In July we sketch out a rough plan for the year ahead before starting our academic year on the first Monday of August. This plan is all based on what the girls have asked to do and what they need to do (maths, English and Spanish are non-negotiable). We’ve dropped a few things compared to last year but we appear to have added a heck of a lot more!
The girls now have different interests and we want to encourage these as much as possible. This is slightly easier now as the girls can work more independently so I can jump between them on their different subjects. Where both girls are doing a subject, we’ll self-study as it’s worth the time investment I have to make. For subjects being done by one girl only, we’ll most probably get in a third party (but I’ll still be very involved as per usual!).
After doing her first GCSE last year (environmental management), and getting an A, Aggie is ready for the next challenge. Peggy is now starting her GCSE journey this year too. The girls want to do them so we’re supporting them in this. We’re doing the non-essential subjects first to ensure there is very low pressure on these early ones.
So, here’s a subject list of everything we’re planning to do in 2023/24. As to how much we’ll actually achieve on this list, I’ll let you know in June 2024!
Subjects done jointly
English – we’re going to kick off with a book study of Animal Farm using Twinkl resources as our base. We’re then going to do some Shakespeare (A Midsummer Night’s Dream I think) up to Christmas and some poetry analysis too. We’ll then see what the girls fancy doing after that. We’re going to add in some work on SPaG – we avoided this in KS2 but punctuation needs some attention now – and do quite a bit of writing for different audiences. I’ll be using Twinkl resources for most of this as their KS3 units of study have proved to be really good so far.
Maths – both girls are working at the same level in maths, although they do work at separate times on this subject. They’ll both continue to work through the CGP textbooks but this year we’re pushing along a lot more by combining year 8 and year 9 topics; the girls are ready for more of a challenge!
Sciences – we’ll keep working through the Activate KS3 books and do more hands-on experiments in chemistry. We’re going to do electricity, magnets and circuits using a new Twinkl workbook which has recently come out. It’s got lots of activities and some cross curricular topics too. We won’t necessarily do all of it; we’ll just see how the sessions roll….
Spanish GCSE to sit in June 2024 (self-study) – we’re having a big push in Spanish this year. The girls will be going to language schools in Malaga for a week and then in Mexico for three weeks to really work on those listening and speaking skills. We’ve tried various online courses for Spanish but we find them too slow. You need more than one lesson a week when learning a language. I was spending a lot of time supplementing the courses in between lessons so I’ve figured I may as well do it all myself! We’re therefore going it alone except for the language schools. We may use a local tutor to help with a final push for the speaking GCSE exam; we’ll see how we get on!
History – we’ll be continuing with the Aaron Wilkes book covering the period 1066-1558. We’ve got a third left of this to do before we’ll move onto book 2. Both girls will also be looking separately at additional eras: Aggie the World Wars and medicine through the ages, and Peggy Ancient Rome and Greece whilst doing GCSE Classical Civilisation (more on this below).
Forest School – we’ll most definitely be returning to the forest in September and will most likely be cooking more delicious things on the campfire.
Geography – we’ve not really done geography for a long time as Aggie was concentrating on Environmental Management GCSE and Peggy’s not been that bothered. This year though I’ve invested in some geography textbooks which we’ll dip in and out of. Both girls have been asking about weather (we’ve had a lot of weather talk in the UK in “summer”) so I think we’ll start there.
Sewing – the girls have both asked if we can learn how to make clothes this year (can you tell we’ve all been watching The Great British Sewing Bee?!). We’ve bought some patterns so we need to work out how to use them… I’ve found a local sewing school so we’re looking into a crash course with them to get us started.
Cooking – we’re going to try and do more of this this year and get the girls making full meals totally independently. We’ll also learn about food science and nutrition along the way too.
RE – we’re going to continue working through the main world religions (we’ve got Buddhism and Christianity left) and do more visits to places of worship. We’ll start off with Buddhism in September as Jake from Humanatees is running a six-week KS3 course and we really enjoyed his Islam one.
Computing – Dom is going to do some general computing sessions with both girls. There are some great lessons on National Oak Academy and he’ll also be using their sessions on online safety too.
Ancient Greek – at some point this year, we’re going to attempt some Ancient Greek together. It’s something none of us has done before but we like a challenge! I’ve found a great resource produced by Classics for All – Basil Batrakhos and the Mystery Letter – so we’ll work through that and see how far we get and if we enjoy it.
Subjects done separately
Agatha
Law – Aggie’s going to follow a five-week course run by Kate Law Tutoring on criminology. Kate also does sessions on law and citizenship so there’s more to do if Aggie enjoys this one.
History – Aggie is going to do a deep study of the history of medicine for a project fair in September. This is likely to be her thematic study for GCSE history so this will give her a head start. She’s also interested in crime and punishment through the ages so she may do this later in the year. She’ll also work on a few WW1/2 courses run by Humanatees throughout the year.
Sociology – Aggie is signed up to do the pre-GCSE Sociology course starting in September with Learn Laugh Play to give her a taste of a subject she thinks she’d like to take further.
Psychology GCSE to sit in June 2024 (with course) – Aggie is working her way through a pre-recorded course run by Survive Succeed Achieve. We’ve thoroughly enjoyed Charlotte’s Psychology 101 courses throughout last year so she was an easy choice for GCSE support.
Latin GCSE to sit in June 2025 (self-study) – we’ve pushed back this GCSE to 2025 as Aggie wants more time to get to grips with the language. She was starting to get stressed about finishing the textbooks in time which we most certainly don’t want. This subject definitely lends itself to a slow and steady approach.
Peggy
Classical Civilisation GCSE to sit in June 2024 (with course) – Peggy will be working towards this exam with the help of a pre-recorded course by Jake of Humanatees. I’ll be heavily involved with her studying though so I can give her plenty of support for her first GCSE.
Business studies GCSE to sit in June 2025 (self-study) – we’re working our way through the textbook for this alongside putting what we’re learning theory-wise into practice with Peggy’s new crochet business. The aim is by June 2025 to have both a GCSE and a thriving business – watch this space!
Latin – Peggy is going to give Latin a try this year. She’s not that enthusiastic about it but I think it’s a really important subject to do so I’m insisting she does this one – sorry Peggy! She absolutely loves learning about Ancient Rome so I’m really confident she’ll enjoy it and it will be so relevant to her classical civilisation studies.
German – Peggy decided earlier in the year that she wanted to learn German and she’s consistently stuck at it using Duolingo. We’ve got the KS3 German CGP books which she’ll work through alongside Duolingo. Dom is on hand to help her (after a little revision himself) as he did GCSE German back in the day. Peggy has said she’d like to go right up to GCSE level so she’s in this for the long haul.
Coding – Peggy is going to continue learning Python and we’ll add in some more computer science as this is a possible GCSE (it’s over to Dom on this one too!)
There’s the plan!
Both girls have checked through the list above and they’re both happy with what we have planned. As we’ve learned though, things change and things come up, so our plan is constantly evolving. We often look half-termly at what we’re actually going to cover under each subject. I don’t like to plan too far ahead as I’ve found planning can go unused as things change. We don’t work on every subject all the time; we’ll often rotate around the humanities. I regularly refer back to our plan though so I can be sure we’re covering as wide a range of knowledge and skills as possible.
We won’t have to book the girls onto the June 2024 GCSE exams until just before Christmas so we’ll check progress on these subjects before then. The girls are young and there is no need to sit GCSEs early if they’re not ready. The moment I get any whiff of too much stress or worry, we’ll reassess and re-schedule. Learning needs to be fun and enjoyable!
