Effinbankers

How many subjects will your fourth year be presented for in 2014 for the first set of "Nationals"?

Not as many as the current S4s!

The consequences for jobs are a pretty dire prospect.

[edited by: catmother at 17:33 (GMT 0) on 12-12-2012]

What sort of jobs/apprenticeships/college courses currently require 7 or 8 standard grades?

CheesyWotsits

What sort of jobs/apprenticeships/college courses currently require 7 or 8 standard grades?

Point taken, but getting S2 or S3 to effectively pick their Higher subjects is a no-no. What they were good at in the lower secondary is not what they might be good at in 2 or 3 years time. Pupils have to be given time to develop their aptitudes and herding them into a corner much earlier serves no purpose IMO.

Think also of the in-fighting within schools as departments compete for numbers; English/Maths + 3 or 4 is a complete joke

You also make the assumption we still have apprenticeships!!  In my place we have an additional 15% returning for S5/6 because there are no jobs or college places.

[edited by: Effinbankers at 17:52 (GMT 0) on 12-12-2012]

CheesyWotsits

What sort of jobs/apprenticeships/college courses currently require 7 or 8 standard grades?

No,I meant our jobs!  8 SG in S4 but only 6 Nationals from next year. I teach a subject that was compulsory up to S4. From next year,it will be an option. It's not looking too good.

[edited by: catmother at 18:21 (GMT 0) on 12-12-2012]

Anyone unsure what will happen to the brighter pupils who want to stay at school until S6? Sure, the middle/below average will continue to use the opportunity to progress through levels but what about those who achieve five highers in fifth year then have no Nats in other subjects to take forward? Is it part of the plan to discourage more able pupils from staying on in S6? Would mean less teachers are required.

halfajack

Anyone unsure what will happen to the brighter pupils who want to stay at school until S6? Sure, the middle/below average will continue to use the opportunity to progress through levels but what about those who achieve five highers in fifth year then have no Nats in other subjects to take forward? Is it part of the plan to discourage more able pupils from staying on in S6? Would mean less teachers are required.

 

Maybe. Although I suspect the powers-that-be prefer teenagers to be in school rather than adding to the unemployment stats.

socrates82

Maybe. Although I suspect the powers-that-be prefer teenagers to be in school rather than adding to the unemployment stats.

 

 

Quite, but those kids are more likely to go on to higher education. Could we be looking at more kids going straight from S5 to uni? 

Effinbankers

CheesyWotsits

What sort of jobs/apprenticeships/college courses currently require 7 or 8 standard grades?

Point taken,

No point made. Genuine question. I don't know which positions require that number of standard grades, but maybe someone else does.

catmother

CheesyWotsits

What sort of jobs/apprenticeships/college courses currently require 7 or 8 standard grades?

No,I meant our jobs!

Ah, that makes more sense. :) Yes. You are right. Doesn't look good for some subjects. However, to cover the timetable still requires the same number of teachers, doesn't it? Jobs reduced in some places, but created in others?

halfajack

socrates82

Maybe. Although I suspect the powers-that-be prefer teenagers to be in school rather than adding to the unemployment stats.

 

 

Quite, but those kids are more likely to go on to higher education. Could we be looking at more kids going straight from S5 to uni? 

Or more crash-course Highers?

CheesyWotsits

Or more crash-course Highers?

 

That's if there are teachers of certain subjects left to teach the pupils.  Some departments might get wiped out with no demand.

Could it be that pupils are forced down more "academic" routes at the expense of practical subjects?  Everyone apart from English and Maths needs to beware.

 

Isn't it the case that English is covered under the literacy requirement, as is Maths under the numeracy one? i.e. they won't be compulsory...? I know that was the fear a few years ago, but maybe that's changed. I wish they'd bring back arithmetic as an option. We're going to offer 7 or 8 subjects but at reduced time, so as to fit in RE and PE. Hard to take, since time was cut from 3 to 2 periods in S1 to S3, with the promise we'd get more time up the school... No. How you're supposed to get to Higher standard in S5 in the time now available I don't know. Also retiring/departing teachers have not been replaced in our department, so we couldn't take advantage of more time available even if it were offered. As for the same number of teachers being required... ... Bigger multi-level classes, fewer options for the kids is our future scenario. Great job, Mike!

Effinbankers

CheesyWotsits

Or more crash-course Highers?

 

That's if there are teachers of certain subjects left to teach the pupils.  Some departments might get wiped out with no demand.

Could it be that pupils are forced down more "academic" routes at the expense of practical subjects?  Everyone apart from English and Maths needs to beware.

 

Maths and English are already optional in S5. Uptake is still good, though as these are still regarded as good highers to get.

We are doing 8 subjects as usual but over S3-S4.

Would the academic S6 kids not do Advanced Highers and crash Highers as they've always done?

inthered

Isn't it the case that English is covered under the literacy requirement, as is Maths under the numeracy one?

Not quite. Although it looked that way for a while, it was decided that literacy would still be assessed within English and numeracy would still be assessed within maths. We all still have a responsibility for developing both, and HWB, though! 

[edited by: halfajack at 22:19 (GMT 0) on 12-12-2012]

It is a potential 'train-wreck' in the making; driven by MR and the SNP, so we know who to blame when it happens. And, English and Maths should be good Highers to get in theory. However, Maths in particular has content more suitable to the 19th century rather than the 21st. No set theory, logic, formal proof, matrices, number bases, machine arithmetic, etc. all of which are required in the application of maths to Computing Science.
Computing Science by contrast has significantly improved and updated the content of Higher so that any pupil, having studied that, could slip easily into a modern FE course in the same field. The problem of course is that many schools have effectively got rid of Computing Science staff and so are in the process of killing the goose that could lay the golden egg.

While I agree that matrices probably have a place in Higher Maths, the question is what you would displace to make way for them. Most of the Higher course is essential basic algebra, trigonometry and calculus. It would be rather like cutting time on grammar in English because the pupils don't have a good enough appreciation of Burns to study Scottish Literature at university. The current content is a bare minimum for studying Physics or Engineering and already falls well short of what an A-Level maths student will cover (despite the latter covering some combination of statistics, mechanics or decision maths too). We already miss out product rule, quotient rule, integration by parts, binomial expansion, arithmetic and geometric series.

halfajack

Anyone unsure what will happen to the brighter pupils who want to stay at school until S6? Sure, the middle/below average will continue to use the opportunity to progress through levels but what about those who achieve five highers in fifth year then have no Nats in other subjects to take forward? Is it part of the plan to discourage more able pupils from staying on in S6? Would mean less teachers are required.

Crash Highers? Or AH.

BillyBobJoe

It would be rather like cutting time on grammar in English because the pupils don't have a good enough appreciation of Burns to study Scottish Literature at university..

We did that years ago. Have you not noticed everyone complaining about standards of written English. Amusingly, the Scottish Government and SQA have created a set text list which includes Burns so your statement is near enough fact.