to the selective universities) or they have three years between GCSE and A2, which has the same issues. It might work they're doing Further Maths (four modules per year for three years rather than six per year for two years) but a university concerned about seeing demonstration of ability to deal with the workload might still worry.

Yet again: there's a reason why state schools complain about admission rates to selective universities. Their students are doing the wrong subjects at the wrong time and getting the wrong results.

jellyhead

onlyroz wrote: »

The majority of students should be aspiring to achieve greater than a C grade, and so to me it makes no sense at all to allow a child to take the exam in year 10 and then be content with the resulting C grade.

My son gave up with maths resits in year 10 because he couldn't make that tiny jump needed to get a B, and kept getting 'almost B'.

It suited him at the time, tbh. He was struggling with the challenges in other subjects that he'd set himself to get into 6th form. He was determined to try this year of 6th form, but the jump was just too much for him, especially as he hadn't even been taught some of the concepts for GCSE maths.

School weren't expecting him to try 6th form, to be fair.

Aimless

Not every school who does early entry is doing it to try to fiddle the statistics and gain a few more C grades. My son's grammar entered the top set for maths a year early. They started the course a year early and had the full two years teaching. Up until the other classes started their GCSEs, there was the opportunity for those not coping to move down and take the exam at the usual age.

He and every person he has spoken to so far got an A, and the whole class is moving on to further maths GCSE this term, which apparently looks in more detail at topics such as algebra, trigonometry and calculus, which will be useful for those who do decide to do the A level.

thorsoak

I certainly didn't take A level maths ...just scraped through O level maths with what would have been a B/C grade (59%) - but remember algebra, trig and calculus as well as geometry playing a large part in the maths syllabus way back in the Dark Ages (1959!)

securityguy

Aimless wrote: »

He and every person he has spoken to so far got an A,

Why not an A*?