alroley wrote: » I saw the girl on Matt Cooper - she had valid points. What did the ISSU say about it?
History Queen wrote: » What was the general gist of her argument?
PoolDude wrote: » Is this all an orchestrated sham? I was thinking about it overnight. The key challenge for students and teachers is the lack of time over the two year cycle to complete the course and teach or revise most effectively. The Minister said data will be gathered up to end of May for PG and they also shared, per the concern in the TUI statement, there has been no further change to the papers. So what they got was all parties calling out what they ‘gave up’ or are not happy with, thereby eroding confidence in the PG and students left with effectively no relief from the heavy workload as they need to try to be on top of every subject till June regardless of which path they take and then due to lack of trust in the system need to take the unchanged written exams which they feel under prepared for. Am I missing something?
noplacehere wrote: » Thinking about this overnight and to be honest I don’t see how this will reduce stress levels in the immediate term for anyone. Students have a decision to make. That decision then impacts the rest of their school year. If they chose predictive grades then they have to perform in every single test and they have to hope that the algorithm won’t reduce them arbitrarily. They will also be sitting in classes with students who need the course covered and finished so the pace is still going to be high and frantic. From watching students in junior cert coping with continuous assessment in CBAs I can see stress levels through the roof. The orals and practicals are going ahead for anyone taking the exams so all that prep will still have to be done. And to be honest in a subject like music where the practical is usually worth 50% I’d imagine the teachers will do assessments of those anyways for the predictive grades, otherwise they wouldn’t really have a decent assessment of their marks. If they are taking the exams then obviously all work needs to be done and revised as well as all practicals and orals. So no reduction in content or pressure for anyone apart from less pressure in June itself. It’s going to be insanely stressful for teachers and management. Classes are now dual stream with two sets of students with different objectives and outcomes, one of those who are reliant on the teacher to give them what they want. I’d expect a significant cohort in the middle to challenge every single grade or be conveniently absent for class tests for the next while or ‘need to take them online’ as this has already been happening in schools in my experience. It’s now going to be worse. Even the ones sitting exams need the course finished, practicals and orals all sat with just a couple of weeks in class before them. that’s not getting into teachers having to do other schools practicals and orals over Easter?! And then there’s the junior certs to be planned for, staff agreement needed on structure of grades etc etc Ugh. This is messy.
km79 wrote: » A lot of good points made The oral situation is a shambles So in your class you might have 1/3 taking the orals . They need prep between now and Easter . The other 2/3 don’t . What happens there then ! It won’t work For many reasons .
Random sample wrote: » For a student who just needs to pass the leaving cert, and has been tipping along nicely, there’s no reason to sit exams. It’s really only students who are aiming very high, are close to their points requirement or who are definitely expecting to fail through predicted grades that need to sit the exams.
km79 wrote: » I assume mocks are gone now .......in fact any formal exams are probably gone now as they will carry far too much significance......
jimmytwotimes 2013 wrote: » I would think some managers will push for some kind of exams for more data. Bit messy tho. If a school, for example, pushes for Easter exams, some students would just be focused on their prep for orals. Different aims of different students now, within the same class groups.
jimmytwotimes 2013 wrote: » Good point by Rosita. If a student chooses to stay away from school for the remainder of the year. This can't be held against them in the PG process. Who is anyone to say the reasons for this aren't genuine? This, then, makes a mockery of any school assessment for PG as others will say, well if they're not coming in and sitting a class test, why should I risk doing poorly in a test and risk a drop in my PG?
am_zarathustra wrote: » Has it been explicitly stated that you can't take engagement (or attendence) into account in this new accredited grading or whatever we are calling it now. If I've finished the last 10% of the course and you weren't there surely that impacts on your grade?
noplacehere wrote: » Do we have any clarity on this though? I thought if we aren’t predicting until May they’d have to be in?
Rosita wrote: » Other winners are OL language students who might have needed to drop to Foundation Level. Why would they do that now with no requirement to do an oral or even a written exam? Would a teacher really fail them?
Nyla Worried Son wrote: » I think students like these in any subject, at risk of failing, will absolutely have to sit the paper. No matter how much they think they can rely on their teacher, they cannot rely on the algorithm. If it's just a couple of subjects then that gives them a chance of focusing on that subject for the exam. But I would see little relief here for a student who is in the bottom 5 in all or most subject classes.
Teach30 wrote: » I have one student who has worked and continuously got h1s from 5th year on but isn’t going doing a high points course... would I still give the highest a grade to that student.... I have others hoping to do medicine and law who’d still be excellent but not as good at answering Qs.
Teach30 wrote: » Thinking about my LC class and what way I would dish out PG. I didnt do any of this last year. I have one student who has worked and continuously got h1s from 5th year on but isn’t going doing a high points course... would I still give the highest a grade to that student.... I have others hoping to do medicine and law who’d still be excellent but not as good at answering Qs. I have results from about 6 small class tests to go on and two small tests they did at home. I don’t keep a record of homework. I’m not even sure if I have a record of tests they did in 5th year.
Rosita wrote: » But your job is to assess at LC level not to try to influence who gets into what course. Not wishing to be smart but saying someone is not as good at answering questions........ultimately the exam is about answering questions. It's like saying I'm a great snooker player just not great at potting balls. Ultimately, while other factors contributed, ability to answer questions is the measure.
Teach30 wrote: » I suppose this students answering style seems better? I’ve never marked LC level so I’m only assuming. Others would be as good but wouldn’t write as long or detailed an answer for Qs but then they might do better in an official exam as they write less so get more covered. I use marking schemes for correcting but even they are vague and never say exactly what to expect from student. I know what your saying but these are the things some teachers will consider when giving PG! Their future course prospects will be down to the me and I’d hate to be remembered for not giving results they need and deserve. That’s just my thinking right now, I’ll obviously follow guidelines when we get them.
