A Level Worked solutions

Core 1 (MEI) worked solutions here!  Check the A Level page for regular updates.

Core 1 MEI (Jan 2011)

Confidence lost in GCSE and A level marking.

Some facts and figures have just been published about the amount of appeals and remarks that have been requested this year by schools for GCSE and A Level candidates.

The Telegraphs sums up the basics quite nicely here - Telegraph - appeals

I was staggered to see that 305 400 GCSE papers were asked to be remarked - a 50% increase on last year.

Let's just let those numbers sink in for a moment....

Each Year 11 has about half a million students in.  It seems about 60% of these students had a result appealed on.  That shows a huge lack of confidence in the exam system.  In an average school of 200 students in year 11, 120 of them are having one GCSE grade challenged.

In addition, appeals cost money.  The amount an appeal cost varies from exam board to exam board but a fee of £25 would be on the conservative side.

Across the country, 305 400 appeals costing £25 totals just over £7.5 million....

Around 20% of these appeals resulted in the grade being changed and the cost of the appeal is refunded to whomever paid it but the time and admin cost to the school is not repaid.

At A level there is a similar picture, with 145 000 grades being challenged.  These generally seem a little bit more expensive to appeal so let's assume £30 (which is definitely on the conservative side).   145 000 appeals at £30 a time gives a total cost of £4.3 million.

So, in total, from one exam season, schools have spent well over £10 million on appeals allowing for the refunds on successful appeals.   This money should be spent in so many more fruitful ways and I am surprised this information has caused such small ripples in the media in our times of austerity.

So, what are the solutions?

1.  Schools need to be clear on their appeals process.  The process is expensive and schools have a responsibility to only appeal where there is a good chance of a grade change.

2.  The exam board needs to mark to a far higher standard.  The checks on markers need to be more rigorous and regular.  In addition, schools need to be made aware of this process of checking so that they become less likely to appeal.

3.  With more and more subjects now being examined in the summer, the pressure on exam boards to turn around results in time for results day is only going to increase.  Exam boards need to up their game.

4.  Finally, the key solution would for an exam board to promise to return all exam papers to the school as part of the fee paid to enter students.  This would give teachers the opportunity to see exactly how their students had performed and to use this to inform their future teaching.  I know it would then cost a bit more to enter students but would probably save money in the long run for schools as appeals would become less likely.

It would just take one exam board to promise it in one subject for it to take off.....

There have to be better ways of spending £12 million pounds...

Top 5 Maths Twitter Accounts we should all be following.

With the holidays in full flow I thought I would do a bit of research and list my top 5 maths twitter accounts that both students and staff should be following.

So, here we go….

Firstly, an honourable mention to NCETM.   It doesn’t make the top 5 as it is probably only suited to the CPD of teachers, rather than of interest to students, but nevertheless, it is one to be following.

We all know that continuing to improve our ability to teach is vital and following an account that has a heavy focus on Maths CPD is a no-brainer.  This account has a great community of skilled professionals working together for a common cause.  I particularly like the resources and support given for maths that is simply intriguing …rather than flogging topics that are going to be in the exams.  Keep it up!

So, my top 5....

5th  ASAPMaths

This is a teacher resource friendly yet fairly new twitter account.  Lots of regular and targeted resources seem to come out during the academic year to help students get a “C” or “A*” at GCSE and, brilliantly, the answers are provided!  Another area to keep an eye on is their “You Tube” channel which is starting to cover specific topics and past papers in a friendly way.

4th.  CorbettMaths

Another twitter account with excellent, and free, resources available.  This account is currently focused on giving students daily practise to ensure they keep their knowledge up to date.  For no other reason, this is a great account to follow.  The Corbettmaths website is linked to this twitter account with helpful and graded videos on a wide range of topics that students should find very helpful.

3rd.  Mr Barton Maths

A close call whether this should have been in 2^nd place or not but Mr Barton has just been edged out into 3^rd!  A truly outstanding twitter account and website is available.  His knowledge of Autograph is especially welcome and his role as a TES maths advisor means that there are lots of links to other helpful resources and people should you need them.  Most impressively, his twitter feed contains links to whole lesson plans and resources should you be needing a starting point for those topics that are tricky to teach.

2nd.  Just Maths  and  Revise Just Maths

Two accounts for the price of one!

This is an established and thriving community of people who regularly engage with the issues of the day.  In addition, Just Maths produces outstanding resources and is always ready to help with questions or queries any student or teacher may have.  They also have a great website linked in but some parts of the website do require a paid subscription to access.  The only reason this isn’t number 1 is because there is, currently, no KS5 stuff available…but I’m sure they are on it!

1st.   Hegarty Maths

A truly fantastic and supportive account that ticks all the boxes.  A brilliant "You Tube" channel is hailed as being absolutely vital by student after student after student.  His fascination with “growth mindsets” and “technology” means you are missing out if you are not following this one.  

Make sure you are following all of these to get September off to a flying start!

A Level and GCSE Maths exam results variability.

The BBC  is reporting of a warning to schools regarding this year’s forthcoming A Level and GCSE results.  However, on closer scrutiny, it is difficult to figure out what the warning actually is....

It seems that there are rumblings of great variations in results this year.  Greater variations of what though?  Greater variations between teacher prediction and actual attainment?  Greater variations between school’s expected and historical results and what they attain this year?  Or greater variation of student attainment across the subjects they have taken….or all three?

To muddy the waters more there is further contradiction.  Glenys Stacey (Chief regulator for Ofqual) says that standards would be “held steady”.  To me, this means that a student who got a “C” last year should get a “C” this year.  But, where is the variation in that?  Encouragingly, Stacey then goes onto say, “Overall, results are likely to look different because of the difference in entry patterns”.

The only difference in entry patterns is that many schools have cancelled their plans to enter Yr 10 students for the GCSE exam as it was claimed by some (principally Ofsted and Ofqual), though I never agreed with it, that entering students early for their maths exam did not result in greater attainment by the end of Yr 11.

So, following Ofqual and Ofsted’s logic, reducing the number of Yr 10 students sitting the exam should result in higher attainment for those in Year 11 this summer – especially as most Yr 11 students will not have been “damaged” by the historical early entry opportunities of the November, January and March sittings. 

But every teacher knows that would be a foolish and dangerous assumption.

Confused?  So am I.

And as the countdown to the results continues, us teachers wait for the traditional shrieks of joy and tears of despair, knowing that we too are receiving our judgement.