What advice would you give to a student starting his/her A Levels?

I am starting my A levels in the summer and since I am the oldest in my family I don't really ave someone to give me tips for college life.
So i was wondering if TSR community who are currently in college or have finished their A Levels have any tips for what I should do, what i should prepare, mistakes I should avoid etc

I am taking English Literature, History, Maths and Economics so if any of you have done those specific subjects or are doing them it would be greatly appreciated. I will try and give as much rep as i can to the more helpful answer (if i can).

THANKS :smile:

(edited 8 years ago)

Reply 1

Tiwa

Ask lots of questions when necessary! Use the specifications for your different subjects. It really helped me! I took English Lit at AS and although I didn't work as hard as I should've, I would recommend getting revision guides for the novels and poems you'll study. With Maths, past papers are crucial. Do as many as possible and do them again. In fact, do as many past papers for all your subjects. All the best.

Reply 2

xLittleMissyx

Just work hard! I know that isnt very helpful, but I wish I had worked harder as I didn't get into my first choice uni and really kicking myself because of it :frown:

Work hard and make your dreams a reality! :smile:

Reply 3

Sandtrooper

Volunteer Team

I do Economics, English Literature and History.

Economics - make sure you understand it from the beginning. Constantly go over your notes, keep up with the news, learn all of your diagrams.

English Literature - actually read your books, and if you have time, other books by the same authors. Make notes on characters, chapters etc. Know context points.

History - notes, notes, notes. And past papers.

Reply 4

applesandpeaches

Start studying/revision from the VERY BEGINNING! I cannot stress enough on that. I started about 2 months before the exams and regretted it:/ good luck

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Reply 5

jcsiah

Original post by guledgwan

My school has a 50% A* rate for History out of a large group of over 50 people, so I can assure you my advice for studying history does work. Firstly, you cannot afford to be lazy and think "oh this detail or fact isn't important" - every fact in history is important. Depth in history means marks, simple. Also, you should ensure that you are updating your notes in depth on a weekly basis divided into each topic in the specification (my total notes came up to around 200 pages of solid facts), as if you come to Easter and are writing notes you will be overwhelmed. Most importantly, the high grades in History come from correctly structured answers, such as noticing links between factors and addressing a wide range of factors (e.g political, economic, social and cultural, and international). However, I wouldn't worry greatly about that - teachers SHOULD tell you what to do. If not, read the examiner reports etc.

English Literature is substantially difficult to give advice for. I think the biggest mistake people make is continuing a GCSE outlook into their studies - the analysis for A Level is thorough and detailed in exploring how meaning is created, whereas GCSE you can offer a surface comment just fine.

For example, if analysing W. H Auden's 'Funeral Blues' a GCSE student would say "The removal of the moon and ocean in "Pack up the moon... Pour away the ocean" suggest personal loss on a great magnitude, as the ocean and moon are expansive" whereas an A Level student would be expected to say "The removal of natural imagery in "Pack up the moon... Pour away the ocean" suggests the lament of Auden following the death of his homosexual lover through the expansive imagery in "Ocean" and "moon" showing the magnitude of his personal sorrow, reinforced in the plosive 'p' suggesting bitterness and anger through it's harsh sound"...

If you listen to your teachers and work very hard continuously (and by that I mean 3 hours an evening all year, 5 during exam run up) you should get the grades. Most important advice is to not be embarrassed to go see staff if you're struggling and asking for additional help, or share notes and ideas with peers as everyone is finding it difficult. Ultimately, as cliche as it is, hard work and independent thought is rewarded.

Best of luck with starting A Levels, if you have any further questions specific to History or Literature you are welcome to send me a private message!

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Reply 6

ALevelBro

Can't comment on the other subjects but for Maths, just work through the examples and practice questions. It's really straightforward and you don't need to spend time reading or 'memorizing' formulas. Past papers are the ultimate revision tool!

