Oh, and hard working students and parents.

I really hoped I had left that giddy nauseous feeling on results day behind, but no every year it happens. Missed "challenging" target by 1% – arse. But going through the names many great characters will be rewarded for their efforts – well done.

Good luck to all.

These days you have to work your ar$e off to fail not pass, lol. 😉

Some truth in that, some students work really hard at being complete fools with the notion that peer image is absolute king. Personally I am always relieved when I get the EMO class, they always do far better than the "are my hoop earings big enough" student.

Also failing in my day was anything less than a C, now it is E.

According to the moylesy show this morning, Aled passed with an A at 57%. How exactly does that work? Where is the A* barrier?

A is normally 80%. He might have got 57% in one of the modules and aced the other(s). A* – 85-90% as far as I remember (we don't do GCSEs any more).

I really cannot be bothered going into school its not like it'll change the grades. Am I a bad teacher?

Exam creep is a problem, it is true that most of a GCE book of 20 years ago in science will be A level now. However what is being tested has also changed hugely and by default what is taught. Very little actual factual recall now, far more problem solving questions with given data and short closed structured questions to answer. These are cheaper to mark by electronic means. But everything is cyclical. Multiple choice tests are now being fazed out and more open ended coursework is being sat in exam conditions and marked by class teachers. Ofqual does flex it's muscles. We have also after 20 years rebuilt the bricklaying course – yes you can guess the rest.

In science people say its got easier because the set factual stuff is less advanced but the problem solving questions are actually harder for a great many people.

"fazed out" We are all doomed.

it's muscles

Indeed.

Exam creep is a HUGE problem by the time you hit university level. Most courses are set by profs who expect the same skills as 20 years ago and simply do not get it. This means students either fail in their droves and are "moderated up" to save face, courses are dumbed to the point of A level level, or students are forced to do a "foundation" year. None of which is good for industry or academia.

a_a – back when I was doing GCSEs the problem solving side was almost an assumed skill, not something that needed to be taught, or at least not tested. Problem solving is all well and good but you need the factual knowledge to use with the problem solving.

Wally – "fazed"….you're a teacher….:D

I dont wish to be down about the students, it's not their fault, but it really is doing no-one any good at all except on paper.

FazedPhased
It's muscles its muscles :-0
go to the back of the class.

a_a – back when I was doing GCSEs the problem solving side was almost an assumed skill, not something that needed to be taught, or at least not tested. Problem solving is all well and good but you need the factual knowledge to use with the problem solving.

Thats funny because back when I did my GCSE's there were hardly any problem solving questions and consequently it was a piss of piss as long as you could remember stuff. Remembering stuff isnt science. Even at degree level/masters it was mostly just remembering stuff rather than science. A couple of research projects aside I hardly did any science till I did my PhD.

courses are set by profs who expect the same skills as 20 years ago and simply do not get it

They need to pull their collective heads out of their collective arses then dont they? Exam creep or boosting numbers at uni which is to blame, Universities must take some blame too.