This half term we started working on the Photo Card for the new GCSE. The textbook included it right from the first unit, at least in the assessment pages, but we have delayed it because it requires such different language to the rest of the GCSE.
In an earlier post on Describing, I wondered if "Describe" in the new GCSE was going to replace the emphasis on "Narrate" in the old GCSE. I didn't use to teach description as part of the old GCSE. We concentrated on building narration around opinions, reasons, if sentences, conflict of opinion, argument, decisions, what was happening, what happened, disappointment and hopes for next time. Description just wasn't an important aspect of the old GCSE, either for tasks or for the markscheme. As an aside, I will say that although narration is no longer mentioned in the markscheme for the new GCSE, I am still teaching it because pupils will have to talk for 5 minutes on one topic in the Conversation part of the exam.
But the new exam, with its long list of adjectives, its "describe your favourite celebrity/teacher/friend" questions in the Role Play, and the much longer photocard description... seemed to push teaching more towards describing.
So we concentrated in the first term on getting very good at the core of language for developing answers using opinions. And decided to delay working on description and on the photocard until term 2.
What have we discovered?
I was correct in thinking that describing has a lot to unpack. The verb to be is highly irregular in different persons and tenses. There's ser / estar to be dealt with. And adjectival agreement. Plus the verb to have.
The thing is, is this really what's required for the photocard? How comfortable are we with an obsession with looks, focusing on eye colour, hair colour, skin colour? Is that what we want from the photo description in the exam: There are three people in the picture. One is black, one is white and one looks as if they have Asian heritage. One is quite slim but the other two are not. One has dark curly hair, one is blond with blue eyes... Where is this going?
So although we have done physical description, and the pupils enjoyed doing and writing detective puzzle scenarios, when we have come to do photo descriptions, not one pupil has gone for physical description.
So what are the things that we have done?
Firstly a top tip. For AQA, there are 2 photos and the pupil has to talk about both. Even if it's only a quick mention of one of them. But what if they never get round to talking about the second photo? They lose track of time, or they get into a muddle on the first one and give up in a panic, or do so well on the first one they think they've done everything, or just forget to talk about the second one? So here's what we've decided as a class: Mention both photos straight away. There are two photos. In one photo... In the other photo... You always say this before getting stuck into the detail of one or other or the photos. At least that way you know you've mentioned it.
Then we come up against the language needed for the photocard. In the old GCSE, it was very much a stand alone task, using language that was only needed for the one question "What is in the photo?" This was a pain, having to deal with a totally different repertoire of language just for one question. Generally this meant learning There is / there are X people, they are in X location, they are doing X and they are doing X. This language wasn't useful anywhere else in the exam, which was almost entirely based on first person opinions, reasons and examples. With the odd incursion into we. And only the highest achieving candidates venturing much into he/she/they.
One way round it was to do the photocard in the first person. After all, why are we showing this photo and talking about it? I am in the park with my friend. Look: I like to play tennis. It is sunny so we are going to have a picnic. My friend said, "I love cheese."
We experimented with this first person approach with the old GCSE photocard and it never felt comfortable. Just as pupils don't go for "She is short and a bit fat with long blond hair and blue eyes", neither did they go for talking about the photo in the first person. It felt as if the scenario wasn't one of showing a picture to a friend. It felt like an exam where you were being tested on your ability to give some formulaic sentences about a picture chosen to put you under pressure. Not surprising, given this was indeed exactly the situation.
Another way round it was to use the imperfect. Talk about what was happening in the picture. In Spanish, pupils love the imperfect with its aba/ía endings which work just as well for 3rd person as for 1st. In French it's a bit more tricky, because if you say il jouait, it's difficult not to sound as if you are making a mess of saying "il joué" or something that the examiner won't like at all. And while we are on the topic of French, let's not even start on the lack of a present continuous and how it all goes wrong as soon as a pupil tries to say They are... working. But that's what I meant right at the top of this post when I said that the photocard requires very different language from the rest of the GCSE.
