Cheating in Controlled Assessments

This link will take you to a form where you can register for email updates so that you automatically receive information on anything new or important.
http://aqa.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/aqa.cfg/php/enduser/doc_serve.php?2=CSI_Eng_EmailAlert_Apr20_Generic2010_WebReg_WF

There is also AskAQA which lets you post a question very quickly.

 

Twilight session as mentioned upthread.

 

I repeat - news to me. I will check and get back to you.

 

Thank-you, regents. Much appreciated.

 

I am a teacher and have been recieving all the email update- I knew about the changes and I haven't been given any info from my HOD due to a transition within the dept. Furthermore, the changes they did make werent major ones that wouldnt really affect your teaching as -like others have said- they were more like guidelines.
I would also like to add that if you email AQA they are brilliant at getting back to you. Weve always had a prompt response to any questions. For example, I emailed all my CA questions to check they were ok and had instant, detailed feedback.
With regards to CA and cheating- I treat it just like an exam.

 

Thanks for this affirmation raindrops
Gruoch - from the horse's mouth today (well the senior subject manager for English anyway) - no changes to the English 3a CA. Your students can use film/audio/stage versions of the texts as long as they also refer to the written version.
Hope this puts your mind at rest. Feel free to pm me if you want to discuss your CA further.

 

I honestly wouldn't consider the notes issue as having "rules" at all. The one page thing was meant to be guidance as to what the board thought would be useful for the students. Notes which are too long or detailed will simply be self-penalising. Don't worry about what others are doing and stick to your guns and principles - your students will be the ones who ultimately benefit (not to mention your results!)

 

What I don't understand about the whole 'self-penalising' idea is that all advice from various sessions/twilights etc is that it won't lose the students marks... !
Hate being at guinea-pig stage with this, I'm sure it will all work out in the end, but don't want the students to miss out on valuable marks/opportunities because of confusion.

 

I assume what you mean by this is that students won't be penalised by the board for having overlong notes? All the evidence from trial CAs and now from the first lot of real ones is that students who have very closely written, overly long or detailed plans do not produce good calibre CAs because they get bogged down in the notes and don't have enough time to use them productively.
Like you, I'm sure it will all work out in the end.

And to the previous poster who referred to students writing the CA at home then producing a very detailed plan in class - if they can memorise their essay well enough there's little anyone can do but I really can't see this being feasible by any but the most exceptional students, who don't need to do that anyway. Encouraging independent self-study is partly what CA is about so by all means let them get on with researching etc at home - you can't stop them once they know the title.

 

Under the old guidelines some schools interpreted "should not" as something that could be allowed. In the JQC controlled assessment guidelines www.jcq.org.uk/attachments/published/1125/ICA%2011-12.PDF section 4.5 says that students must not be given credit for support given and any support must be recorded. So I suppose if you know of a school that is giving assistance to students, then I would then report them to their exam board so they can expect this help to be written in the student's records and chase the school up if it is not.

 

As a Governor, I am absolutely horrified that an exam which forms:
1. One of the most important exams on a child's CV, and
2. One of the most important exams in a school's reputation,
Is not secure enough in it's procedures and advise to be sure that :
1. Training and information so thorough that there is no chance of misunderstanding by those expected to execute the assessment process,
2. That cheating is minimised through a robust system of rules, invigilation and disciplinary for those found in breach, and
3. That exam grades awarded are a fair reflection of ability. (I question how an experienced teacher can suddenly be surprised by Grade C's now not being C's - there are less than 10 grades. An experienced teacher should be able to see Grade C work when it exists)

Should this system not have been piloted before going live?
Is this exam currently fit for purpose?

 

CAs have no grades as such. There are, in the results, grades A*-U but only 6 mark bands.
You work it out.

 

So, AQA are saying, the work quality can be described as 1,2,3,4,5,6. However, in the end they give students A*- U (and have done since time in memorial). Why on earth did AQA - when faced with a new system - not create descriptors for 8 groups? As a layperson that smacks of wanting a lack of transparancy (for whatever reason).
It also to me, as a Governor, appears that no one can actually say what qualities you need to be a C grade student over a D grade student (or other grade boundries). The difference between a C and a D will be a vague line drawn somewhere in one of the mid-groups? How does the exam board substantiate this to the higher oversight board? The students are either competent or not competent and, therefore, before all this started the exam boards should have decided what that criteria was and ensured a split of group criteria for the competent (C) over the not competent enough (D). It ain't rocket science.
And quality learning. How many hours of quality teaching and learning are being wasted through this controlled assessment process?

 

Ah - you have spotted our dilemma that we have been griping and agonising over for months...

 

C for CAs Eng Lang Jan 2011 - 44, June - 53
C for CAs Eng Lit Jan 2011 - 22, June - 21
Note: these boundaries are freely available on the AQA web site. They are not in the secure section.

Hours to be spent on each element are also recommended on the AQA web site though I can't track it down at the moment.

 

Quite agree how much time is wasted through controlled assessment. We have to do controlled assessment in our English lessons as can not take students out of any other lessons and do not have the space in school for students to sit an assessment other than in English lessons. So a 4 hour Of Mice and Men sessions takes, 1 hour for notes (and I understood this to be one side of? A4 for WJEC, so how does Grouch say it is A3?) and then 4 hours is allowed for task. We have 60 minute lessons and can not really get a full 60 minutes per lesson, so we always end up taking one hour into two. So far I have lost 20 lessons taking time out for controlled assessment which means my teaching time for each unit seriously depleted and we are now struggling to teach poetry for the Shakespeare link in 2 weeks of lessons. To cap it all I then spend time checking who has missed the assessment for illness etc. and looking when they can do this without them being taken out of an English lesson as we have moved onto the next teaching time for the next assessment.
I also spend time teaching KS3 to draft work out and check, edit and improve before they hand in and then they get to Y10 and I tell them if they do draft anything I can't mark it as it is exam regulations. Absolutely fed up with the whole process to be honest. Rant over!!

 

I agree - you would think that whoever invented this labyrinthine system of assessment was not actually a serving teacher wouldn't you?
Ahem

 

Despite misgivings, I like CAs in the sense that you do them, they're done and it's over. I never found that happened with coursework. It always resurfaced in Y11 for improving, redrafting or whatever. But the marking, banding, grading fiasco is rubbish. As a school, we do CAs properly but I know of schools that are in the bottom half of the league tables who don't. I fear our results will not be good this year.

 

On an internal level, I do hope your subject link Governors understand this situation as I know from my experience, should results drop, then these underlying reasons for it after the event could possibly sound like a daft excuse coming from the SLT. Our school has brilliant, professional and loyal teaching staff and it pains me to predict a conversation on this, if results drop, which doesn't appreciate the difficult situation they have been under to do the best for the students.
So, it seems, grades have now been given thresholds, is that right? So, students who are now in year 11 know the grades for the CAs they did in year 10? (Hence Grauco's comment about the need for more CAs due to missed grades) Am I understanding this correctly?
There seems a big difference between C for CAs Eng Lang Jan 2011 - 44, June - 53. Were the questions in June 2011 really that much 'easier' to demnstrate English Language skills on that it required a 20% better mark for the same grade?
I'm still interested to hear from Regents re: my questions on the robustness of the training and disciplinary procedures which they have in place to ensure that the information and opportunity afforded to candidates is the same across the cohort, so there can be seen to be no advantage or disadvantage for candidates.

 

Hey. Guess what? I've an idea - let's have just examinations instead thus eradicating cheating and endless redrafts at a stroke. Too obvious???