These are some notes for the guidance of Hackney primary teachers considering taking GCSE this year with AQA.
GCSE Requirements Summarised.
1. Foundation Tier, Grades G to C. Higher Tier, Grades D to A*. Higher tier chiefly requires ability to put verbs into one past and one future tense - eg
Tengo que trabajar
Tuvé que trabajar
Voy a tener que trabajar
Almost all the writing you do is in the first person.
2. Topics
· My world
· Holiday Time and Travel
· Work and Lifestyle
· The young person in society.
3. Components
Speaking. 8-10mins Foundation – role play, presentation of 30-90 seconds, questions, two to three topics. You are allowed 10 mins prep time – ie you can make some notes and speak from them.
Listening test. 25%, 30 mins foundation, 40mins higher. Includes preparation time. Can be from any part of the syllabus, but mostly short items. The main difficulty with higher is probably the speed.
Reading test. Mostly short items, and often answers are ticking boxes.
Writing. Three pieces of coursework – total 250-200 words foundation, total 4-500 words higher. Three different themes (these can be the same themes you choose for speaking). Controlled conditions for at least one of these. You may complete a draft, which will be returned to you with an official comment sheet – you can then work on the draft in the light of the sheet, and complete the coursework assessment. (QCA, p86 has directions, and these can be used for planning)
Game Plan
For both tiers, you need to be able to construct simple sentences in Spanish in speaking and writing, and to be able to recognise them in listening and reading. The listening and reading will include some irrelevant information in order to try to confuse you - this is not my idea, and I think it is educationally unsound.
You need
Some sentence hubs, positive and negative, that you can build sentences around.
Practice in listening, to get used to speed
A clear plan to build up skills on your selected topics
A buddy.
15 minutes protected time each day, at your discretion.
