If you are interested in the one-year GCSE programme starting this
September , please contact Juliette on the address below.
The courses are not resit courses – they will cover the full GCSE course in a year. You need to have a certain minimum standard of literacy and
numeracy in order to be able to manage the course in a year, so there are
assessments to see if you’re ready for this course. However, you are
*not* expected to be already at GCSE standard.
The English course will be taught by Juliette herself, who is a former
home-educating mum.
All the details you need below: —
To confirm, we are offering:
*Schedule (so far)*:
*English GCSE*: Monday1.30pm – 3.30pm and Thursday1.30pm – 3.30pm.
*Maths GCSE* (Higher and foundation): Monday11am – 1.00pm and Thursday 11am – 1.00pm
*Science GCSE* (Combined Science): 3 hrs a week.
*Computer sciences*: 1.5 hrs a week.
*Foreign languages*: these GCSEs are not taught courses: study will be
independent. We offer support with exam preparation and registration.
*Enrichment/taster courses*: These will be non-exam courses running for a
term. We have not finalised what we can offer but, for example, current
courses include art and drama.
*Assessments*: Wednesday 28th or Thursday 29th at *Lewisham Way Campus *at
*1pm*.
*Juliette Grassby | Lecturer – ESOL | Lewisham Southwark College*
Lewisham Way | London | SE4 1UT
Direct Line: 0203 757 3085 | Main Line: 020 3757 3000
“The Pearson Edexcel Student Books for Chemistry and Physics are really good
– better than the Edexcel Student Book for Biology, in our experience. The
Chemistry one is by Jim Clark of www.chemguide.co.uk and he offers extra
support on that site. The Physics one we also found straightforward and
interesting for the boys to work through; both my oldest two got A* grades
using this book alone.
Just in case anyone else reading is wondering about timing of these exams,
Edexcel IGCSE Physics and Chemistry are not changing to 9-1 grading until
Summer 2019, and the last exam of the current specification is January
2019. You can take this as a first-time candidate but you won’t have
another chance at the exact same specification.”
Shooters Hill Sixth-Form College has started a new programme offering a
core set of GCSEs in one year. It’s aimed at people who are new to the UK
or who did not, for whatever reason, get the grades they wanted first time
around. Shooters Hill College have had several home-ed students who’ve
done very well there and who’ve built up a good reputation for home -edders
there.
This is a really good opportunity as it’s quite unusual to be able to
access a full set of GCSEs in a one-year course which are targeting higher
grades, so that you can go on to study A-levels afterwards. Most colleges
nowadays will offer GCSEs in English and maths plus vocational
qualifications in other subjects, and where they do offer GCSEs they will
usually be targeting Foundation level, ie grades 1-4 (old system C-G),
which would not prepare you for A-levels.
This course is being offered for ages 16-19. However, it is worth asking
them if they would take younger students, as they have been flexible in the
past. Funding is available for part-time home-educated students in the
same way as it is for 16-19 year-olds; see http://slhe.wikia.com/wiki/College
Cheers
Angela
*GCSE Course*
This course is applicable to students who have recently arrived in the UK
and need an opportunity to upgrade their skills in order to move onto a
Level 3 / A Level course in a years’ time! Often students who are recent
arrivals to the UK have lots of potential to do Level 3 / A Level courses
but over time we have recognised that due to the literacy requirements of
these courses it is necessary for them to spend a year focussed on
upgrading these skills.
This course might also be suitable for those UK students who did not
achieve the x 5 9-4 grades at GCSE for various personal reasons, and as a
result are not able to access a Level 3 course relevant to their future
aspirations. This course is not suitable for students wishing to enrol for
a Level 3 BTEC programme, they should be looking at doing a Level 2 BTEC
which would allow progression to their Level 3 BTEC choice.
The aim of the programme is for students to achieve a minimum of x 5 GCSEs
grade 9-4
The choice of subjects is dependent on prior attainment and prospective
aspiration as to what A Level / Level 3 programme they wish to study – but
the majority of students will be studying x 5 subjects.
I have copied and pasted a recent thread from the HE GCSE group…bloomi’ good advice! Home Ed Mum’s r the best!
FIRST THE QUESTION and then the answers, all names have been removed:
Hi all.
