What happens if coursework is too long?

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ur geography's a 100 pages long!! ok, wow. we didnt get told any limit for our geography but what can you have been writing about? its not that interesting ... i got an A* mine was approx 20 pages...

Reply 21

monkee

Charlurr

Double post - meh.

Coursework in GCSE doesn't really count for much of your overall grade so if you don't get A*, it's not the end of the world ^_^

'Spose not...I am predicted VERY high though...meep. I can't do Geography mapwork either, so it's important I do well on the coursework.

Reply 22

callum9999

monkee

28 or 29 out of 30. But it took him ages to mark, poor soul...lol!

Then you should get a similar mark. As I said earlier, appeal if you don't.

I don't understand how you could of written so much though!

Reply 23

monkee

callum9999

Then you should get a similar mark. As I said earlier, appeal if you don't.

I don't understand how you could of written so much though!

I don't! It was on rivers though, and ALOT of the pages were taken up by graphs.

Reply 24

Charlurr

I was predicted VERY high also. And may I once again say that even though I didn't get A*'s in my coursework (mostly due to the discovery of binge drinking and cigarettes), I still got them overall. So coursework is not that important, considering most of it isn't even worth 10% of the course.

Reply 25

monkee

I suppose what I really want to know is, do they do the counting-up-to-the-limit thing? Because the way my Geography is laid out, that means I'll only get a few marks. I'm on AQA A. Furthermore, I'm worried my coursework is DRASTICALLY going to go down...I should be fine on the Human paper, the Physical paper is something else (lol) but obviously I don't have a fighting chance if my coursework gets plunged to a C.

Reply 26

alex_hk90

monkee

Because this has been a problem with a lot of my subjects - I didn't know there was a specific limit. I'd been told to cut some down but I didn't know how so I left it to be on the safe side. Help!

When I did GCSEs (a couple of years ago) there were guidelines for the maximum word count in courseworks but no penalty for going over. My Geography was about 15000 words, History over 20000 in total and ICT (Short Course) was around 200 pages. I got (very high) A*s for all of them. So as long as things haven't changed too much you should be fine. :smile:

However, my brother's doing the same History specification and I think they now have an official word limit. I wouldn't be surprised if it was due to schools like ours submitting ridiculously long courseworks. :redface:

In History everyone was expected to be writing over 20 pages for one of them. :s-smilie:

The History department unsurprisingly got the best marks in the school.

Reply 27

badger stripes

monkee

'Spose not...I am predicted VERY high though...meep. I can't do Geography mapwork either, so it's important I do well on the coursework.

I really couldnt do map work either ... hmm, i suggest that you try taking out paragraphs first if u want to reduce it, instead of looking through and taking out set words...

its good practice or else ur gunna struggle wen it comes to AS ...

Reply 28

monkee

alex_hk90

In History everyone was expected to be writing over 20 pages for one of them. :s-smilie:

The History department unsurprisingly got the best marks in the school.

You see, I'm not worried about my History coursework. I did a lot, but that was thoroughness, and I didn't go particularly mad. But I will admit...my Geography coursework story is something I'm going to have to tell to the grandkids.

Reply 29

ch0c0h01ic

Sorry, i didn't take the time to read everybody elses posts but it does depend on the coursework details.

Worst case scenario:
The examiner can refuse to mark your coursework
The examiner can refuse to mark and/or give you credit for words outside of your word-limit
The examiner can deduct marks for exceeding your word limit

Go back to your teacher and ask what the word limit is and the threshold (ie; the amount of words you are allowed to go above or below the word limit without penalty). It is normally 10% or 100 words. You need to rectify your coursework, leaving it and getting a ****e mark because you couldn't be bothered to go back and cut stuff out is a complete waste of your time and effort.

Reply 30

monkee

badger stripes

I'm doing a non-coursework subject so I'll be fine with Physics...Maths I'm trying NOT to do statistics so I don't have the same problem. And I'm not taking my waffle subject, Geography, for AS. But thanks anyway!

Reply 31

moody28028

For one of the enlglish lit essays, a girl in my year wrote 18 pages. :eek:

Reply 32

Charlurr

If you go over the word count you only lose a maximum of two marks, in which you'll still have an A*. Stop worrying.

Reply 33

monkee

ch0c0h01ic

That's not the problem. The problem is we were told a few weeks ago that the marks stood as they'd been remarked and marked again by the head of department.

Edit: but I completely agree with you. I'm redoing my language coursework because I know from experience if you do it with language pieces you'll probably made loads of mistakes.

Reply 34

alex_hk90

monkee

We did AQA A Geography at our school and people had courseworks at around 100 pages, none of them were deducted any marks. And I don't think that has changed as my brother did it this year and his was quite long as well. If you're unsure check the specification on the exam board website.

Reply 35

ch0c0h01ic

monkee

Well it depends on what examining board you're going through but in my day (about 5 years back) the word limit for geo coursework was about 2500 words, but this did exclude wording in diagrams and tables so you could be a bit creative if you needed to conceal the words, it might have changed by now though. And if i remember rightly we faced penalisation if we exceeded or didn't reach the word limit.

Reply 36

monkee

ch0c0h01ic

I'm on AQA. Is that bad?

Edit: to make things clear, there's nothing I can do about it now, I don't think; I'm trying to figure out how to recuperate marks, as in have an idea what I've got to get in the exam to still get an A* or at least an A.

Reply 37

callum9999

monkee

Im not sure if you are talking about AS there but there is no maths coursework at this level (whether you do stats or not)

Reply 38

monkee

Yeah, it's AQA A. I don't know what the procedure is as to whether they've been sent off or not.

Reply 39

BurningSnowman

monkee

I don't know how similarly they treat GCSEs, but I had English Language A2 coursework submitted to AQA far over the word 'limit' in the spec. in January, and got full UMS.

I think you're unlikely to be penalised much/at all unless the length seems ridiculous to the examiner. But rock the exam just in case. :p: