My son is good at PE, is playing tennis and football outside school and at school, likes it, is it a sensible option? Is it time consuming like arts for exemple? How difficult is it? I will of course talk to his PE teacher next term when we need to take the decision about GCSEs. He is in year 9 now. Thanks

Read the specification for the board the school offer and get your son to look at sample papers. I think it makes a good break from traditional academic GCSEs.

Guest gives good advice.

Lots of children seem to think PE GCSE is all about playing sport - it isn't - that is quite a small part of it. There is a lot of theory and that involves science, as well as requiring candidates to run various sporting events to show leadership in sport (often in groups, so that means, like drama, the group you are in can affect your overall grade). However, it is a break from the more academic subjects and if he enjoys sport, he may find that he goes into the lessons more positively.

My DS did OCR last year. The exam is not just sport, they do a lot of biology. For his spec whilst the exam itself was not hard the exam grade boundaries were high and so they had to score highly to get good grades. Lots of friends children took it in the misbelief it was all about playing sport and ended up struggling. As G55 said have a look at the specs for the board your school uses and then decide.

I would recommend it. They cover a lot of interesting theory and history and there are lots of options for the practical side. My dd did it and really enjoyed it. DG

Thanks. Out of possible 138 boys or so, only 4 to 7 take this option at GCSEs and the grades are mainly As and Bs, hardly any A*s, so as someone said the grade boundaries must be quite high as this is a school that is in the top 30 in the country and the boys are working hard and clever. We'll see what his PE teacher says.

You can find the grade boundaries online if you are interested. If you say which board it is I'll link to them.

My youngest dd is in year 9 at her girls grammar and has given a preliminary indication to her school she will be doing PE amongst her four options.I have been following the PE results for the AQA course at her school for the last few years.There is nothing I have seen which would indicate high grade boundaries.At her school a number of girls gain A* and A's from a group of about 30 to 40 girls.In 2017 out of 33 girls 7 gained A* and 13 A's.

_________________
In the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years.

Abraham Lincoln

If I understood correctly the board is OCR Guest55, thanks!

My daughter started PE GCSE this year and she really enjoys it. She is very sporty but also enjoys the science and theory of it, she likes biology. During this term they have done one practical lesson, all the rest have been theory, there are quite a few kids in her year who are doing it because they thought they would just be doing sport all year, they were clearly told this wasn't the case, some of these children are struggling. She doesn't find it very difficult, but it is not a soft option either. They do have to be very accomplished at their chosen sports to get top grades for the practical side, but this only makes up around 20 or 30% (cant remember exactly) of the final grade.