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Post by Deleted on Oct 7, 2020 13:33:20 GMT
I didn't leave school just to have to do hard sums again. B grade 'O' Level maths, achieved in the 4th form, and that's where my involvement ended.
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Post by EspadaIII on Oct 7, 2020 13:39:25 GMT
That was pretty good a B in the 4th form. I think I only got a B in the 5th form. I did go onto Maths A-levels where I got a wonderful D.
Sometimes I think the teachers are to blame. I see it now with my daughter. Some subjects she really doesn't like but loves the teachers and gets good grades (French). Others she likes, but struggles because the teacher is naff (Chemistry).
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Post by Deleted on Oct 7, 2020 13:45:03 GMT
I think I got a bit lucky, in that the questions fell very much on the categories I was best at.
Now the confession. Doing 'O' Level in the 4th form meant I proceeded to do something called "Additional Maths" in the 5th form. Not sure if it was an official 'O' Level or some halfway house qualification to A Level. And I'm not sure because my result came in as "Ungraded - U". I clearly remember struggling hopelessly all year, and my teacher's exasperation building. She thought I was winding her up. But I wasn't, I was utterly flummoxed by everything. And I've resented having to do any bloody maths ever since.
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Post by EspadaIII on Oct 7, 2020 14:07:18 GMT
In a class of 27 doing English Literature at The Manchester Grammar School, 20 of us failed, with 15 getting a U. Cue post mortem on how supposedly bright lads could fail so miserably when the chosen works were The Merchant of Venice and 1984. I have never heard a satisfactory answer but one suspects the teacher was a pillock; as were many at the school at the time. Seemed to be employed for their wierd characters rather than any ability to teach.
Also reminds me of my first organic Chemistry lecturer at Birmingham University. An elderly (probably my age but in mental years in his 90s), fat, balding man in a three piece brown suit. He walked into the lecture theatre, didn't look at the assembled throng of eager students or even introduce himslef. He open a battered note book, opened his mouth and rading from the book said 'Alkanes'. He then spoke in a monotone for 55 minutes, closed the book and walked out. On October 6th 1983, 120 students looked at each other open mouthed and said "What the f***! was that". My degree is not in Chemistry from Birmingham University but Polymer Science and Technology from Manchester Met. A course that had people who knew how to teach and a department that did not rest on the laurels of a Noble prize winner from half a century earlier.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 7, 2020 14:16:29 GMT
15 'U's out of 27? I've never heard anything like that. Sounds like my good old Comprehensive was way better than that Grammar school. Blimey.
Not quite following your University history there - did you start doing Chemistry at Birmingham, give up and then move to Manchester Met?
My son's in the 5th form now and mentioned University for the first time unprompted this morning - he'd been looking into Medicine at Birmingham and what he'd need to achieve at A Level or Int Bacc to get there. Brum was my sister's university, but that was late 80s.
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WDB
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Post by WDB on Oct 7, 2020 15:13:15 GMT
Oh Bloody Hell Al! It's only maths! Only arithmetic really. Primary school stuff. |
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Post by Humph on Oct 7, 2020 15:41:45 GMT
Don't be too hard on him. I've never ceased to be amazed for example, by how many accountants there are who quite clearly can't count!
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Post by Deleted on Oct 7, 2020 16:01:04 GMT
Oh Bloody Hell Al! It's only maths! Only arithmetic really. Primary school stuff. I don't care what level it is. I'm 50 and I can't be bothered. I used to know it, I forgot it, I don't care. |
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Avant
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Post by Avant on Oct 7, 2020 16:40:05 GMT
Espada, I thought MGS was supposed to be one of the best schools academically in the country. It used to be direct-grant but was presumably fee-paying when you were there. It doesn't sound as if your parents got value for money.
I was incredibly lucky: I was an only child so my parents, who weren't rich, could just afford for me to go to private schools (Cumnor House prep school in Sussex, the Westminster). It was entirely through brilliant teaching (in classics) that I got good results. SWMBO and I had four children (which we don't regret) so couldn't afford private education (which we do), and none of ours did well at school despite all being intelligent.
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Post by EspadaIII on Oct 7, 2020 19:15:21 GMT
Yes. MGS was meant to be a great school but failed moderately intelligent pupils like me.
It was Oxbridge or nothing really.
I scraped into Birmingham university but didn't survive the cut at the end of the second year. I hated the course and was much happier in Manchester.
So like you Avant, I am an only child unable to afford to send three children to private school but so far mine seem to be doing as well as we hoped.
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Post by Humph on Oct 8, 2020 15:47:48 GMT
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Post by Deleted on Oct 8, 2020 15:58:59 GMT
I approve of everything except the price tag.
I've got my beady eye on my step father's BRG MG B Roadster for an EV (and chrome bumper) conversion....or the Morris Minor, or the Wolseley 15/50...but not the Navara or the Range Rover.
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