We’ve been playing with the idea of embarking on GCSEs for a little while
now. It seems to take some time for parent and child to get their head
around the process and procedures. Our son would like to work on his own
for most subjects with the input of an “expert” as and when needed. Our
exam centre runs quite a variety of boards, which gives us a good choice of
syllabi. So here are a few questions for those of you with experience…
How much time would you leave yourself to prepare, if prep is done largely
autonomously without a tutor or even parent? How does the suggested
contact time (seems to be between 120-180hours) compare to how much time a
child needs to prepare for themselves at home?
Would you buy and work from the textbook, doing the section tests and then
move onto passed papers? This I guess is the traditional path, but not the
quick one.
Or would you work from past papers backwards, dealing with any question
that proved to be hard?Would you then go back to the appropriate textbook
or would you search wider on the internet?
Do you try past papers from different syllabi in order to decide on the
most appropriate one?
Any ideas on “how you did it” would be much appreciated. Of course, every
child/family is different, but sometimes it’s a case of gathering ideas
from a variety of pools…
Two points spring to mind, one is that, for the most part you will probably need to do IGCSEs since GCSEs (except for Maths, law psychology soiology RE) have controlled assessment which has to be run by the exam centre. Sometimes a centre will allow you to go in and sit with their students.
Secondly, sitting exams is a personal thing and it might pay to sit one to start with to gauge how well things have gone. Sometimes we can be over-ambitious with our youngsters, sometimes we are too fearful, but if you find a method that works successfully then go with that.
Most importantly, there is exam technique and it is possible to know all the material and still flunk because you weren’t writing what the examiner wanted to see, yes it is very much hoop jumping.
We did either 4 GCSE/IGCSE in a year or 3 GCSE/IGCSE and an AS, spreading them over 2 years at age 15 and 16. We studied just with textbooks and then moved on to past papers. The children worked independently, coming to me when stuck and if needed we looked it up on line. Some topics eg Physics IGCSE they had never studied formally before so they were starting form scratch. They spent on average an hour a day on each topic – this meant all was done by lunch time and they still had time to do non academic things in the afternoon/evening. We started in August and aimed to finish textbooks by end of February so that there was plenty of time to revise. This worked for DS1 and DS2 ans we are following the same pattern for DD1 this year.
You can get revision books for some of the Edexcel IGCSE topics. If your
son already has knowledge of some topics and doesn’t want to work right the
way through textbooks you could try looking at revision books and past
papers to see if that covers enough for him. You would need to make sure
that you weren’t missing out some areas of the spec though as obviously the
revision guide is just a summary.
how ever many past papers you do you cannot be sure you have covered all the materiel – so I think working through the text book is essential,
How long – depends on how quickly your son learns/remembers. And the essay subjects especially, you have to learn to do the hoop-jumping! And how many subjects/how much time for each.
to pass exams, you need to know the content of the text book To learn about the subject, you need input from many sources!
most pick a syllabus because their centre doesn’t have much choice! If you have a choice, i would look at specs and past papers, but not work through them. In general, EDEXCEL have books aimed specifically at their subject, CIE don’t
We did what you call the Traditional route – worked for us – 10 A*
I think for most people it would work better to start with a textbook and
then move on to past papers only when you’re already confident about the
topics. Reasons for this are:
1. There are only a finite number of past papers for each specification,
as they keep changing them. Once you’ve used them up, you’ll not have
anything left for the hugely useful mock exam sessions during your
revision period.
2. Past papers are usually a good guide to the style of future exams but
don’t rely on them to predict content. Some topics do come up on a regular
basis, but the syllabus always contains more topics than can be examined in
one paper.
3. Could be quite demotivating to start with the final paper.
What we have done is looked at the syllabuses, chosen one,, bought the
standard textbook, son has worked through books on his own for some topics,
with groups/tutors for languages and English, asking for help when
necessary. If he isn’t sure about something, I help him look for a book
which might approach it in a different way, or a website with a different
explanation – BBC Bitesize works well for us. If your kids like multimedia
stuff, there are tutorials and demonstrations on YouTube for *everything*
you could possibly need! If he’s working on his own and finds it easy,
rather than doing every question in the exercises he will do every other
one. The ‘Review’ exercises at the end of every chapter are saved for the
revision period. Once the book is finished, he goes back and does as many
of those ‘Review' exercises as he needs to feel confident on each topic,
then we start on past papers. We have usually allowed a month for
revision/past papers before each exam.