Reply 7

math42

English Lit - I can't give a great deal of advice with this one as I did not put too much work into it. But I found making a lot of thematic notes helped for open book exams, contemplating the sort of stuff they could ask you, looking at the assessment objectives and trying to make sure you nail them. Learning many many quotes and contemplating/writing down what you could say on particular quotes is useful for closed book exams. Coursework, best way is to draft and redraft a lot and as said really nail the assessment objectives.
Maths - Don't slack; interest/level of work decides your grade in A level maths. Go through the book thoroughly making sure you really grasp the topics and once you do, do as many past papers as you can get your hands on.
History - Practice the types of questions they ask you and learn lots and lots of facts. If you can write well, are armed with the right facts and are familiar with the style of question you can't go very wrong.
credentials: AAA in these at AS (didn't take History to A2, dunno my grades for the others at that level yet)

edit: just realised I put the most advice for English..oh well. :colondollar:

Reply 8

foureyes_

Exam solutions will be your lifeline for maths, trust me and do loads of past papers throughout the year.
Idk much about the rest of your subjects but they seem to be v content based, so i suggest you review the content before you start learning it in class, that way you already have some knowledge on it and then when your teacher teaches it to you, you can ask questions about what you dont understand etc, and review your class work every week so it will be stored better in your long term memory.
Also i find mind maps are very helpful for content based subjects, I used them a lot in psychology, it can really help you visualise the information, but thats just me, i'm a very visual learner, you should research what sort of revision tactics work best for you and integrate them into your every day schedule. You should really start to revise as soon as you can, thats one of the many mistakes i made.

Reply 9

Feraligatr

With regards to sciences, its best to make sure you completely understand the content, memorisation will not help you at A-Levels, you have to have understood everything. Doing loads of past papers will also help you a lot too. Just make sure you understand everything inside and out in your specification and do loads and loads of past papers (if need be, get past papers from other exam boards and do similar questions)
Make sure you do past papers more than once and record progress if that helps :smile:

Reply 10

username1468462

English Lit - Find out if your exam is closed text (without the book) and if so start learning quotes early! You could also read the novels you'll be studying next year over summer if you wanted to, that would give you a good head start.

History - There is a lot more content to learn than at GCSE. Revise it as you go along would be the best advice I could give you - History was my best subject at GCSE but I started AS revision in March and it was a bit of a struggle to try and learn every specific detail of that much content. I think (hope!) it was fine in the end but just consolidating each topic when you've finished it would be a very good thing to do and what I should have been doing this year and have already started doing for A2!

Reply 11

KRBryan

Original post by guledgwan

Economics - definitely make sure you know the topic you just covered by always asking questions, checking the news for relevant articles and also YouTube was probably my greatest resource! Econplusdal, Phil Holden, Dani's Revision Channel, Tutor2u, all great economics Youtube channels I would suggest. Keep on top of your revision, I made cue cards for AS and A2 and if you try and do some once a month or when you've finished a topic, you'll love yourself come exam period! That way your revision material is done and you can then focus on past papers, definitions, knowledge and most importantly, exam technique.

Good luck!!

Reply 12

Blackstarr

Since there are A level changes I would suggest you take a look at the new specs for the subjects you will be doing and the current past papers.

Reply 13

onimusha370

set your goals high, do loads of work.
Then you'll be fine :smile:

Reply 14

quentinhamilton

Do LOTS of past papers/exam questions

Reply 15

Alex621

Definitely for maths make sure you reguarly complete past paper questions, my teacher made packs of all the past paper questions on each topic so that when we had finished learning a particular topic, we could work through the pack to make sure we can do all the questions.

This takes so much pressure off when you get close to exams, as you don't need to bombard yourself with past papers.

Reply 16

TVIO

You can't afford to not understand something in maths, most of it builds on top of each other. Have to work hard from the start to ensure this, then do all the past papers you can at exam time and make sure you can do every single question.