When the science department were considering which awarding body to go with for Physics AS and A Levels, Kingsbury High School took a comprehensive view of what was available.
Daniel Danaher is Head of Physics at the school, and shares their tried and tested insights here.
When the science department were considering which awarding body to go with for Physics AS and A Levels, they took a comprehensive view of what was available. Daniel said: "We worked as a department to look at the specification, exam structure, practical endorsement and support available to come to a decision."
After considering all the aspects, the science team selected our new AS and A Level Physics specifications and started teaching them from September 2015, with 38 students taking Physics AS and 15 taking the A Level. The team decided to continue teaching the AS because, "We wanted an examination result-based on national standards to assess the progress of our pupils before starting Year 13. We also wanted to ensure that Year 12 pupils had a focus to their learning.
Daniel said that for him, the three top aspects of our new Physics AS and A Levels were:
- Practical endorsement rather than controlled assessment of practical skills
- The stretch and challenge provided by a unified physics paper/problems
- Assessment by exams rather than coursework/practical work.
Daniel explained how they have successfully adapted to the new approach to practical assessment: "As a department, we started off by looking at the requirements and completing the online training provided by OCR. We discussed each of the CPACs and discussed how to use the physics tracker to record our assessments. We then developed a lab book for Year 12 pupils which combines experimental instructions with assessment records, activities, information and the practical skills handbook."
"We also run a series of lectures on experimental work to provide some of the background theory. As the course has progressed, we have met regularly as a department to compare feedback and to share best practice."
Daniel identified one challenge regarding equipment. He said, "There are some practicals that required equipment that we only have one set of (for example PAG 5.2 finding the speed of sound using a resonance tube). We wanted every pupil to use the equipment so to overcome this, we organised times throughout the lesson for pupils to use the equipment and record data, whilst the rest of the class were completing an activity about resonance or analysing their data. This worked pretty well and we will use the same approach next year."
A challenging, constructive curriculum
Daniel commented that in general, the new curriculum provides a good level of challenge for the most able pupils who enjoy solving problems which require knowledge of different areas of the subject. The clear links between practical work and theory also enabled pupils to get a better understanding of how different concepts can be understood using experimental work.
Great for both theory and practical work
Daniel said that the students have most enjoyed being able to use their theoretical knowledge to understand experimental work.
The team have appreciated the all-round nature of the support we provide – including the INSET for subject leaders and online training that the whole department can access. "The most valuable support so far has been the monitoring visit. We had a chance to ask questions about how we have been carrying out the practical work and to get feedback on what we were doing. This gave us confidence in what we had been doing so far and also some ideas on how we could do things better."
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