The "how hard did you work to get 4A's at AS level in bio+chem+maths+psych" thread

Hi, I'd like people who have 4As in preferably the following subjects: biology, chemistry, maths and psychology to answer these questions.

How hard did you think the work was?
How many hours per day did you spend in front of the books (studying) for January exams and then June exams? Did you start revising from september or another month?

How much T.V were you able to watch per day?

Were you able to go on MSN, facebook and if so, how long per day?

How much were you able to go out on weekdays and also, weekends?

How long did it take you to complete homework per day? Did you do any other work (e.g. texbook revision) as well as homework, daily even before exams began (e.g. in September for January exams)?

Thanks :smile:

Please make these answers as detailed as possible and only answer if you got 4A's in AS level biology, chemistry, maths and psychology (including A's in January unit exams) and you can add other information regarding how much you worked too if you want :smile:

Rep given to most helpful answers :smile:

Thanks x

I know each person is different and everyone has to put in different amounts of effort but just curious about others and how they worked.

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Reply 1

stef.strawbs.123

Im only about to start my As' but I would say that its best to work how you work best than to ask people how THEY work best :smile:

We all learn differently :smile:

Reply 2

polopolo

tv - 2hrs 11mins
msn/facebook - 1hr44mins
homework - 1hr13mins (this might be 1hr14mins depending on how hard it is)

hope that helps

Reply 3

Malsy

Took me about a month only to prepare for the exams for bio/chem/psych.

Reply 4

Princestia

Thanks Malsy for the post :smile:

.. So is it 1 month to learn, understand, memorize or 1 month to actually just revise everything you know?

polopolo: I sense sarcasm in your post =/

Will appreciate any more posts from people about this. Thanks :smile:

Reply 5

Laura373

Oooh, they're my subjects! Now I'm doing A2 biology, chemistry and psychology, and AS maths.
I did TOO MUCH work for my AS's, as my psychology teacher told me today xD

Reply 6

funsize17

Laura373

Oooh, they're my subjects! Now I'm doing A2 biology, chemistry and psychology, and AS maths.
I did TOO MUCH work for my AS's, as my psychology teacher told me today xD

I couldnt never imagine a teacher telling me i had done too much work haha.
How did you do too much?

Reply 7

funsize17

Hey, i'm about to start AS bio, chem, psych and geog :smile:

. Wahooo.
I think i'm going to just try and be more organised and prepared this year and next year in order to get top grades and i am going to study from september just a little bit every night and then some hardcore revision nearer the module exams. To be honest, september to january isn't that long so i don't see the point in waiting.

Reply 8

Degausser

I did those exact subjects at AS. There wasn't that much work tbh, I did perhaps a couple hours about 3 days a week during term time, with most of that being psych.

During exam time it was a lot more but again, mainly psych, as thats about memorising studies and spitting them out again moreso than the others.

Reply 9

fox_amro

Well i did computing instead of bio and i only ever worked a month before exams so it depens on how hard you need to work

Reply 10

roosel4

Just do the classwork and homework throughout the year to a good ability, revise a month or 2 before your exams (a couple of hours a day) and you should do very well. Obviously not everyone can get 4A's, but keep to this and you'll be on target. Only start cutting out socialising/TV near exams or when you are swamped in homework. Hope that helped.

Reply 11

Malsy

Princestia

Thanks Malsy for the post :smile:

For ASs it probably was learn, understand, memorize but I'm hoping for A2 it's a bit different. Dreading A2s

Reply 12

Laura373

funsize17

I couldnt never imagine a teacher telling me i had done too much work haha.
How did you do too much?

she gave us an evaluation sheet of AS to fill in, and one of the questions was "how long did you revise for?". She then asked us to read out our answers and mine for the January exam was 3 hours per day throughout the christmas holidays. She was like "i can't believe that, that's FAR too much". I got 100 on that unit so there you go :rolleyes:

(and I didn't do as much work on the June exam, because I was too busy cramming chemistry in a month due to a crap teacher xD)

Reply 13

Deadalot

I did further maths as well and I worked less hard than I did in year 10 to get 3 language GCSEs

Reply 14

HighSkies

lol I think I recognise you from a previous thread you made. :smile:

I did biology, chemistry and psychology which I've gotten all A's at AS so far and in January modules where applicable.

