When you're revising for your GCSE exams, you want to make the most of your study time.

So, we invited the experts at the AQA exam board to share their tips and advice on preparing for GCSE Geography exams.

The article that follows has been written by an AQA curriculum expert, based on their years of experience in the assessment of their subject.  

You can find more articles in this series, covering a range of subjects at both GCSE and A-level, over on our revision section.

Also on The Student Room, you can find student discussion of 2024 GCSE exams.

Make sure you’re answering the question properly by paying attention to the command words and the context. For instance…

• “Explain” means to give reason(s).
• “Assess” means to give an informed judgement.
• “Justify” means to give reasons why you support a particular decision or opinion.
• If the question uses the phrase ‘…to what extent…’ make sure that who address this, such as ‘…I agree with this statement to a large/small extent because…’

In Section C of Paper 1 and Paper 2, make sure you only answer the right questions for the optional units you’ve studied.

Recognise the importance of taking time to think and plan answers to 6 and 9-mark questions.

Think about your overall decision if appropriate (e.g., do you agree or disagree? How much do you agree?). In this type of question, it doesn’t matter whether you agree or disagree; the important thing is to use clear evidence to back up your view.

Consider what information might help you show the examiner the reason for your decision. It’s important that you can confidently say why you’ve come to that conclusion.

Don’t spend too much time writing an introduction to your answer, but always remember to include a conclusion. However, your answer should be well organised and structured, and written in a logical way.

If you’re not sure what the question is asking, cross out the words you don’t know and see what’s left – can you recognise key words, or case studies or concepts that you can write about?

When writing answers to 4, 6 and 9-mark questions, use sentences, not bullet points. Include facts from named examples or case studies if asked to do so in the question.

But, if you can’t remember an example or case study, you can still earn marks for answering the question in more general terms, using evidence to back up each point.

If there is a figure to look at (like a map, photo, or graph) make sure to reference it in your answer and include evidence based on what you can see.

Take time when you’re revising key facts and figures and select the information that’s appropriate to the question being asked. Don’t just tell the examiner everything you know about your case study; stop and think ‘does this help to answer the question?’

Also, remember that you can use information from a case study or example in any question in the exam, even if the question doesn’t specifically ask for it. If you feel that it would help you in your response, use it.

Become familiar with the geographical terms and know how to define them. Build up a glossary of words for each topic.

Create revision cards, mind maps, flow diagrams and mnemonics to help you learn processes and difficult concepts.

If a question asks you to use a figure (image, graph, map, data etc.), make sure you refer to it in your answer. You can use phrases such as ‘I can see from figure 1 that…’ or ‘figure 1 shows that…’’ and take care to be accurate and specific.

If a question asks you to calculate a value, you can use a calculator, double-check your working to make sure you haven’t made any errors. If the question is worth more than 1 mark, make sure to write down any working out.

Be accurate when rounding numbers.

Take care when reading your paper not to miss questions that require you to fill in a table or graph or annotate an image.

Take a pencil and a ruler into the exam with you and use them when you’re completing diagrams or drawing straight lines.

The best way to do this is to practice lots of these types of questions when you’re revising.

When you’re revising, don’t forget to spend some time making sure you’re familiar with the pre-release booklet. Practice questions where you need to use information from different pages in the booklet.

Always have a go at the 9-mark decision-making question and make sure that your answer supports your opinion. The best answers to these questions use information from different sources in the booklet, with detailed development in your own words.

Do make sure that, when you’re reviewing fieldwork for both physical and human geography, you’re able to justify all parts off your fieldwork enquiry:

• Why did you investigate that particular geographical issue?
• Why were the methods you used appropriate?
• Why was it better to present your data the way that you did?
• What did your results tell you about your investigation?
• If you were to make changes to your investigation, how would these changes have an impact on your overall conclusion?

It’s important to think about these types of questions and not just say where you went and what you did.

Some questions may make links between different parts of your investigation, such as the extent to which data collection methods helped you reach valid conclusions.

Make sure you know the titles of your physical geography and human geography investigations.

Don’t worry about questions you’re unsure about. The important thing is that you come back to them and have a go at an answer.

If the question is multiple-choice, eliminate the answers you know are wrong and choose your answer from the ones you have left.

If you’re unsure about the information from a case study, or the correct case study to use, think about it, plan how you might respond and try to write the best answer you can.

Remember, to get your marks for spelling, punctuation, and grammar, you need to attempt the questions that have these marks added to them. These are added to some of the 9-mark questions, and you can spot these by looking for [+SPaG (3 marks)] next to the question.

For Paper 1 and Paper 2, the number of marks available is roughly equivalent to the number of minutes in the exam. Therefore a 9-mark question should take no longer than 9-10 minutes to complete. Don’t spend too long on the earlier questions and run the risk of running out of time later.

Paper 3 has more time for the amount of marks available. The additional 15 minutes is to allow you to refamiliarise yourself with the pre-release material to use in the response to the questions in Section A, read and understand the unfamiliar fieldwork contexts and think about the details of your own fieldwork investigations in Section B.