GCSE emotions

So the results are in!!

As it wasn't that long ago that I was collecting my own GCSEs it was all too familiar feeling of worry and nervousness. In fact as a parent I think the suspense was harder to deal with, maybe because we know the importance of preparing for the future, we can look back and see how the choices we made affect where we are now and for some (myself included) if the opportunity was there we would go back and do things differently.

So as I found out my sons results;
English B
Maths B
History B
Sociology B
ICT C
RE C
French C
Media studies C
Science D


There were a mixture of emotions that I felt that reflected how I felt when I opened my own envelope.

My first thought was how disappointed I was, I mean I know that sounds bad because his results are pretty good, but as I said to him his results are good for an average child and he was never ranked average at school. From a young age, even as a summer baby and being the youngest in his class he was always in the top groups for Literacy and Numeracy and he has always been praised as being 'such a bright boy' by his teachers. His main downfall is how lazy he is, the minute school is over he sees that as his free time to do what he wants (mainly play Xbox games) and so I feel partly responsible that his grades were not better (he was predicted a few As) as I didn't push him with his homework/revision as much as I should have.

At the same time as being disappointed I was also relieved, he had already got into 6th form at his school to study History, Sociology and Government and Politics A levels but if he also wanted do his English A level (which is the most important one as he wants to be a journalist) then he had to get a B or above in his English GCSE... thankfully he did!

Overall I mostly felt proud, for a start he got better grades than I did (5 Cs, 5 Ds and an E) and his dad didn't even do GCSEs as he was expelled from school! He kind of outdid the both of us so it would be irrational for us to complain.

I'm wondering if its wrong to put such high expectations on your children when it comes to exams, on the one hand it shows you believe in them and can encourage them to push themselves but at the same time does it just stress them out and set you all up for disappointment when they don't achieve what you're expecting?