Competition - post a photo you've taken of nature >>

My journey to good GCSE grades!

Hello. I am making this to keep track of my revision for my GCSEs. I will begin posting most weekdays starting in September. I take my GCSEs in May/June 2018.

My subjects are:
Maths - Edexcel
English Language - AQA
English Literature - AQA
Combined Science - Edexcel
Resistant Materials - WJEC
Computer Science - OCR
Child Development - AQA
French - AQA
Further Maths - AQA

I did Further Maths this year and I will post my result. I am hoping for an A^, but I think I might of only got an A* instead.

My end of year 10 mock results were:
Maths - 9
English Language - 3
English Literature - 3
Science - 8, 8
RE (we didn't have a mock in)
Resistant Materials - C
Computer Science - 6 (close to a 7)
Child Development - A*
French - 4
Further Maths (did mock in May before my exam) - A^

I am happy with all of my results except both English results, Resistant Materials and French. I would appreciate it if anyone could tell me any revision tips for these subjects.

Here are the grades I am trying to get in my GCSEs:
Maths - 8/9
English Literature - 7
English Language - 7
Science - 7/8
RE - 7
Resistant Materials - B/A
Computer Science - 8
Child Development - A*
French - 6
Further Maths - A* / A^

When I finish Secondary School I would like to go to my local Sixth Form and do A levels in:
Maths
Further Maths
Physics
Statistics

After Sixth Form I would like to study maths at university.

Thanks everyone :smile:

(edited 5 years ago)

Scroll to see replies

Reply 1

username2899906

Wow. You are actually able to get 9s. My school doesn't give them as they don't know how work will look for that grade. Plus different subjects seem to be doing different things with the grades. English takes my 6/7 target grade as what I should get at the end of year 11 but Maths take it as where I should be now.

Reply 2

Loci Pi

Original post by Goldfish4343

I got 236/240 on the mock exam and my maths teacher said it was a 9. Another student mentioned it to my form tutor (who is not a maths teacher) who then started telling me it was a 'fake grade 9' :s-smilie:

(I think she hates me lol). I put it as a 9 in the post but honestly I still don't think I deserved it, I was just good at the topics that came up as it was mainly algebra. We used the Edexcel mock set 1 from Autumn 2016.
I guess the boundaries and information regarding the grade 9 will be more clear once this years boundaries are released.
Do you have any tips for English? In our class we barely did any work for the Literature mock so nearly everyone got below a 5. My problem was timing and I spent like half my time on the 'An Inspector Calls' question. I also missed the first few minutes of the English Literature mock as me and some other year 10s had to give a speech in an assembly that morning.

Thanks :smile:

Reply 3

Onikaminaj

Hi. I am doing my gcses in 2018 as well.
Kind of random but do you feel like the 9-1 is considerably harder than the old spec?

Reply 4

username2899906

Original post by Mosope17

Hi. I am doing my gcses in 2018 as well.
Kind of random but do you feel like the 9-1 is considerably harder than the old spec?

I'm not finding them that hard. My only weak subject is German which I was made to do. They expect you to learn way too much vocabulary.

Reply 5

Loci Pi

Original post by Mosope17

Hi. I am doing my gcses in 2018 as well.
Kind of random but do you feel like the 9-1 is considerably harder than the old spec?

In French and English, yes. But for maths, science and computing, not really.

Reply 6

Loci Pi

In French we were given a list of about 60 vocab words and phrases to learn over the holidays. We will have a test, in English to French, in the first lesson back. Does anyone have any tips for effectively memorising them, as I would like to try and get full marks on the test?

Thanks :smile:

Reply 7

Onikaminaj

Original post by Loci Pi

You can try a website called Memrise. Or you can make flashcards on paper or on an website called Quizlet and then learn it pretty much daily.
My friend also likes to do a look over write thing.

Reply 8

Loci Pi

Original post by Mosope17

You can try a website called Memrise. Or you can make flashcards on paper or on an website called Quizlet and then learn it pretty much daily.
My friend also likes to do a look over write thing.

That looks good. I might use Quizlet :smile:

Reply 9

Loci Pi

I started my summer holiday revision today by doing a GCP maths sample paper (78/80) and doing an hour of answering practise questions for Biology :smile:

(edited 6 years ago)

Reply 10

Loci Pi

Today I did an hours worth of maths revision, answering the questions on similarity / congruence proofs and ratio from my CGP grade 9 targeted textbook. Also, this morning I did some questions in my Computer Science textbook about hardware, software, the CPU and the fetch, decode, execute cycle. I read the textbook pages about Python to revise for the controlled assessment.

I had a really weird dream last night about my Further Maths GCSE results. I dreamed that during the exam, I missed out a page at the back of both exams and each back page contained like 8 marks, and that would stop me from being able to get an A^. A few days ago I dreamed that my teachers gave me the wrong time to go to school and collect my results, and when I showed up there was only one teacher there who refused to give me my result and made we wait until September lol. :s-smilie:

I guess you could say that it's a sine that I'm going mad! :congrats:

(edited 6 years ago)

Reply 11

Onikaminaj

Original post by Loci Pi

I guess you could say that it's a sine that I'm going mad! :congrats:

I have the grade 9 workbook as well (Cgp edexcel) would you say it is useful/good? I have been kind of avoiding using it just bc I am paranoid I will not b able to do anyyy of the questions. Although in the real exam only one or 2 qs will b Grade 9.

Reply 12

Loci Pi

Original post by Mosope17

Not all of the questions in the workbook are what you would expect for grade 9 difficulty. Most of the questions are what I would call grade 7-9. For some of the questions it has a hint next to it so you know how to start the question. Using the grade 9 book has helped with my mock exams and tests a lot, because it has made me think more logically than I would have to be to solve easier questions. The mark scheme is quite detailed, but it only covers one method, not lots of alternative methods like in a real GCSE mark scheme. I would also recommend using the GCP practise papers.

Reply 13

livgotlost

Original post by Loci Pi

Enter all the vocabulary into Quizlet and use the "Learn" tool. By the end of the holidays (if you do it once through each day) you will know it amazingly!

Reply 14

Loci Pi

Original post by livgotlost

Enter all the vocabulary into Quizlet and use the "Learn" tool. By the end of the holidays (if you do it once through each day) you will know it amazingly!

Thanks

I found Quizlet a few days ago on a Youtube video's comments. It's been very helpful.

Reply 15

Loci Pi

UPDATE: I have got my Further Maths result back. I got an A^, although I am a bit surprised at how high the boundaries were.

Now I have done FM I am going to self teach the A level stuff in preparation for sixth form. I have covered C1, C2, C3 and part of S1.

I have bought 2 new workbooks from CGP. These are the AS level maths workbook and the new spec GCSE 9-1 workbook (not the grade 9 book as I mentioned previously).

In the next few days I will be ordering back to school supplies. I go back to school on the 5th of September.

Reply 16

Eulogy

Original post by Loci Pi

Good on you for getting the A^ after so much stress. Do you think it's worth learning the old spec of maths if you're going to be doing the reformed spec.

Reply 17

Loci Pi

Original post by Eulogy

Good on you for getting the A^ after so much stress. Do you think it's worth learning the old spec of maths if you're going to be doing the reformed spec.

Thanks. When I started learning the new spec maths I used an old spec textbook. Then when I finished that I learned the maths that was new to the spec. :smile:

Reply 18