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If You Are Good At Chemistry Please Read.

i find chemistry immensely difficult. it'd be far to say i do pretty much no work for subjects like english and psychology and do just fine. chemistry i dedicate ALL my time to and i get nowhere. i know i'm not stupid, i feel i just don't know to revise it properly. with the final A2 exams just around the corner pleeease tell me some effective ways to revise chemistry, preferabely if you often do well in chemistry:

Reply 1

Ariana123

12

what exam board are u on?

Reply 2

ninety_nine

OP

12

AQA.

i think there's only one specification on AQA for Chemistry.

i have the official AQA textbook for AS/A2 etc. but i'm just unsure of the best way to revise! biology's a lot easier - a lot of the time they're rehearsed answers, same pretty much for psychology. english is developing an analytic technique and using it.

CHEMISTRY THOUGH!?! ARGH!

Reply 3

Kolya

17

There is a body of facts that you need to memorize; if you do not memorize those facts then you are just throwing away easy marks on the exam.

Reply 4

Colourspinner

2

For organic chemistry, put everything you've learnt on a piece of A3 paper and stick it somewhere you'll see at least once every day. This will help you see the relationship between all the reactions you've learnt and because you see them so often, you'll soon learn them all by heart without realising.

Reply 5

Joe555

13

Chemistry does suck! I must admit, it's basically a memory game, just memorise everything. ie. Aclyation conditions etc. That's all chemistry is! - a memory test

Reply 6

Formica

1

I got an A in Chemistry (Nuffield) last year just by memorising Student Unit Guides 1 and 2. In hindsight the memorisiation approach would've been much stronger with more supplementary exam question practise and reading around the subject.

Reply 7

Ariana123

12

i'm doing AQA chemistry A2 at the moment as well and basically the collins revision books (tiny red books, that the exam is written from), i just memorise them, i don't even pay attention in class and it got me A's in AS, obviously A2 is a bigger jump and much harder, but i still rely on these books, you can get them from amazon..... hope i helped =) (you can get similar ones for biology too!)

Reply 8

Funguy

1

I used those Collins revisions guides last year and they got me no where!!

Reply 9

nexttime

22

chemistry is about memorizing facts?? what about biology! i can probably fit everything i need to know for a chem exam on 2 A4 sides - bio takes at least ten (and that's very compact)
i do a different exam board but for me chem is hard, so good understanding and application is what you need rather than facts. maybe OCR is just really different
i just do exam papers, note what i got wrong and why, look it up if i have to, and write what i need to learn on the front of that paper, and it works well (i like to think so anyway)

Reply 10

Ariana123

12

yeah doing past exam papers and noting down what u don't know, then learn that. AQA basically have the same questions throughout the years just worded differently!

Reply 11

randdom

20

As hard as it might be with chemistry to work effectively you have to start by actually trying to learn what is in the books learn the concepts. I used flash cards which had questions on the front and then the answers on the back. Also for the mathmatical questions make sure you have done lots of practices and you know exactly what you need to be doing.

Once you have done that then it is time to work on past papers. Get your hands on as many past papers as you can and work through them taking note of the correct answers. This is useful as it lets you know where your areas of weakness are and also questions are sometimes repeated.

Reply 12

starsilver

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! PAST PAPERS !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :biggrin:

+ colourspinners idea of putting things around your room so you see them every day is good!

Also, try to work out what kind of learning memory you have... e.g. i have a very visual learning so i have to write things out and draw diagrams to revise.

Reply 13

ninety_nine

OP

12

Colourspinner

For organic chemistry, put everything you've learnt on a piece of A3 paper and stick it somewhere you'll see at least once every day. This will help you see the relationship between all the reactions you've learnt and because you see them so often, you'll soon learn them all by heart without realising.

could you fit most organic chemistry onto A3? are you talking flow charts etc?

Reply 14

ninety_nine

OP

12

Fairy_Pop

i'm doing AQA chemistry A2 at the moment as well and basically the collins revision books (tiny red books, that the exam is written from), i just memorise them, i don't even pay attention in class and it got me A's in AS, obviously A2 is a bigger jump and much harder, but i still rely on these books, you can get them from amazon..... hope i helped =) (you can get similar ones for biology too!)

YES! i had those and they were great, except they're so compact they assume a lot of knowledge already i think. does memorising them actually work? i can see how it might, it does include everything you need to know for the exam.

Reply 15

ninety_nine

OP

12

nexttime

chemistry is about memorizing facts?? what about biology! i can probably fit everything i need to know for a chem exam on 2 A4 sides - bio takes at least ten (and that's very compact)
i do a different exam board but for me chem is hard, so good understanding and application is what you need rather than facts. maybe OCR is just really different
i just do exam papers, note what i got wrong and why, look it up if i have to, and write what i need to learn on the front of that paper, and it works well (i like to think so anyway)

generally i find people find biology far easier then chemistry (easy to compare because a lot of people combine the two subjects for say: medicine, dentistry, vet sci etc.) i like biology because it's more wordy and less mathematical. you can't 'blag' biology but once you've learnt it, it requires less rehearsal than something like chemistry that you must come back to every two days or it WILL be forgotten :frown:

Reply 16

Colourspinner

2

ninety_nine

could you fit most organic chemistry onto A3? are you talking flow charts etc?

Yes I mean flowcharts. It's absolutely possible to fit all A2 organic chemistry onto A3. Start with alkanes and alkenes in the middle, and keep it simple. Personally I prefer not putting reagents in the flowchart as they take up too much space. But do whatever that works best for you :smile:

Reply 17

ninety_nine

OP

12

Colourspinner

Yes I mean flowcharts. It's absolutely possible to fit all A2 organic chemistry onto A3. Start with alkanes and alkenes in the middle, and keep it simple. Personally I prefer not putting reagents in the flowchart as they take up too much space. But do whatever that works best for you :smile:

thanks for the tip :smile:

Reply 18

nexttime

22

ninety_nine

generally i find people find biology far easier then chemistry (easy to compare because a lot of people combine the two subjects for say: medicine, dentistry, vet sci etc.) i like biology because it's more wordy and less mathematical. you can't 'blag' biology but once you've learnt it, it requires less rehearsal than something like chemistry that you must come back to every two days or it WILL be forgotten :frown:

well i tend to be more mathsy anyway but your right - you cant blag biology coz there's jus so many key words etc, and the mark schemes tend to be stupid and make me angry :mad:

but just learn chem and then keep re-reading, and i would say its much easier

Reply 19

ninety_nine

OP

12

nexttime

well i tend to be more mathsy anyway but your right - you cant blag biology coz there's jus so many key words etc, and the mark schemes tend to be stupid and make me angry :mad:

but just learn chem and then keep re-reading, and i would say its much easier

bio is difficult but it can be mastered better than chemistry i'd say. my mate got 300/300 in bio at AS but 291/300 in Chem - negligible difference but he said he'd doubled his effort for Chemistry.

If You Are Good At Chemistry Please Read.

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