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I have moved down sets for everything

So in year 8, I did really well in most of my end of year exams, however, maths is the only one I didn't do so well on, I got a 57% score, my school is in the Star academies, but I won't specify, my school doesn't have enough teachers for maths English and science to take place at the same time, so we have these things called 'bands' Band A is set 1 and 2, Band B is set 3,4,5, I was in band A last year, and you can never be in both bands at the same time, you go up to set 2 for something, you go up for everything, vice versa, for some reason, despite me doing well in my end of year exams I flopped only maths and now I have gone to set 3 for everything, such a nasty surprise, I really want to get back up but it is near impossible, all my teachers don't know what happened, this moving down has caused me so much stress and depression, I just think about most of my friends in Band A, and how good teacher they have, I am begging for some advice, for some reason, I seem to be middle of the pack in every class that I am in, I'm am in Y9, only Y10 and Y11, Band oA get to do more advanced subjects, I feel lots of opportunities slipping away from me, I won't get to do triple science, please, I am in tears writing this, please help me, please I beg you, I want to be able to reach my full potential, if anyone has any advice please share, I already spoke to my teachers and they just say they don't know what happened
(edited 3 years ago)
Original post by Jonniewobble
So in year 8, I did really well in most of my end of year exams, however, maths is the only one I didn't do so well on, I got a 57% score, my school is in the Star academies, but I won't specify, my school doesn't have enough teachers for maths English and science to take place at the same time, so we have these things called 'bands' Band A is set 1 and 2, Band B is set 3,4,5, I was in band A last year, and you can never be in both bands at the same time, you go up to set 2 for something, you go up for everything, vice versa, for some reason, despite me doing well in my end of year exams I flopped only maths and now I have gone to set 3 for everything, such a nasty surprise, I really want to get back up but it is near impossible, all my teachers don't know what happened, this moving down has caused me so much stress and depression, I just think about most of my friends in Band A, and how good teacher they have, I am begging for some advice, for some reason, I seem to be middle of the pack in every class that I am in, I'm am in Y9, only Y10 and Y11, Band oA get to do more advanced subjects, I feel lots of opportunities slipping away from me, I won't get to do triple science, please, I am in tears writing this, please help me, please I beg you, I want to be able to reach my full potential, if anyone has any advice please share, I already spoke to my teachers and they just say they don't know what happened

surely you can move back into band A? sorry if i am misinterpreting what you are saying, but if your maths score was a one-off, you can get into a higher set for your next test?
some student got swapped out with me and three others, so spots in band a are likely full, it's gonna be REALLY hard to snag someone's spot, and they are likely there to stay, btw I consistently did bad in maths in year 8, I literally got a 10% so 5/50 on one test, teacher literally made me retake it, retake I got 21/50, it was a hard test, I was slowly improving throught the year, until I guess my improvement too slow
Original post by Jonniewobble
some student got swapped out with me and three others, so spots in band a are likely full, it's gonna be REALLY hard to snag someone's spot, and they are likely there to stay, btw I consistently did bad in maths in year 8, I literally got a 10% so 5/50 on one test, teacher literally made me retake it, retake I got 21/50, it was a hard test, I was slowly improving throught the year, until I guess my improvement too slow

sets don't matter at all. just grind for the gcses- who cares about sets if you could be getting 9s and 8s for GCSE if you put the work in?
yeah I know but I don't want to say high school was a bad experience,
besides higher sets get to do more advanced subject, which in turn will give them more potential, in my current sets, there are a bunch of idiots who ruin everything, constantly try to be tardy and just hold up the class
Original post by Jonniewobble
besides higher sets get to do more advanced subject, which in turn will give them more potential, in my current sets, there are a bunch of idiots who ruin everything, constantly try to be tardy and just hold up the class

If the higher sets’ course differs from yours, definitely talk to your teachers :smile:
Original post by Jonniewobble
besides higher sets get to do more advanced subject, which in turn will give them more potential, in my current sets, there are a bunch of idiots who ruin everything, constantly try to be tardy and just hold up the class

i think you just need to take matters into your own hands. they will learn these advanced subjects, but how would this affect their GCSE performance?
focus on doing well on topics that are required for gcse- i was in low sets as well (especially for english and science), and my teachers weren't any help either- so i put the effort in and achieved the grades i wanted. and you can definitely do it too.
they just say they don't know what happened, I was suddenly put in the bottom set for IT or as you might know it computing, only top 30 kids get to do computer science, rest do IT, I'm not asking to be in CS, I just wanna be able to reach my full potential
yeah I definitely am gonna go for it, sucks to be dropped down from set 1 and 2to 3 and a few 4s, but none of the revision techniques I'm using are working, I don't think all nighters are gonna work,
Original post by Jonniewobble
So in year 8, I did really well in most of my end of year exams, however, maths is the only one I didn't do so well on, I got a 57% score, my school is in the Star academies, but I won't specify, my school doesn't have enough teachers for maths English and science to take place at the same time, so we have these things called 'bands' Band A is set 1 and 2, Band B is set 3,4,5, I was in band A last year, and you can never be in both bands at the same time, you go up to set 2 for something, you go up for everything, vice versa, for some reason, despite me doing well in my end of year exams I flopped only maths and now I have gone to set 3 for everything, such a nasty surprise, I really want to get back up but it is near impossible, all my teachers don't know what happened, this moving down has caused me so much stress and depression, I just think about most of my friends in Band A, and how good teacher they have, I am begging for some advice, for some reason, I seem to be middle of the pack in every class that I am in, I'm am in Y9, only Y10 and Y11, Band oA get to do more advanced subjects, I feel lots of opportunities slipping away from me, I won't get to do triple science, please, I am in tears writing this, please help me, please I beg you, I want to be able to reach my full potential, if anyone has any advice please share, I already spoke to my teachers and they just say they don't know what happened

my story is literally the exact same but i was in set one for everything, and after i got moved down to set 4 for everything and still now to this day i didnt get moved up, i hate my **** life
Original post by Mike Dems
my story is literally the exact same but i was in set one for everything, and after i got moved down to set 4 for everything and still now to this day i didnt get moved up, i hate my **** life

