Sarah Phillips, Business and Economics Subject Advisor

Welcome to Cambridge National in Enterprise and Marketing! You are not alone in starting to teach this qualification, even if you are a one-person department. This blog will signpost you to the wealth of resources and support available for you every step of the way throughout the course.

First steps – Teach Cambridge

Make sure you’re set up on our secure teacher website Teach Cambridge as soon as possible. This site, designed by teachers for teachers, includes all the support and resources that you will need, personalised for you and the subjects you teach. 

As it is secure, you will need to be given access to the system by your exams officer. Send this link to them if they need more information. 

Once you have access, it’s simple to set up: just make sure you add the courses you are delivering so you get all the updates, resources, and training relevant to them. Select Enterprise and Marketing Level 1/Level 2 (2022+) from the list of options. You can add other courses at any time by clicking on My account, Account, and Settings. 

Resources

You'll find lots of useful resources on the Teach Cambridge website. You can navigate to them or use the resource finder to locate them. They include:

Planning and teaching resources

• The curriculum planner shows an overview of the units, a reminder of the terminal assessment rule (which is really important) and an overview of how you might structure your course over two or three years.  
• Schemes of work are provided for all three units, plus a blank template for you to use to create your own scheme of work (SoW). Our SoW includes lesson ideas and activities as well as useful links to support your delivery. I’d use this as a starting point to create my own SoW.  
• As well as those included in the schemes of work, additional teaching activities and ideas are available to support your teaching and learning. 
• Details of endorsed textbooks are on the subject page of our public website as well as Teach Cambridge. 
• Our understanding the assessment document applies to all our Cambridge National courses. It outlines the assessment methods and includes the question types and command words students will get in the exam. It also covers the command words used in the NEA assessment criteria so you can make an informed decision when assessing students’ work.  

The terminal rule for assessment means that the externally assessed unit (R067 for this course) must be taken in the student’s final assessment series for their qualification. This can be in January or June. Make sure you keep this in mind when planning your delivery and making your entries.

Assessment – NEA

There are two internally assessed NEA units for Enterprise and Marketing: 

• R068 - Design a business proposal 
• R069 – Market and pitch a business proposal 

R068 must be completed before R069. 

• The set assignments for each unit are only on Teach Cambridge. Remember they are replaced each June and are only live for the January and June series the following academic year. Check the dates on the front cover to make sure you are using the right one. 
• We have sample assessment materials for both NEA units. They can be used for teaching and learning for practice to prepare students before they start their live NEA. 
• When you are ready to start assessing, record your marks on the unit recording sheets (on Teach Cambridge). There's a completed example provided in the online course Essentials for the NEA which is helpful to support you. You need to send the completed forms with your sample to your moderator.
• To help you assess the NEA there are high, medium and low level candidate exemplars for both units with commentary showing how to apply the marking criteria. 
• Share our student guide to NEA assignments with students, and maybe even parents/carers, just before starting the NEA. It is also a useful reminder of the NEA rules for teachers. 
• Following each series, our moderators’ reports provide constructive feedback on centres’ assessment of moderated work, based on what the moderation team have noticed. These reports also highlight areas where requirements have been misinterpreted, and provide guidance to centre assessors on what is needed to access higher mark bands. Where appropriate, the report will also signpost other sources of information that centre assessors will find helpful.

Assessment – exam

The exam for unit R067 can be taken in either the January or June series.

• We’ve created a sample exam paper  to show the structure and type of questions you can expect. This is also available on the public website, so you can use it with students to teach exam technique and the use of command words. 
• There’s also a guide and a candidate style answers document alongside the sample paper. You could use these to explore the features of the exam, help ensure your marking is accurate, and show you the approach the examiner is taking with future exams. 
• We also have a practice paper which is only on the secure Teach Cambridge site so students won’t have access to it. You could use this for a mock or to give you a starting point to create your own. 
• ExamBuilder is our tool for creating your own tests and exam papers. This will be really useful for setting mocks. Click ‘Business’ and choose the ‘New! Enterprise and Marketing (J837)’ to make sure you only choose questions relevant to the current specification. 
• After each exam series, our examiners’ reports provide constructive feedback on candidates’ performance and useful guidance for future candidates.

Promoting the course

Finally, looking forward to recruiting students, our teacher toolkits include leaflets, posters, guides and an editable PowerPoint to help promote the course to students and parents/carers. I would use these at option evenings or even use the posters around school as an early promotion. You can download these, or order hard copies if you would prefer. 

Professional development – getting started

If you’re new to Enterprise and Marketing, these are the most important training courses: 

• The free eLearning Essentials for the NEA is mandatory, designed to prepare and support you for the delivery of the Cambridge Nationals suite NEA set assignments. It’s really useful, especially as it covers all Nationals so if you teach more than one you only need to do this course once. 
• The free eLearning Cambridge Nationals in Enterprise and Marketing on internal assessment specifically for the Enterprise and Marketing course. It gives a good insight into the process for completing and assessing the NEAs. 
• Starting to teach: Cambridge Nationals Enterprise and Marketing J837. This is a free webinar providing everything you need to get started, including links to resources as well as an overview of the course structure and assessment requirements. 

You can book these from our professional development page or from the training link on Teach Cambridge.

Professional development – ongoing

We run a wide range of professional development sessions each year – many free – to support your teaching. 

These include:  

• Exploring the NEA: how you can help your students prepare for their internal assessment, including a chance to mark real student work.  
• Exploring the exam: how you can help your students prepare for their exam, including looking at actual exam papers.  
• Enhance your teaching: supporting and stretching your students on their NEA. 
• Ask the subject advisor: a chance to discuss your queries with one of our subject experts.  
• Ask the moderator: put your questions to our principal moderator.

You can book a place on these and other courses from our professional development page or from the training link on Teach Cambridge.

Network meetings

We hold regular free online teacher network meetings. You can find out when the next one is on the teacher network page. 

Alternatively, if you fancy hosting your own network meeting for you and centres local to you please email us at ocr.vqbusiness@ocr.org.uk or networks@ocr.org.uk. We can provide in-person or virtual support.

Stay connected

We’re here to help you get the best for your students. Please don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any questions. We can respond to emails, set up a Teams meeting or give you a call to talk through anything to do with delivering the course.

Email us at ocr.vqbusiness@ocr.org.uk, call us on 01223 553998 or message us @OCR_BusEcon.

You can also sign up to subject updates to keep up-to-date with the latest news, updates and resources.

If you are considering teaching any of our qualifications, use our online form to let us know, so that we can help you with more information.

About the author

Sarah joined the Business and Economics team in September 2022. She has over 20 years’ experience as a teacher of Business, Economics and Finance and in leadership roles including Head of Department, Head of Sixth Form and Assistant Principal. She has been an assessor for A Level Economics and holds a degree in Business Economics and the RSA Certificate in English Language Teaching to Adults (CELTA).