We mainly have used Edexcel and their textbooks are usually good – and,
crucially,, they make answers available to home educators for free if
they’re not already in the books,, whereas some other boards don’t.
However, in one topic (IGCSE Maths A) the Edexcel textbook didn’t suit us
so we switched to another one.
In terms of time to prepare – depends on the subject and child. If he’s
motivated, I’d just start him on the book and see how fast he goes. My
oldest took GCSE maths when he was 12, did it in one year spending up to an
hour a day on it, rising to a bit more in the final month. He started
working through IGCSE Physics and it went a lot faster than he expected so
he covered the whole course in about 4 months, doing about an hour maybe 3
or 4 times a week. DS2 is 13 and hasn’t taken any exams yet, largely
because we realised there was no hurry and haven’t got round to it – we are
currently trying to decide if he should go in for any this summer, when
he’ll be 14, as he wants to but I am concerned it will be rushing the rest
of the material. Anyway…
We found it helps both DS1 and DS2 to have a target – I say they should aim
to finish a whole exercise (which is usually neatly designed to cover one
school lesson’s worth of theory) in a session. This seems to work well.
Without this target it was no easier, and sessions just dawdled without
DS1 feeling he was achieving anything. The oldest two are very
self-motivated so I don’t force them to do any of this, but they do usually
find they work best with a timer as well. I have four younger children and
DS3 (11) is a very different person so we will have to look for a whole new
approach with him. It’s the beauty of home-ed that, even when aiming for
exams, you can tailor the whole approach to the individual – yes, they all
have to cover the same material, but beyond that there are a wealth of
resources to help you approach it in different ways.
You’ll find lots of info on starting to do exams, how to prepare, how to
enter, what books are recommended by other home educators etc,, on the HE
Exams wiki. The wiki is the ‘distilled wisdom’ of this group – a permanent
reference for the questions which come up regularly. You can find it at http://www.home-education-exams.org.uk .
One talented home-ed Mum is offering the following:
Instrumental Lessons – Piano – grade 8; Keyboard; Flute Beginners Only; Recorder beginners only and Music theory (usually as part of the instrumental class but can be taught as a separate subject) – grade 8. SR
Group lessons of the above if taken during school hours can be offered at HER.
Tuesdays 11.30 – 12.30 and 12.45 – 1. 45 Baby Music and art classes ages 0 – 5 SR
NEW THIS TERM: CHOIR. Yes we have a new choir starting this term with a concert at the end of the term.
Choir : Tues from 7pm – 8.30 – currently this is taking children from age 7 – upwards (subject to time change if a large primary school age/secondary school age variety)
Adult Group piano lessons: Thursday’s from 7.30 – 9.00 max. numbers 8 (NB I have taught group piano lessons for up to 12 in a group for 10 years in Hammersmith and Fulham Adult education).
Currently starting a ‘re-living’ history of music course – which starts on Monday 24th October at the Fulham Group – however if this gets oversubscribed then there may be an opportunity of running it at my studio at another time. (HER)
Occasionally I run workshops in things like HOW THE PIANO WORKS which involves taking the piano apart and putting it back together again.
Other workshops include – Creative music making; Sigh-treading; Paperweaving and more both music and craft workshops.
Can also help with GCSE Revision.
All students can work towards ABRSM exams ( I have been teaching since 1989 and have a 100% exam success rate with both individual and group students. With around 60% Merits and Distinctions). Groups get the opportunity of working towards music medals.
Amazingly encouraging report of how one Mum has been working with her children, copied and pasted from another site…
I have been so impressed reading about what XYZ’s and ABC’s
> children have done. It is amazing what can be achieved within the family,
> and in both cases I thought that perhaps all that time that is usually
> spent commuting to school, doing school admin, school busy work etc, has
> instead been channelled into a truly impressive education.
