Year 9 support Thread
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Re: Year 9 support Thread
Yes, I'm sure that is the approach of the majority. But teaching in a school can be an advantage in many different ways and definitely some use it. A good friend of mine went to a different school to me but her mother taught at my school. She said that her mum was aware that her school was not teaching everything needed for the o level syllabuses .... don't know how she realised in subjects other than her own but partly she gathered it from the O level results being terrible even for the top sets .... so she got photocopies of all the exercise books of the daughter of another teacher at our school. And gave them to my friend who used to them revise for her O levels.
She could answer questions that others at her school couldn't because they had missed out big chunks of the syllabus. Not fair really. But not fair that they hadn't been taught everything either.
No, I don't think that (m)any parents would want to use last year's paper at home if they knew it was going to be used as a mock at school (is that what all schools do these days? don't they put their own papers together from a variety of old real questions? Or use a paper older than last year's? If last year's paper is the first one for a new specification isn't it useful to use the questions earlier than mock-time as learning material?) but it could be handy to have a generous supply of old questions for revision purposes if school doesn't supply them? And home schoolers could find it useful?
To me, having access to real past exam questions and model answers is one of the greatest revision tools one can have.
Just surprised really that there is no public access to old exam questions and model answers either free or paid for.
G55 you wondered how a teacher might get resources for their own child (or friend's children) from subjects other than their own? Through teacher friends and colleagues at school.
She could answer questions that others at her school couldn't because they had missed out big chunks of the syllabus. Not fair really. But not fair that they hadn't been taught everything either.
No, I don't think that (m)any parents would want to use last year's paper at home if they knew it was going to be used as a mock at school (is that what all schools do these days? don't they put their own papers together from a variety of old real questions? Or use a paper older than last year's? If last year's paper is the first one for a new specification isn't it useful to use the questions earlier than mock-time as learning material?) but it could be handy to have a generous supply of old questions for revision purposes if school doesn't supply them? And home schoolers could find it useful?
To me, having access to real past exam questions and model answers is one of the greatest revision tools one can have.
Just surprised really that there is no public access to old exam questions and model answers either free or paid for.
G55 you wondered how a teacher might get resources for their own child (or friend's children) from subjects other than their own? Through teacher friends and colleagues at school.
Re: Year 9 support Thread
Genuinely don't think this goes on. Honestly Mystery, by the time your child has sat GCSEs, you will understand why this is not a thing. They do nothing but past papers and practice questions for the last six months of Y11. That includes those whose parents are teachers as well as those who aren't. They will be super well-prepared by the time the exams come and GCSEs are just a reward for hard slog. End of.mystery wrote:G55 you wondered how a teacher might get resources for their own child (or friend's children) from subjects other than their own? Through teacher friends and colleagues at school.
Re: Year 9 support Thread
There is so much now freely availble on the internet that there is absolutely no need for teachers to scrounge materials from colleagues. I can't think of any teacher I know who did. All the other past papers are freely available; it's only last year's that are kept 'locked' for teachers to use as mocks should they want to do so.
Frankly I find it somewhat offensive that you would think that teachers would try to 'cheat' for their own children.
Frankly I find it somewhat offensive that you would think that teachers would try to 'cheat' for their own children.
Re: Year 9 support Thread
I have a DD in Year 11 and I work in a school. I could have got hold of the French Listening for example but what would have been the point? To give her a false impression of her ability? Plus she would have gone mental had I shown it to her. She gets annoyed with her English teacher who keeps telling the class what their practice essays under test conditions are about. I actually think it's a disadvantage to know in advance what is coming up if you're not going to know in the real thing.
Re: Year 9 support Thread
As an LSA, I have been in lessons taught by some amazing teachers and honestly I would say that this has helped DD. For example, she might ask me, "What's the best way to revise ...?" and I will come up with some suggestions. History, in particular, has seen some improvement. I can't say that her teacher isn't good because there are pupils getting 8s and 9s in her class, but clearly DD needs reinforcement and she will come to me for clarification if it's a topic I know something about. I don't feel guilty about it. I spend a lot of time working unpaid at home creating resources for those who are struggling, so I don't have a problem with using the knowledge gained from being in a lesson to help my own daughter.
