I spend a fair proportion of my time teaching students who got a 3 or less in their GCSE English and want to resit. Especially in the Autumn term, I work with many Year 12 students who, while studying for either A levels or other qualifications, want to get that all important 4 in their English. Many of them need to get a 4 to do the course they are working on or aiming to do next. Despite that, the institutions they attend – either 6th Form in a school or a Further Education College – seem to struggle to provide the resources to help them improve their grade.
When a student comes to me, it is sometimes clear why they have not so far succeeded in their English. It may be that studying hasn’t been a priority for them, that school was perhaps more of a social rather than academic experience, from their point of view. It may be that they weren’t really cut out for the strait-jacket which is the school experience, and learning in a classroom environment was difficult for them. Most of the time, though, it is not at all easy to discern why they have not got the grade they want.
Inevitably, some students simply are not capable of the level they are looking for. I like to think that in some way, at some time, they would be capable of it, but to tackle underlying literacy issues takes time and effort which the student is often unable or unwilling to give. I feel that those students should have access to other English tests which might help them on their way. Functional skills qualifications are a good way forward, but for many courses this is not enough; most require GCSEs at a level 4 or above.
Most students, though, are almost there with their grade and just need that extra boost. The issue is that, when they come to me in September, they have already had nearly 3 months away from education. They are not reading either fiction or non-fiction. They are not writing stories, journals or letters. So, of course, their standard of work has already dropped. And they only have two months until their exam.
The shortness of the time is not the only issue. The environment these students are studying in has changed. Previously, as a normal GCSE student, they would probably be getting around 7 or 8 lessons a fortnight, usually of an hour each. In Year 12 in a school where they are studying for A levels, they may get one lesson a week resit class. In college it may be similar. I’m sure these times vary, but it is certain that the student resitting is getting far few hours exposure to English, to reading and writing. The constant repetition of the way the student should go about tackling a question, the sentence starters, the grammar and punctuation, the understanding of the text – this constant revision is no longer there. Usually, students who are at this point are not readers themselves, therefore the less they are required to read and write in their school or college day, the worse their standard becomes.
In addition, for the students and for the school, the focus is no longer on their English resit. Generally, they are not particularly interested in the subject and wish to get the magic ‘4’ simply to go on to other things. The school or college does not have the resources to concentrate their energies on these classes either. I have repeatedly heard stories of students who, through staff illness or whatever, have not had teachers for weeks on end, but have been simply left with exercises to do. The lessons also seem just to be a repetition of what they had before, which clearly did not work for them.
The truth is, the student has probably been working on those skills in English which are being tested in the GCSEs since Year 9, and hopefully before. They have gone through hundreds of tests, worked on hundreds of examples of past paper questions, and have had hundreds of lessons explaining SQI/PEA/PETER paragraphs, evaluation and SITE, simple and complex comparison and so on. Why, then, have they been unable thus far to get the grade they want and need?
Perhaps the reason is that we do spend too long looking at those aspects of teaching English (in order to get them through the exam) and not enough time simply on learning to read and write. Perhaps we think they have already learned to do that by the time they leave primary school, but the truth is that literacy is something you have to keep working on. Not just until you get your GCSEs, but for the rest of your life. The more you read, the better you get at it. You can not only decode, but understand the implications of the text. You can not only get a feeling for the tone of it, but also understand the bias of it. You start to see how all that is written is based on some other written text. You begin to see patterns. The same is true when you write. If you don’t do it, you don’t develop the skills needed. As you continue to do it, you become ever better at persuading, or involving your reader, or teaching them. To create this sort of learner, we should be focusing on reading and writing for fun, so that they become a part of life which continues whether you have English lessons at school or not.
Dragging the student’s grade up those last few marks to get the all important ‘4’ of course matters practically for those involved. It opens those doors to the careers or study they hope to do. But in terms of actual education, rather than fulfilling the needs of employers and the education sector, we are missing the point. Not only are we missing the point over those last few months before the resit. But we have been missing it all through Key Stage 4.
The question is, how can we strike the balance between helping our students on to the next rung of their education or the first rung of their career, and making them literate citizens whose learning continues for their whole lives? As educators, we only get judged on one of these things, but that should not determine our whole focus.
Enjoy English 