Anybody got a link for old o´level english language papers

[piggynose]

I´ve tried googling without much sucess

[factor-fiction]

There are some interesting examples here comparing old 'O' level questions with current GCSE questions in English and Maths.
http://www.timesonlin...on/article4275054.ece

[jake-the-peg]

If past examples of such stories are anything to go by they compare *foundation level* GCSE papers with O levels rather than with CSEs which they are more readilly comparable with.

Or they will cherry pick individual easy questions from the start of the paper - typically questions get more difficult as you go through the paper.

They are basically flattering their predominantly older readership by saying 'Young people today aren't as clever as you' and they all go off saying 'Oh no we had it hard you know!'

[jake-the-peg]

Here's some extracts from a 1985 maths O level paper

http://education.guar...ory/0,,358622,00.html

Having coached my kids through GCSE maths in the last couple of years they look pretty similar to me

[jake-the-peg]

There are links to English papers from here:

http://www.guardian.c...ian/2000/oct/28/dumb3

[wolf63]

piggy - good luck to you if you are thinking of doing this 'O' level. I sat my maths O level twice at school and failed miserably both times.

About 15-20 years later my pal and I went to our local college to study it just to see how we got on. It was brilliant - and we were actually good at it. We struggled with some of the areas of maths (the geometry stuff) but overall it was a good experience.

Are you doing an open learning/distance learning course?

[piggynose]

wolf 63, as you prob know, i´m now living in spain. I teach english for a living, and it seems a little embarrasing not having a recent qualification in the english language. Like you i didnt do well at school and left in ´76. went to nightschool in ´79 and with tuition passed finally passed the o´level. would like to retake the exam, then if i pass then do the A´level.

[wolf63]

And then you can hang your certificates on the wall! :-)

My brother's pal did TEFL in Germany - the guy was from Newcastle and could barely speak English himself, heaven knows what the Germans made of his accent.

Good luck - enjoy snow-free Spain.

[Prudie]

jake-the-peg I'll rise to the bait - I did O Level maths in 1970 and it included differentiation, integration, quadratic and simultaneous equations, learning the formulae for all the conic sections (parabola, circle, ellipse, hyperbola), area under a currce, volume of revolution etc etc so although that may have been a sample paper it can only be early easy questions. My daughter got an A in GCSE maths and she couldn't even begin to do the stuff I've listed here - she doesn't even know her tables properly so sorry but yes it was harder in the past. I also have a maths degree and taught maths for 10 years so have a rough idea what I'm talking about.

[Prudie]

Sory piggy just realised I've gone off topic - apologies and Merry Xmas!

[Ellipsis]

> Here's some extracts from a 1985 maths O level paper
> http://education.guar...ory/0,,358622,00.html

They look pretty easy, but selective. I'd like to see the ones they left out. I did my Maths O Level in 1983 and I recall having to learn lots of geometric constructions and proofs, e.g. prove the volume of a cone ...

[Ellipsis]

Interesting Prudie ... by 1983 differentiation and integration were A Level Maths, not O Level - certainly on my syllabus ...

[Prudie]

I've noticed Ellipsis that Molly has been talking about starting integration on her A level course so it must have changed. I taught at CSE level so did not keep up to date with the O level syllabus.

[ChuckFickens]

Also apologies for being slightly off topic here (talking about maths rather than English)

In my opinion GCSE maths was far easier than O level maths, I was in the first year ever to do GCSEs (yay, nothing like being a guinea pig for your education) and found GCSE maths incredibly easy, largely due to having an older brother that had done O level maths, meaning I had read all the O level maths text books prior to starting GCSE maths (yes I used to read maths and science books for the hell of it).

The range of topics and the knowledge you were expected to know to do O level maths was noticeably more than what was expected for GCSE.

It was also very noticeable that when I started A level maths the entire course was geared up to continue on from O level maths meaning that there was an expectation for things to have been learnt that quite simply were not covered in GCSE maths.

I also do think that it continues to be made easier, my nephew is currently doing his GCSEs and seems to be totally unaware of some things that I would have considered the basics.

[saxy_jag]

Piggy, I'm not sure O'level still exists - certainly not in the UK. The equiivalent is GCSE although as Jake and Chuck have intimated, there is a difference between the two.

I suggest you contact the various accreditation boards and perhaps buy some old GCSE papers from them - they're not very expensive:

OCR - http://www.ocr.org.uk...rmaterials/index.html
EDEXCEL - https://eiewebvip.edexcel.org.uk/pastpapers/