The problem with the old GCSE was that you had to do this different language just for one question where the pupil had to give a shortish formulaic answer.
With the new GCSE, they have to talk a lot more on the photos. Around a minute, which is a long time. I think this counts as another important insight from this half term. Try it yourself. Pick a photo and see how long you can talk about it using the sort of language pupils have at their disposal. What on earth is there to say that can keep you going that long. Especially if you are steering away from physical description.
I actually think this is a good thing. Learning to use 3rd person singular and plural and how to say they are ---ing, and there is... for just one short answer in the whole exam seemed unwieldy. Now it is for a much longer answer and has to be done properly. It is a big feature of the course. And what we need to do is to find ways to use the language learned for the photocard in other areas of the exam.
Time for some examples.
I created some model answers for 2 photos and mixed them in together. Pupils had to separate them out.
Then next lesson, pupils had to talk about the photos using the structures that they remembered. And do a written version.
You can see by the time they come to do the written version, it's changed from the language I gave them in the first lesson. Including mixing using the present continuous and the imperfect.
Then they had to recycle as many of the structures as possible to the next set of photos we used. Again, you can see that there's some formulaic aspects as to what to include and what language to use, but also the pupils are using their knowledge of the language to create their own descriptions, rather than relying on set structures:
Some things to note:
- You can see the initial In one picture... In the other... tactic.
- I worked a lot on pupils doing this in spoken Spanish and spontaneously. But in the exam, they do have time to write down answers in the preparation time.
- "They seem" is useful. It avoids the ser / estar problem, and also allows you to use personality adjectives. They seem kind.
- They are using a mixture of present tense llevan uniforme, present continuous están comiendo and imperfect cocinaban. Different pupils have their personal favourite.
- Using the present continuous can get you into trouble: están llevando uniforme doesn't sound right.
- I am still not sure this is enough for a minute.
- We will have to keep an eye on the exam board guidance on marking this task. Marks are for the amount of information conveyed clearly (code for accurately even where accuracy marks are not allocated). So may be just "There is" and a list of nouns would be enough.
The secret of this is going to be to keep using the language features we've worked on for the photocard in the language we use for other aspects of the exam. The imperfect is definitely part of our core repertoire. Using 3rd person is something I'm keen to do much more than with the old GCSE. Description is something we can build in to all topics. That leaves the present continuous. Which just seems to be used for this one task. At least with this GCSE it's for a more substantial task than the old GCSE. Introducing a whole tense just for one utterance didn't feel worthwhile. I think we were right to delay introducing this until pupils had a strong core repertoire under their belt. I think you can really see this in how quickly they were able to pick up the new language for describing pictures and run with it. And what I can now do, is make sure describing a photo is part of something we do regularly across topics, so none of this language gets forgotten.
There is an alternative version of this which I don't want to contemplate because it is so awful.
The AQA markscheme for the photocard is entirely based on "clarity" and "amount of information". Clarity sounds a lot like a way of marking for accuracy even though accuracy marks aren't supposed to apply here. And lewizrs.bsky.social has tipped me off on bluesky, that in AQA training, "a lot of information" has been quantified as saying 15 things. So for full marks, our pupils need to say 7-8 things about each photo, keeping absolute "clarity".
As we get nearer to the exam, this could mean simplistic formulaic responses are what works best.
There is a man. He is big. He is fat. He is blond. There is a woman. She is big. She is fat. She is not blond.
Repeat for the other picture. Full marks every time.
This reminds me of going back to the disastrous Controlled Assessment GCSE where AQA's interpretation of "amount of information", along with "variety of language" meant that rote learned answers scored higher than teaching pupils to be able to speak.
You can see in this post, the approach I am trying to take. Where pupils develop a coherent body of language that they can deploy across topics and across the exam tasks. Avoiding silos and rote learned single use language. What if AQA's interpretation of the markscheme means this approach actually penalises pupils in the exam?
Here we go again?
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