KS3 GCSE preparation

by Jane Wade,
Teacher of Religious Education

No-one can afford to wait for Year 9 to start teaching those vital GCSE skills, but we don't want to scare our students by overwhelming them with a full on GCSE just weeks into Year 7.

 

We take a typical GCSE question and adapt it to suit the KS3 curriculum so that they develop exam skills but with knowledge that is appropriate for them.  They might, therefore, receive the 12 mark question - 

'Baptism is the most important sacrament.'  Evaluate this statement. 

 

We break the answer down into the paragraphs an examiner would expect to see and discuss as a class,the kind of ideas that we would put into each paragraph.  After this, each student is assigned just one paragraph and plans an answer before copying their complete version onto a sheet of A4 paper.  Students then put up their paragraphs on the board and annotate other people's paragraphs with positive comments and advice for improvement.  Students then take someone else's paragraph and rewrite it with the suggested improvements.

 

We've found that this is a much less frightening approach to GCSE questions that involves students trusting and supporting each other.