Summer 2022 – advance information – FAQs for GCSE and A Level Economics
23 February 2022
Matt Dilley, OCR Subject Advisor
In the past weeks, we’ve been running online Q&A events to give you a chance to ask subject-specific questions about this year’s advance information (AI). This followed our more general FAQ blogs for teachers and for students. In this blog, I’ve summarised the questions asked at our Economics Q&A event.
What has been removed by AI?
The focus of advance information wasn’t to reduce content, but to focus student revision for the forthcoming exams. There is still an expectation that all content is covered and all should be revised. Nothing has been ‘cut’ from the specification but the advance information should be used to help focus student revision on the areas worth the most marks.
Will you be taking into account that the A Level cohort have never sat external GCSEs and are not used to external exams so they may underperform? Will grade boundaries therefore be more generous?
AI is part of a package of support which also includes changes to grade boundaries, as outlined in Ofqual’s recent blog. The results awarded this year will be “midway” between the last set of examined results and the grades awarded via the TAG process last year.
GCSE economics has very few past papers. Are topics used less in the exam papers more likely to be used in the 6 markers to assess content not previously examined?
One of the principles of AI is that it shouldn’t provide enough information to allow for “question spotting”. This means that no inference can be made of question types that will be associated to different topics.
Can we assume that the AI list does include the multiple choice revision areas? We were concerned that the list could be just high tariff questions.
The list of topics for AI will depend on the qualification you are studying. You can check the first page of the AI document for this information and see below.
Economics A Level - The AI list DOES include topics covered in MCQs. However, it will only include the topics relating to the correct answers, topics relating to incorrect answers won’t appear on the topic list.
Economics GCSE – The AI DOES NOT include MCQs. By providing this information we would not have been able to give enough focus on the topics to be revised. The AI information is only for the written answer questions.
You state that the AI doesn’t give granular detail for any exam board. We have seen the Edexcel Economics AI and this is broken down by detailed topics. Can you clarify?
Each exam board has its own specification which is presented in differing levels of detail. At meetings between the exam boards we agreed which level of detail would be appropriate to detail in AI documents for each specification. This is to be as consistent as possible across exam boards and to ensure parity for learners.
Will there only be questions from the AI on the actual paper?
AI is designed for revision purposes and will help to narrow down the content that students revise for their exams. If a student only revised the content from the A Level AI document they would be able to score maximum marks on that examination. However, the AI for Economics GCSE doesn’t include MCQs, so maximum marks wouldn’t be possible on this paper just by following the AI guidance.
How can I focus revision when much of the syllabus appears on paper 3?
Remember that paper 3 is synoptic and includes many topics from papers 1 and 2. By breaking this down and focusing on the topics for each individual paper you are able to see which topics are important to revise for paper 3 alone and which topics can be revised for both exams.
I’m unsure how useful the AI is for my students as the list of topics isn’t small enough
AI has a number of principles that underpin how it was created. We needed to make sure that it wasn’t too prescriptive as this would allow for “question spotting” and undermine the integrity of the qualifications. Students need to know that the grade they are awarded has meaning and is comparable to other students.
AI is also part of a package to support students and shouldn’t be viewed as a stand-alone piece of information. By altering grade boundaries, students have additional support and can feel confident that the grades awarded to them will be fair and take into consideration the difficulties they have faced over the past few years.
Stay connected
If you have any questions about this summer’s assessment and would like to talk to us, please get in touch at economics@ocr.org.uk or follow us on Twitter @OCR_BusEcon where I share resources and articles. You can also sign up to subject updates and receive email information about economics resources and support.
About the author
Matt Dilley - Subject Advisor
Matt joined OCR in April 2020 as part of the Business and Economics advisory team. He has a degree in Accountancy with a focus on Financial Accounting. His work experience includes commercial banking and 12 years as a teacher of Business Studies and Economics where he was a faculty lead.
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