So this is the first week of nearly two weeks off timetable for us while the whole secondary section of the school from Year7-Year10 sit end of year exams for every subject. Year 11 and 13 have left and Year 12 have just returned from study leave so their normal lessons are resuming and any of the Year 11 students who are returning to Sixth form have started their induction.
My question is are end of year exams a good or bad idea? I haven’t worked in a school before that collapses the timetable, however I have worked in one where they don’t have any exams at all and one that had exams but they were carried out during the normal lessons.
At the moment students are sitting exams in two set timetabled blocks each day and actually get to go home at lunchtime while the teachers start to mark them. The exams are carried out like real exams in real exam conditions and the students are taking them very seriously. All of the students I have spoken to today are very positive about the exams and have carried out lots of revision for them, would this have happened if it wasn’t taken as seriously and carried out in lessons? Would students normally talk so positive about exams? I asked some of them why? The main answer was that they could prove what they had learnt in the year and were looking forward to the results.
I can also see the benefits of students getting used to the format and certainly being more calm and less stressed about exams when they get to GCSE as they have been doing it for years.
What do you think? Do you think this is a good idea? Do you do it? What do your students think?