How hard did you think the work was?
I thought chemistry was hard because I found the concepts difficult to understand but once I got them its practice practice practice with past papers. Overall medium-hard difficulty.
Biology was similar to GCSE in terms of how to prepare for exams so not very difficult. Its relatively easy to understand new concepts but the difficulty comes when having to remember it all for the exams. As you probably know biology mark schemes are very selective in how they want you to answer. There is sometimes some weird how science works questions too. Overall medium difficulty.
Psychology is easy to understand but there is even more to memorise with the vast amount of case studies and expriments there are. If you are interested in it though (as for any subject) it becomes easier to remember. Overall light-medium difficulty.

How many hours per day did you spend in front of the books (studying) for January exams and then June exams? Did you start revising from september or another month?
I started revising in November for January exams. Some people will think I'm stupid for doing so but trust me, with all the distractions from christmas/run up to christmas/new year you get little work done/your motivation will die. :p:

But it paid off in the end as I got A's. This is especially important for you as you potentially have a module to sit in every subject you do. I started early April for May exams and late April for June exams. I think it paid off because I did particularly well in June modules compared to Jan for all my subjects. I varied in hours. On weekends I could do 7-8 hours or so and on weekdays 2 hours solid at school and maybe 1 hour or (often) nothing when I got home. Thats as it got dangerously close to exams.

How much T.V were you able to watch per day?
I don't really watch much T.V. so if we change that to how many hours on the computer a day I'd say about 3 hours.

Were you able to go on MSN, facebook and if so, how long per day?
Yes, I would be able to go on them, see above.

How much were you able to go out on weekdays and also, weekends?
Weekdays I couldn't really go out at night/all night except for the very rare occasion where I had no homework for next day. I couldn't do that from November-January exams, April (after easter hols)- June exams. I also don't really advise it either. :o:

I could however perhaps 1-2 times a week (i.e. when I didn't have stupid amounts of homework to do) go shopping with my friends/movie after school. :p:

I finish school at 3:50pm.

How long did it take you to complete homework per day? Did you do any other work (e.g. texbook revision) as well as homework, daily even before exams began (e.g. in September for January exams)?
Revision for exams in September? Nooo way. You haven't even learnt anything to revise yet!!!
Hm, it varies but as a bit of help for you this is a (crappy) picture of an average week in my homework diary for you:

(No, I hardly ever got psychology homework.)
I stay after school nearly everyday to complete homework or revision and I often work in lunch breaks too. Once again, people will go 'pfttt loser!' But it was good because:
1: I had all the resources I needed to complete my homework including the computers/library and teachers.
2: I didn't need to carry a load of heavy books and files to and from school everyday.
3: All the time I had when I got home (except mid-exam period) was free time to do whatever the heck I wanted to do. :biggrin:

Hope that helps a bit.

Reply 15

funsize17

Laura373

(and I didn't do as much work on the June exam, because I was too busy cramming chemistry in a month due to a crap teacher xD)

Well done

Reply 16

Astin Martin

I dossed around at school, especially when it is a grammar school and the reputation has fallen over the years and just work normally at home and got 90%+ in all three sciences for AS. Hate the UKCAT though. Looking forward to BMAT.

Reply 17

Princestia

Thanks SOOOO much, you are amazing, HighSkies :smile:

.. I read your post like 5 times - That's how useful it was :smile:

Thanks again a lot! :smile:

I gave you positive rep :smile:

Astin Martin

Hi, how many hours did you study at home per day?

Thanks for posting :smile:

Also, thanks to everyone else for posting with helpful advice :smile:

Reply 18

milan5baros

The sky's the limit on how hard you can work as an individual. Aim for perfection, and you might come some were close. :yep:

Reply 19

cannyeinstein

Managed to get straight 'A's at AS in Chem, Maths, Bio and RS.
For Biology and RS I quite literally started revising the day before each exam. Maths and chemistry I worked a bit harder, but was still only revising a couple of weeks before the exams.
I don't watch that much TV except for films and sports, but do spend time on the computer. I'd spend most evenings last year just mooching about not doing much. I was committed to about 10 hours of sport a week though, so that ate up alot of time. I tried to get most of my work done at school, but outside of school hours. I could usually get that and more done inside about 8 hours of extracurricular work in my school library (each week).
But it all depends on the individual, I'm happy with the work I put in and the return I got, because I knew that I would get a disproportionately small extra return for any extra work I did. I essentially did the bare minimum to get where I wanted to be. So you've got to work a bit harder if you want to be averaging 95 UMS. But AS doesn't matter all that much as long as you do get your 'A's and predicted 'A's. Because you will still need the same grades for the A* grades at A2... :rolleyes: