1) How was year 11 for you?
I'm not going to lie: it was disgustingly stressful. Our school forced us into early-entry maths and English language in November, meaning that we had to cram in 2 years' worth of English coursework and exam preparation into about 6 weeks; this was a few weeks before our mocks as well, which we didn't get much time to revise for. By the end of the summer exam season, we were so exhausted that we were all snapping at each other constantly, so it wasn't that great. The leavers' events are quite nice though, and we've become closer as a year group and with the teachers as a whole.
2) How many exams did you sit?2 in June 2013, 3 in November 2013, about 13 for the December mock exams, and then for this summer... *counts* Wait... 21 written exams, plus a 10 hour art exam.
3) What advice will you like to give to the upcoming year 11s?
- Start revision early, and organise yourself from the very beginning. I bought a blank notebook (in retrospect, a diary would have saved me SO much time) and wrote the w/c in the corner of every double page. First, start with entering the dates of all your exams on the appropriate double-page spread; you'll be able to find these dates very early on, long before the official timetables are given to you. Then, on a separate piece of paper, write down each subject as a header, and then the modules that you have for each one. With this, you can work out how many weeks you have until each exam, and then divide the content up into chunks, giving yourself a 'to-do' list on each double-page spread. I personally didn't want a revision timetable as such because that would stress me out too much, but it saved so much time in the actual revision period to just look at the current week and see something like, "w/c April 4th - RE:Crime; Geography:Coasts; Biology:B1, unit 4" (for example). That way, I would know that I would only have to do that much work, I wouldn't burn out by doing too much early on, but that I would definitely get everything done. I started all this in about February with a few hours per day (mostly at the weekends at this point because I still had homework and coursework to get done), and then by study leave/holidays I was doing 6/7 per day.
- Do something to take your mind off revision! I do a lot of sport, and whilst my friends stopped training for the 2 months or so before and during exams, I carried on exactly the same as before, doing about 8 hours a week. It helped to stay in my usual pattern of doing things; the exercise helped me sleep; and it was nice to do something that was completely different to doing work!
- Don't talk to anyone directly before or after an exam. Just don't. For my first geography exam, my friends decided to cram the whole syllabus in the lunch break before, but they got so worked up walking to the hall that they couldn't remember what a volcano was. -.-
- Stick your revision notes on the wall: my whole wall was covered in posters and stuff, and it forced me to concentrate.
- Buy a treat for yourself after the end of exam season, and for after results day. The day of my last exam, I went out and bought Ed Sheeran's new album which came out that day, and then last week, once I got and was happy with my results, I bought an embarrassing amount of make-up and clothes. I NEED IT FOR SIXTH FORM, OKAY.
- Exam season won't last forever, and if you give up your social life for a little bit, everything will seem so much better when you go out afterwards, knowing you've earned it.
Wooo, long post.