>
> That’s not really the case here, however. I feel like we are muddling
> through but it seems to work, and I feel school would waste so much time
> which they could spend better elsewhere. We are not ‘finished’ yet as DS1
> is only 15 (school yr 10, ie due to take GCSEs next year on conventional
> timetable) and there are 5 younger children too. However, he’s got a good
> bunch of qualifications under his belt already and I thought some people
> might like to hear how it has worked in this family so far – how working
> towards exams can work even if you are not very organised…
>
> I have never been organised enough to follow a timetable, and even when I
> have tried, it is like herding cats with the kids all suddenly developing
> urgent things they ‘neeeeeeeed’ to do (cue plaintive cries of “But we’re
> being autonomous / creative/ imaginative!” as they cynically attempt to
> manipulate me). Something always crops up to throw a spanner in the works
> – usually a baby/toddler! I would blame the chaos on having a large family
> but that doesn’t cut it as I have a friend with 12 kids who home-eds and
> she is always wonderfully organised! I think it is more that I am easily
> distracted, love learning new stuff, have no sense of time and get
> sidetracked into new things all the time. Anyway, we have never been
> either card-carrying autonomous, or structured – it’s been a case of
> structure for core subjects and looking out for educational opportunities
> and following our interests elsewhere. From somewhere around age 5-7
> depending, I have started them doing some simple maths and handwriting
> workbooks about 3 times a week, as well as learning to read. We also did
> some Bond exercises eg Non-Verbal Reasoning and Verbal Reasoning. Total
> sitting-down time for littlies probably an hour, with lots of
> interruptions, about 3x a week, plus ad hoc things like doing some science
> activities or drawing or a new craft, but that is just as and when it
> happens. Lots of sport. Lots of informal science, reading interesting
> articles in the newspaper, pointing out interesting things, encouraging
> hobbies and keeping lots of animals. Lots of reading fiction of all sorts.
> We subscribe to New Scientist and really find it helpful. Computer game
> time restricted to around an hour a day because I do worry about it
> crowding out other things. Big kids spend longer on it as they are on
> Skype with a group of friends. Oldest does computer programming and DS2
> does some as well as computer graphics. Everyone has French and Japanese
> lessons (a family project). Big kids do music lessons and go to drama
> group.
>
> DS1 wanted to start taking exams early because he was fed up with people in
> his sports classes saying “How will you get any GCSEs if you don’t go to
> school?”. He took modular maths when he was 12 (A*), then Physics at 13
> (A*), ECDL (IT qualification) and Digital Creator (another IT qualification
> which is 2 GCSEs worth), and Japanese speaking/listening (A*/A, half a
> GCSE). Aged 14 he took Chemistry (A*), Law (A) and Japanese
> reading/writing (this completed a full GCSE in Japanese, overall A grade).
> So aged 14 he had 5 GCSEs/IGCSEs all at A* or A, and 3 vocational
> equivalents. This year he’s taking Biology and Additional Maths and has
> retaken the law. So before he even reaches the year in which he would have
> taken GCSEs at school, he will have 10 GCSE equivalents, including 7
> GCSEs/IGCSEs, and then next year he will take at least English Lit &
> Language and maybe French and Geography. So he’ll finish with somewhere
> between 9 and 11 ‘real’ (I)GCSEs plus the vocationals on top, and that will
> be having usually worked for only 2-3 hours a day, steadily, throughout the
> secondary years. Actually for the first couple of years of secondary, when
> he was just doing Maths and then Physics, he spent only an hour or so a day
> studying these things, although other time doing his own things eg computer
> programming.
>
> We have mostly skipped any formal work aimed at KS3 (11-14years), except in
> maths. In the other subjects it seems to be all either repeating stuff you
> would have done at primary level, or beginning things you’ll have to do
> again in GCSE courses anyway. Of course, in schools this works well as
> part of the ‘spiral learning’ concept whereby you go over the same material
> several times in the school career and expect a bit more to stick each
> time, but it’s not necessarily the most efficient way for home education.
> For science at least, I just could not see the point of following a KS3
> course for our family. At GCSE level I think there is quite a difference
> between education and qualification, and while the kids are happy to jump
> through the hoops required to get the qualification, I don’t want the
> national curriculum to also dictate their *education* – that’s something
> wider.