Now I realised that these sets don't matter, all that matters is passing your GCSES, i doubt your employer would really care about your sets
Original post by Jonniewobble
Now I realised that these sets don't matter, all that matters is passing your GCSES, i doubt your employer would really care about your sets

i was fine in set 1 whyyyyy was i moved down serfuhedsfds, welp ill take it
It does suck, but hey, we shouldn't let this drag us down on life right
Original post by Jonniewobble
It does suck, but hey, we shouldn't let this drag us down on life right

yeah that is true, and my parents are very disappointed in me for being in those classes :frown:, extremely disappointed. but they were happy when i was in set 1
Original post by Jonniewobble
So in year 8, I did really well in most of my end of year exams, however, maths is the only one I didn't do so well on, I got a 57% score, my school is in the Star academies, but I won't specify, my school doesn't have enough teachers for maths English and science to take place at the same time, so we have these things called 'bands' Band A is set 1 and 2, Band B is set 3,4,5, I was in band A last year, and you can never be in both bands at the same time, you go up to set 2 for something, you go up for everything, vice versa, for some reason, despite me doing well in my end of year exams I flopped only maths and now I have gone to set 3 for everything, such a nasty surprise, I really want to get back up but it is near impossible, all my teachers don't know what happened, this moving down has caused me so much stress and depression, I just think about most of my friends in Band A, and how good teacher they have, I am begging for some advice, for some reason, I seem to be middle of the pack in every class that I am in, I'm am in Y9, only Y10 and Y11, Band oA get to do more advanced subjects, I feel lots of opportunities slipping away from me, I won't get to do triple science, please, I am in tears writing this, please help me, please I beg you, I want to be able to reach my full potential, if anyone has any advice please share, I already spoke to my teachers and they just say they don't know what happened

So in my school we have quarterly assessments (Q1, Q2, Q3, Q4) and basically Q1 and Q3 arent very important but Q2 and Q4, you can move sets and stuff. Anyway, in year 7, i started off in set 1 but, in Q2, due to a horrible maths, RE and geography score, I moved down to set 2. My mum was really mad. But i ended up preferring set 2 to set 1 and after Q4, i stayed in set 2 for year 8. Right now, i am in the middle of my Q2s (Q2 week) and i just had my science exam and im not sure how i did on it. I am really scared bc i have my maths exam tmrw (im getting so much better at maths now) but I have my english exam the day after and i am super scared bc my english teacher gets distracted really easily and we end up not learning anything and our class gets no work done. in our english Q1, the average score for my class was 50% so the grade boundary was lowered bc everyone did so badly. We have to write an analytical paragraph and a letter for the exam and i cant remember anything bc we havent been taught anything. My mum said if i move down to set 3, she will take away my phone and all my sports. I literally just had a full on panic attack before writing this. What should i tell my mum if i fail?
Original post by caraisontop
So in my school we have quarterly assessments (Q1, Q2, Q3, Q4) and basically Q1 and Q3 arent very important but Q2 and Q4, you can move sets and stuff. Anyway, in year 7, i started off in set 1 but, in Q2, due to a horrible maths, RE and geography score, I moved down to set 2. My mum was really mad. But i ended up preferring set 2 to set 1 and after Q4, i stayed in set 2 for year 8. Right now, i am in the middle of my Q2s (Q2 week) and i just had my science exam and im not sure how i did on it. I am really scared bc i have my maths exam tmrw (im getting so much better at maths now) but I have my english exam the day after and i am super scared bc my english teacher gets distracted really easily and we end up not learning anything and our class gets no work done. in our english Q1, the average score for my class was 50% so the grade boundary was lowered bc everyone did so badly. We have to write an analytical paragraph and a letter for the exam and i cant remember anything bc we havent been taught anything. My mum said if i move down to set 3, she will take away my phone and all my sports. I literally just had a full on panic attack before writing this. What should i tell my mum if i fail?

could you try using youtube videos to learn how to write the paragraph and the letter?
Youtube channels like Mr Everything English, Mr Salles, Mr Bruff, and there are many more. You can also find youtube channels for other subjects, like The GCSE Maths Tutor for maths.
At my school, we learn a structure called TEAL for the paragraph.
Topic sentence (a sentence about what you will be talking about in your paragraph)
Evidence (so a quote)
Analysis
Link (how your analysis links to the topic sentence)
You should be able to find more information about paragraphs online and on youtube.
You should try to talk to your mum, and I know that it might be very difficult and she might end up taking everything away, but you need to make her understand the situation you’re in. I’m so sorry about how she’s reacting to the situation.
Good luck, I think you can get past this, you’ll do great on your gcses, you’re only in year 9 :smile:
(edited 4 months ago)
You are still relatively early on in your courses and if you evidence to your teachers and their respective department heads that you're capable as a student they'll put you into an advanced set, but the only way that's going to happen is if you put in the hard work and boost your grades. I assure you the people you're competing with for places in these top sets are not working as hard as you think, and you can quite easily reassert yourself if you study effectively.

I strongly advise you research effective study techniques and ensure you're using a positive mix of active recall and spaced repition in the run-up to your quarterly exams so that you know the content. If you learn everything they teach you in class alongside whatever is listed in your textbooks, there's nothing they can throw at you which will lower your grades -- just make sure you understand the content to the best of your ability when it comes to things like science and aren't just memorising it.

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