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Rosie's Journey to Growing My Grades






:badger::badger: WELCOME:badger::badger:






Hello everyone, I'm Rosie and in the summer of 2017 I will be sitting my A-Levels (A2). And have mocks on the week commencing Monday 28th November 2016.
I have decided to study Business Management at University and have recieved all 5 conditional offers!

Universities:

University of Birmingham: AAB
University of Warwick: AAB
Coventry University: ABB
Aston University: AAB
University of Worcester: 112 points

MEGs(Minimum Expected Grades [My School's Alternative to Targets])

Business Studies (AQA): A
Psychology (AQA): A
English Literature (Edexcel): B
General Studies B (AQA): B

My Personal Goals:

Business Studies: A*
Psychology: A
English Literature: A
General Studies: B

AS Attained Grades:

Business Studies: B
Psychology: B
Philosophy and Ethics: B
English Literature: D
General Studies: D

As much as my head of year debated with me, I insisted on dropping Philosophy and Ethics as I enjoyed English much more, and wanted the challenge of getting the grade I desire in English. Nothing worth doing is easy right?

About Me:

So as you know my name is Rosie, I'm 17 and go to a fairly average state school. I live in a normal but big town, and suffer from panic disorder and anxiety. I try not to let this get to me, and try to have a positive outlook on my studies.

I'm completely open to tips on ways I can improve my revision so please post if you feel I can improve in anyway!




Thank you and good luck everyone!


(edited 7 years ago)

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Reply 1
Great inspiration here, especially with your anxiety and it's great that you're thinking positively too :h: Those are some top unis you're applying to and you've got great grades to show as well, good luck in your journey and we'll be looking forward to hearing updates :smile:
This week has been rough, I have unfortuantely not been sleeping well, and had to have my boyfriend who lives 3 and 1/2 hours away come and see me to make me feel better, I had to take today (Monday) off school as the stress of A-Levels and my mocks has been building up on me, however on a successful note I have kept to doing my homework on the day it is set and so I am feeling a lot less stress now from it all. Hopefully this week will be more successful in terms of revison, spending my frees tomorrow doing catch up from todays work and revising my AS Business content.

Trying to remain positive depsite having an unproductive week, anyone have any tips on stress management for A-Levels?
So revision for mocks has been much better today, I decided to work at my kitchen table today due to a brighter light now that the evenings are darker and much more space than my desk. IMG_0632.JPG
Revision has been going well, I have been making A3 revision mind maps for each section of my mocks and have been watching tutor2u online videos to help me.
Finally been given my mock dates:
Monday 28th November: Business
Monday 28th November: General Studies
Friday 2nd December: Psychology
Monday 5th December: English Literature

Very happy with the spacing between the mocks so I have a lot of time between them to concentrate on the forthcoming ones.
I am struggling a lot with stress at the moment and need some help, will hopefully get through it though!
Revision has been very successful, done A3 mind maps on all of my Business content AS and the A2 content so far, and completed my Schizophrenia flashcards for psychology. Tomorrow will be spent doing Business past paper questions, watching business videos and touching up on current business affairs.

Another development: I've decided to meditate each night before I go to bed, as a way to calm myself down and help with positive thinking!

Wish me luck!
3 mocks down and 1 to go, they've all gone really well so far, I'm hoping that will reflect well in my grades and I'm hoping to achieve at least AAC/AAB. Which should put me on the right track for the end of the year, if not better. Did a really good practise essay for my English Teacher and she asked me to type it up so I'll attach it here, I feel as though my English grade is grately improving and I feel much more confident about it. I also did a 42 slide Business revision powerpoint which I will also attach and found this was really helpful for me and I hope it will for others too. I will let you know how English went on Monday evening, and will post all my attained mock grades in one big post when I have them all.
I'm very sorry that's it's been over a month since I last updated! With everything going on with Mocks and then waiting for results and the compulsory relaxation in the Christmas holidays I never found the time to update this thread!

So Mock grades, I was a tad disappointed for one, but the rest were what I expected or even above that! I got AACC, however not in the subjects I expected.

The first A was in Psychology, which I was very pleased with, getting an A+, in particular, was great. Psychology at A-Level is just very easy for me, and revising is fun and the answers always seem to make sense, so I'm very proud of myself!

The second A was General Studies... However, this isn't a true reflection because last years General Studies was a D and I haven't been allowed a resit and because it's an old A Level I believe I'm capped to a B, so I feel as though I'm only going to get a C at the end of Year 13. However, none of my offers included it so it's just an added bonus if I get a fairly good grade.