Re: Year 9 support Thread
G55, I don't think I suggested that teachers cheat on behalf of their children did I? This is really rather puzzling. What did you find offensive? If, when I was teaching, a colleague in another subject had said that their own child was strugging with x, y or z in a subject I taught and I'd said, "oh try this ...." would that have been cheating? Surely not.
Yes, I am sure plenty of schools spend the last 6 months doing questions from past papers -- but presumably there are others that don't as otherwise there wouldn't be so many people on the GCSE thread concerned that they've not finished the syllabus yet in quite a few subjects.
It's good to know there are public sources of past GCSE papers on the web with model answers. I didn't know that. I'd expected the exam boards' websites to be the place for that so was surprised when I realised from this thread that they are not.
What are good websites for real past GCSE exam questions with model answers?
Yes, I am sure plenty of schools spend the last 6 months doing questions from past papers -- but presumably there are others that don't as otherwise there wouldn't be so many people on the GCSE thread concerned that they've not finished the syllabus yet in quite a few subjects.
It's good to know there are public sources of past GCSE papers on the web with model answers. I didn't know that. I'd expected the exam boards' websites to be the place for that so was surprised when I realised from this thread that they are not.
What are good websites for real past GCSE exam questions with model answers?
Re: Year 9 support Thread
Mystery - you implied as much but I'm glad you did not mean it.
The exam board websites have past papers and mark schemes on them plus the examiners reports which give examples of 'real' student responses and how they were marked. I would have thought you would have looked to see what was there if your daughter is choosing GCSEs?
There are other websites, often written by teachers with all sorts of stuff. You can explore what's available by googling; some of it is good, some not so. Your daughter's school will probably have a wealth of materials on their own intranet too.
The exam board websites have past papers and mark schemes on them plus the examiners reports which give examples of 'real' student responses and how they were marked. I would have thought you would have looked to see what was there if your daughter is choosing GCSEs?
There are other websites, often written by teachers with all sorts of stuff. You can explore what's available by googling; some of it is good, some not so. Your daughter's school will probably have a wealth of materials on their own intranet too.
Re: Year 9 support Thread
Thanks - no she didn't look at past papers when choosing GCSEs. There wasn't that much choice and she went for subjects she likes the most currently - that was school's only advice on choosing, for everyone. The tenth one was a bit of a toss-up between a second MFL and computer science AQA 8520 which includes a coding project worth 20%.
I am a little dismayed to have spotted this evening online that there was widespread cheating with the project for the cohort to sit this summer and it will not count for pupils sitting in 2018 or 2019 and it is not clear what will happen in 2020 to this element. This was announced in early January??? and yet our choice deadline was shortly after the announcement, it would seem, and she based the choice on detailed responses from the school about the project as she was not keen on doing a lot of coding under strict exam conditions but liked the sound of a project worked on over a longer time scale and where you could think about it as it evolved over time. Oh dear! Very puzzling the school was not aware at the time of option choices. Maybe I have misunderstood. Hope so.
I am a little dismayed to have spotted this evening online that there was widespread cheating with the project for the cohort to sit this summer and it will not count for pupils sitting in 2018 or 2019 and it is not clear what will happen in 2020 to this element. This was announced in early January??? and yet our choice deadline was shortly after the announcement, it would seem, and she based the choice on detailed responses from the school about the project as she was not keen on doing a lot of coding under strict exam conditions but liked the sound of a project worked on over a longer time scale and where you could think about it as it evolved over time. Oh dear! Very puzzling the school was not aware at the time of option choices. Maybe I have misunderstood. Hope so.
Re: Year 9 support Thread
That was reported extensively in the press and possibly a thread on here? I know it was on TSR.
Re: Year 9 support Thread
Yes --- I had my eye off the ball news-wise in January for various reasons but I seem to think I read a headline about computer science cheating and wrongly assumed there'd been some one-off leak of an exam paper the previous summer and not read the main body of the article. Our annual parents' evening was late January very shortly before the options deadline; she was still undecided after parents' evening and in a quick interchange after parents' evening and a shufty through the specification and the specimen papers on the AQA website the choice was made. Oh dear.