KING EDWARD VII BY SUBJECT - PART 3

ENGLISH LANGUAGE - GRADE D
ENGLISH LITERATURE - GRADE E

I’d been average at best ever since the first day I set foot in school and it didn’t get any better at King Edward VII. One day I missed a lesson due to illness and I had to do the days work in isolation during the next lesson (the closest thing to an exam situation when I usually produce my best work). Mrs Locke later commented that was the best work that I had ever done. However I still only got a Grade D for it, I knew then that my best wasn’t good enough to get a C grade so I almost gave up trying. I didn’t like the teacher Mrs Locke and I also disagreed with some aspects
of the course. Writing poems contributed to 10% of the final grade, I fail to see how this is relevant to everyday life.

I got on far better with the English Literature teacher Mrs Shaw a lot better, unfortunately you have to be a good reader to get far in that subject and I was average at most.

Report extracts

He is sometimes vague about deadlines but is keeping up with classwork.

There are flashes of imagination in Matthew’s work but he does not develop ideas fully.

PHYSICAL EDUCATION - GRADE D

It was never my strong point but I enjoyed physical education more at King Edward VII than anywhere else. You had a choice in the sports that you were assessed on so that meant unsuitable sports (like Rugby) and sports I hated (Cricket) were played a lot less which was great. There was also a theory side to the subject which was what could best be described as sports science. I liked this and was a bit disappointed not to get a grade C.

Report

Matthew has made a very good start to this course. He participated regularly, he worked at the skills and I feel he has gained some self confidence. A very good start Matthew well done.

INTEGRATED HUMANITIES - GRADE E

At Castle Rock humanities was history, geography and religious studies taught as 3 separate subjects. At King Edward VII it seemed to be a jumbled up collection of random unrelated topics. Africa in the media, who killed JFK ?, should boxing be banned ? and a fictitious murder mystery called “who killed Mrs Butler ?” were titles that I can remember.

As far as I’m concerned that’s not a proper subject. So much so that I often wondered what was the point in doing it in the first place. A friend once quizzed the teacher on the use of a G.C.S.E in integrated humanities. Her reply was that it’s still a G.C.S.E pass, I would say that you can use that argument to justify teaching almost anything in school. My lack of interest and the fact it was 100% coursework were the main reasons I got a low grade.

TECH GRAPHICS - GRADE G

At Castle Rock “design” was the separate subjects of woodwork, metalwork, art, ceramics and home economics. I was below average at all of them!!!! At King Edward VII we had to pick one subject off a list to do for G.C.S.E. I can’t remember the exact list but I would probably have been better off doing textiles as I later went on to spend 7 years in the textiles industry but obviously I wasn’t to know that at the time.

I was a bit indifferent to design anyway so as long as I wasn’t doing art I didn’t really care. Dad advised me to do technical drawing/graphics. I could see his reasoning behind it as technical drawing is one of the few subjects at school that could be directly used to gain employment later in life.

Unfortunately he overlooked one undeniable fact, I was absolutely, totally useless at it despite having a good teacher in Mr Barrett.


MY COMMENTS

Overall I got 4 grade “C and above”, 3 grade “D” and 3 “E and below”. I’m not sure if to look at his as good or bad. I underachieved in terms of my ability but given the events of the education system and the horrible time I had at Castle Rock I did fairly well. I would have liked more control over what I was learning as it was obvious by the end of the first year that I was getting nowhere with English Literature, Integrated humanities and Tech Graphics. Surely it would have been better to abandon those subjects and devote that time into turning the 3 grade “D”s into “C and above”

I still had the grades to be able to stay on into further education.....................