Which leaves the two C's, one of them was Business, which I was sadly disappointed in, given I'm usually an A/B grade student and need an A at the end of the year. However, this paper included 2 x 25 mark essays which we had only done once before so over 1/2 marks were for these two essays, so I can't be disappointed, particularly since then I have improved one of those essays which would have bumped me up to at least a B, if not an A with the marks added on.

And my final C was for English Lit, which I was very pleased with, the C was a high one, and my revision and learning quotes paid off, particularly since I managed to do 4 analysis paragraphs, when at AS I only had time for 2. So my exam technique has obviously improved massively.

So overall the mocks weren't too bad.

I'm going to follow this with a second post all about my new revision timetable!
I bought a guide in the summer called How to Ace Your A-Levels, and it kinda went to the back of my mind, and I've tried revision timetables before reading this and they never worked really. I found them ineffective and rarely working for me. And this book highlighted why, I hadn't been repeating the content, I needed to go over it multiple times in order for it to stick into my long term memory for good. So using this guide I have came up with a layered revision timetable, that splits my content up so it is primarily all covered and secondly repeated. I have attached it and I believe it to be thorough. I hope you agree.
I have been super awful at updating this!
However, revision really hasn't been going well, I've been bogged down with English coursework, and feeling super down because of stress, and I'm just not doing that great at the moment.
However, I break up from school next week and so I'm going to be spending the whole week doing much more revision, so hopefully I can catch up!

Today, Warwick actually lowered my grade from AAA to AAB which is so good, however the course just isn't for me, so I'm still sticking with Birmingham I think. And I think Worcester is going to be my insurance.

I have a Warwick open day tomorrow (Wednesday 8th February) and a Birmingham one in the half term as well as Worcester in April.

In terms of grades I'm getting roughly at the moment they are very similar to what they were in my mocks.

Business: C (around 13% off an A)
Psychology: A
English Lit: C/B
General Studies: B

Really need to work on Business, however it's simply exam technique, I know all the stuff but it's just choosing relevant information. My Business teacher has said she isn't worried about any of our grades so I'm not going to, she knows I want at least an A, and I know I'm going to achieve that.

I have also decided to start meditating as much as possible to help with stress levels, hopefully will start that soon.

Talk soon

-Rosie
Hi, I'm in the same position as you, I got a D in english Last year but i didn't really revise as it was linear, I'm now on a grade B and I'm hoping to get an A in the summer. What exam board are you sitting for English?
Hi I'm on Edexcel! I'm hoping to get a B but I'm really struggling at the moment :frown:
So I firmed Warwick! Finally! And put Worcester as my insurance! Had a really tough few weeks as I just got broken up with :frown: It's been absolutely awful and I've been really struggling to revise :frown: hope it won't affect my grades too much, my first ever relationship of 7 months and he dumped me :frown: but I'm getting back on track now and hope it won't affect me getting my AAB.
Hey Same here! How comes you're struggling? The thing I'm struggling the most with is poetry, prose and drama I'm good at but I can't really grasp poetry and considering the weighting of it I need to go over it.
I just don't know what I'm doing wrong to not get me up to the B grade. Like I'm doing what the mark scheme says and yet my teachers are still putting me on a C :frown: I don't mind poetry, well the contemporary anyway. I hate the chosen poet (we're doing Larkin) and I hate drama :frown:
Original post by bunchofrosies
I just don't know what I'm doing wrong to not get me up to the B grade. Like I'm doing what the mark scheme says and yet my teachers are still putting me on a C :frown: I don't mind poetry, well the contemporary anyway. I hate the chosen poet (we're doing Larkin) and I hate drama :frown:


it's the same with my teachers, but I am getting B grades yet they refuse to say I'm working on a grade B, I have a really harsh marker of a teacher so I guess maybe that's why. What are you studying for Drama and prose?
Dr Faustus, Antony and Cleopatra and Dracula and The Little Stranger what about you?
Original post by bunchofrosies
Dr Faustus, Antony and Cleopatra and Dracula and The Little Stranger what about you?


I'm doing Faustus too, if you have any questions about it feel free to ask ☺️
Original post by C Marlowe
I'm doing Faustus too, if you have any questions about it feel free to ask ☺️


Thank you! I just struggle with actual essay writing, like I know my points but it's making them clear
Original post by bunchofrosies
Thank you! I just struggle with actual essay writing, like I know my points but it's making them clear


Ah okay I see what you mean, you have the knowledge it's just trying to make it coherent.

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