[Mark K]

We have two teachers delivering the source and essay papers at the same time, this means that neither of us get through the course in time to take the January exam.

What tends to happen is that all students either hit or beat their target grades in the Italian essay paper but about half the group will crash and burn on the New England Source Exam. However, we find that the Russian 100 years Themes exam at A2 is so easy that those who fail the sources can spend most of their time preparing to re-take in the January and will get their grade even if they have to re-take again in June.

Thanks very much to everyone who has posted the hints and tips for this F964 paper, I teach F963 but the AOs are the same. This paper is a constant thorn in my side any further advice would be massively appreciated!

[Mark H.]

Has anyone who contacted OCR about the AS results received a reply yet? I e-mailed them promptly and followed it up with a written letter but haven't even received an e-mail acknowledgement from them, which is unusual from previous experience.

[Mark H.]

To be fair, I have now received a written holding reply from OCR. I await a proper detailed response as well as the results of the remarks we have requested.

This post has been edited by Mark H.: 07 September 2009 - 05:24 AM

[Jenjane]

we have had 3/8 remarks back on our courseowrk at A2 and all 3 have gone up. waiting for next 5 with hope: apparently if 8 change then they do the whole lot again!
Got photocopies of the work with examiner's comments. Especially poor copying means this is particularly difficult to read....
Jane

[JohnP]

Some excellent advice on here which I for one will attempt to incorporate into my planning and department briefings.

For what it's worth I would not take an exam in January for AS students as it tends to either dent their confidence or inflate it.
Build them up slowly over the year and nurture their confidence whilst seeking to stretch them and all the time increase their reading, skills and general workload. I find that strategy will and does pay dividends.

[MrsRH]

Wish you could convince our SMT of this JohnP! We HAVE managed to convince them not to make us enter students for Jan exams (resits only) but they are making us teach all one unit before Xmas and the the other one Jan to April/May

[awarrington]

In light of peoples concerns about this unit, I have created what is called a 'Ning'. This is basically a social networking site for people to upload and share resources on this Unit: F964.

Although it has been created for America and the Cold War in Asia topic, I would be happy for anybody who teaches this unit (F964) to share good practice, i.e resources, techniques they use for promoting source skills etc.

The 'Ning' can be found at: http://ocrhistoryf964.ning.com/

It will ask you to create a username and password and then you are free to use it. This has only just been created so I will be uploading my resources very soon and it would be great if other people could do the same. I have made this on the recommendation of a geography teacher at our school who has found it extremely useful.

Hope people find it helpful.

[Mark H.]

A centre I am in contact with has received its first three remarks for the Document paper back. Two of them went up by 20 percent!

This post has been edited by Mark H.: 08 September 2009 - 04:24 PM

[Mark H.]

I have now received the remarks I requested for a sample of 7 candidates on F964. One went up two grades, three one grade and three stayed at the same grade. I have still not received a proper reply to my original letter of concern sent soon after the results were originally published.

[Jenjane]

Mark H., on 16 September 2009 - 08:44 PM, said:

I have now received the remarks I requested for a sample of 7 candidates on F964. One went up two grades, three one grade and three stayed at the same grade. I have still not received a proper reply to my original letter of concern sent soon after the results were originally published.

We also only had a couple of changes, however, we seem to have said something useful as they now have decided to remark the whole chohort of coursework! Watch this space!
Jane

[Mark H.]

I eventually received a reply to my letter. It was perfectly pleasant and polite (in contrast to the rather condescending tone OCR have sometimes adopted in the past) but was utterly non-committal, understanding my disappointment with the F964 results but arguing that there could be a variety of reasons for the low and out of expected rank order marks. Despite the fact that the letter was dated after we had received our re-mark results it made no comment about these, notably the fact that 4 out of 7 had gone up a grade or more, and one went down nearly a grade, clearly implying that there was something wrong with the original marking. I am now awaiting the results of a further 5 remarks.
I would also like to thank people who posted tips and advice. I have gratefully adopted some for my own classes but to be honest it's pretty much what we already do, and have been doing for years, on the Document paper for the old OCR Specification. I don't wish to sound complacent but in my view the main problem is the quality of the marking, probably not helped by the opacity of the mark scheme. I am by no means the only person to have reached this conclusion.

This post has been edited by Mark H.: 24 September 2009 - 05:23 AM

[LiamB]

One huge problem with F964 is the fact that so much of the course is left out of the examination. My students sat the 1945-76 Vietnam course and the whole paper was on the Tet Offensive.
In F964, there is no choice of question or topic and if the students have not fully revised the bit of the syllabus the examiners decide to focus on shame on them I know, but we do live in the real world)then they are stuffed. Do other AS modules in other subjects have this kind of over-selectivity with course content and narrowness of examination? I do think that examination outght to be a little braoder brush in its approach.

[Mark H.]

To be fair, this was also true of the AS document paper on the old OCR Specification. However, because we're now down to two modules, with somewhat more content on each, the lack of question choice and narrowness of focus does seem to loom larger.

This post has been edited by Mark H.: 24 September 2009 - 05:28 AM

[emp]

cj.ayres, on 23 August 2009 - 02:11 PM, said:

johnwayne, on Aug 23 2009, 12:10 PM, said:

hi everyone - my colleague's paper f964 did very well but the contrast to my paper f961 was terrible; e.g. a grade B on F964 and an E/U on the F961? very erratic, and these are all very good students. Will be asking for remarks as well.
Am I right in stating you can't see the students papers first if you are going for a remark? thanks.

Hi Johnwayne

Unfortunatley you can't view papers before a remark - that would be too easy!

Can I be cheeky and ask you for some advice on F964 as I really don't know where we went wrong.
Thanks

Hello,
We asked for photocopies of the scripts so we could decide if a re-mark was in order. They took so long to arrive that we had to ask for re-marks 'in the dark' - usual inexplicable outcome - one wnt up 12 marks - 5 stayed the same & one went down 8 marks! No explanation for this was given!
Elaine

[Mark H.]

OCR have just posted the June 2009 Examiners' Report on their website (http://www.ocr.org.uk/download/rep_09/ocr_35212_rep_09_gce_jun.pdf)
Given the problems that a number of centres seem to have had with their results for the F963 and F964 Source papers, I'd be interested in any reactions to the examiners' views, especially the very detailed general comments on both papers on pages 26-35 of the Report.

This post has been edited by Mark H.: 11 October 2009 - 07:47 AM