Letter to Y11 Parents 16.08.21

16 March 2021

 

 

Dear Parent/Carer

 

As you may be aware, the government has asked schools to generate, for each subject, teacher assessed grades for their students. These grades will be based on a range of evidence, including evidence produced in the coming months.

 

The government guidance states that schools should continue teaching students for as long as possible, to cover as much of the specification content as possible and they should aim to assess students on as broad a range of specification content as they can. The student work produced in the assessed tasks should follow the same format as exam board materials and be marked in a way that reflects exam board mark schemes. The guidance also states that more recent evidence is likely to be more representative of student performance.

 

It is with this in mind that I write to you to explain how English, Maths and Science will be assessed in the coming weeks at Outwood Academy Shafton. 

 

 

Students will be revising the paper 1 content in lessons and, from the week beginning Monday 21 March 2021, will be completing mini assessments each week for 4 weeks. Each of these assessments added together would equal the entirety of a real paper. Because these assessments will be small, they will refer to content that is in manageable chunks for the students to revise for each week. 

 

In the tables overleaf, I have set out what will be taught and assessed each week so that you can support your child to revise for these assessments appropriately in the weeks before.

 

In supporting your child to revise please encourage them to login to their GCSE Pod account and complete their weekly homework tasks. Please also be aware that they should have received a revision guide in the September term. If your child has not received one, please let me know by emailing c.nield@shafton.outwood.com. We also have an Outwood Science website; https://science.outwood.com/which has links to many revision platforms; for example, it contains links to YouTube playlists, revision websites and also has a wealth of revision resources embedded into the site such as practice questions or printable flashcards to name a few. In addition, during the week prior to any assessment, students will be given a short document to support their revision for the coming week. If students are absent or they misplace this, a copy of these documents will be found in their Google Classrooms. 

 

 

 

For students sitting higher combined (sets X2 and Y2) the plan is as follows:

 

For students sitting foundation combined (sets X3, X4, X5, Y3 and Y5) the plan is as follows:

 For students sitting Triple Science (sets X1 and Y1) the plan is as follows:

 

 

Within the Maths department we will be looking at various ways to assess your child.   It is very important that your child continues to demonstrate what they know and also to communicate to their teachers what areas and support they require.  Through the next six weeks we will be completing weekly assessments that will enable a detailed question level analysis to take place.  Subsequent lessons will have a focus on the topics identified from the analysis in order to move students forward and close the gaps. 

 

In supporting your child over the upcoming weeks, please remind them to attend after school maths every Wednesday at 2:30pm, complete their weekly Hegarty homework and to use the wonderful revision website. https://sites.google.com/outwood.com/maths/home

 

Throughout the weeks, students will have the opportunity to explore and take home past exam papers questions to build their understanding and subject knowledge.   Should your child require any further resources, please email me at c.phillips@outwood.com and the department will be happy to arrange resources and supportive materials.  

 

 

In English lessons we are covering any aspects of the course that students still need in order to build a full portfolio of work for both English Language and English Literature.  Throughout the next few weeks, our students will be completing weekly assessments to give them every opportunity to shine and showcase their abilities. We will be focusing on one skill each week so that students can narrow their focus and polish their skills in small manageable chunks so as not to overwhelm them. Fortunately, students have already been building a bank of assessments for their portfolios since September, so we are focusing primarily on where the gaps are and then moving towards areas of weakness in order to give students an extra opportunity to achieve a higher mark. Our 121 tutor has already started withdrawing students to complete assessments that they have missed earlier in the year due to absence. I can assure you that we are all working incredibly hard to ensure that all students have every opportunity to build a strong portfolio of assessed work. 

 

Work for each lesson will be available on google classroom for students to access from home if needed. Staff will be setting some specific revision tasks prior to the Literature essays so that students will be given notice of which areas they need to focus on regarding the texts that they have studied. This will be shared before the Easter holidays, but won’t be assessed until after we return, so that students have plenty of time to build a secure knowledge and understanding of the texts. 

 

We also have an Outwood English revision website with a bank of information and resources for each element of the courses for both English Language and English Literature, which your child can access to support their learning: revision.english.outwood.com 

 

Please contact any of the colleagues above or you can get in touch via the ‘Contact Us’ button on our website. I hope that this information is of use.

 

Yours faithfully, 

 

 

 

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Letter to Y11 Parents 16.03.21.pdf 452 KB