>
> We had a token attempt at studying English with the oldest two about 3 or 4
> years ago but they didn’t really want to write much and I wasn’t that happy
> with the books we found. I tried Galore Park but they got fed up with
> those, and we tried something else but they argued with the textbook, so I
> just left it – they read widely, had good handwriting, so we just got on
> with other subjects and I asked them to write stories now and then. It was
> only 2 weeks before DS1’s law GCSE that we realised he’d never actually
> written an essay and – whoops – he would need to do that for the exam, or
> near enough, as the longer questions on paper 2 require answers which are
> around a page of A4. He managed well enough, but was not happy with the A
> grade he got, so this year he has spent a couple of weeks working on essay
> technique and has retaken the exam. We deliberately left English until
> last in the hope that greater maturity would help, and fortunately a lovely
> home-ed mum and tutor has set up an English group which DS1 goes to with
> his friends, so I don’t need to think about that. He enjoys it and it is a
> social occasion, and she is so full of enthusiasm that she is motivating
> the children.
>
> History is done in an informal and sometimes underhand way. I bought the
> Galore Park books and I thought they were great, but the oldest two did not
> like them. DS1 has now declined to study history on a formal basis on the
> grounds that he knows all he needs to know from reading the Horrible
> Histories series, and that the textbooks don’t tell him anything that these
> books don’t, it’s just less interesting (!!!)…… actually he does seem
> to remember just about everything from them, but hmm! History is old hat,
> apparently; I provide historical fiction, lots of podcasts while I have a
> captive audience in the car, and cross my fingers. We go to some English
> Heritage events and learn lots from those. We go to museums, usually with
> a target of just a few things to look at, and will have found out something
> about them beforehand. DS2 has expressed an interest in a History IGCSE in
> a couple of years so I suppose it will be a case of working through the
> book and building on background knowledge.
>
> How the oldest 2 study for the subjects they are aiming for exams in is –
> they take the set textbook for the subject and work through it, doing the
> exercises as they go. In maths, if the exercises seem easy then they do
> every other question. The ‘Review’ questions at the end of each chapter
> are saved for revision.
> The goal we have is to do 3 units of work a day – each unit being an
> exercise from a textbook or homework from French or Japanese. The older
> kids manage this themselves mostly, though if I see them at a loose end or
> starting to get niggly with each other, I will remind them to go and do
> either some studying or some housework. It’s amazing how interesting
> textbooks can be when the alternative is vacuuming the stairs.
>
> DS1 likes to mix maths with violin practise because apparently it helps;
> he’ll do maths for a while, then if something seems difficult, he will play
> violin for 10 minutes or so before going back to it. We call it doing a
> Sherlock Holmes.
> Oldest marks his own work from the mark scheme as he goes along. I have a
> look now and then to see if he’s on track and make myself feel useful. If
> he is unsure of anything he asks me and I will help him find another book
> or a good source online. If I find a good radio or TV programme or
> newspaper article on the topic then I show it to him, but DS1 prefers books
> to videos and presentations as he can go through at his own pace and skim
> stuff he already knows. So far, I have not needed to get involved; he has
> largely educated himself as far as the syllabus is concerned. That is sort
> of deliberate as I wanted the kids to be independent learners, and it is
> sort of necessary as if they were waiting for me to explain it to them,
> they would be waiting all day sometimes! I set up as many science
> practicals as seem a) practical (ha ha) and b) enjoyable. We did get a
> chemistry tutor to come round and do some practicals that I was scared of.
>
> When a date is set for the exam then we do more or less what Nola-Ann
> described, ie look at book sections to cover, divide by weeks remaining,
> saving 4 weeks for review/revision. If you are using a standard textbook
> (we have mostly used Edexcel ones) you will see that the exercises are
> designed to be one school lesson’s worth, so while the chapters may be
> different lengths, the sub-sections are usually a consistent size. When
> the book is finished, go back and do those ‘Review’ questions, then start
> on past papers, as many as possible. Save the most recent past paper for
> last. We do all past papers under exam conditions; I have a suspicion that
> DS1 finds it a convenient retreat from the noise of siblings. He and I
> both mark his mock exams, paying attention to what examiners are looking
> for & always reading the Examiner’s Reports for more guidance.
>
> I didn’t ever envision our home-ed life being quite as unstructured as it
> is; I had visions of them getting a wonderful classical education, me doing
> a better job than school could and probably in a tidy house too! The
> reality has been chaotic and sporadic, but yet it still seems to
> work. I thought I would be doing more actual teaching, but it turns out,
> mostly the older two don’t want me to do that. I am allowed to help with
> problem -solving or locating useful resources, but they want to do it
> themselves mostly. I am very lucky that they are motivated. It must be so
> much harder when you have someone who is not motivated, but you want to
> keep their options open.
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