How do you get an A* in Biology A-Level?

I'm doing biology in Year 13 now but last year I got AAAA at AS Level.

I revise by using flashcards and past papers mainly.

Flashcards are great for memorising facts and definitions. There's two main ways people use them: Write an exam question on the front and the markscheme on the back OR making their own little fact check questions with answers on the back e.g. "What sugar is in DNA?" then on the back "Deoxyribose sugar". I personally use the second type.

Past paper questions are the best thing you could probably do. I do AQA biology and my spec is very specific about what it needs to get a mark. The best way to get used to what they want in an answer is to do past questions and mark them yourself using the mark scheme.

I found that going to my local library with a mate was also really helpful in revision as there's much less distractions than at home. We go every Tuesday and Sunday and it helps out so much!

Mindmaps were also really helpful in making concise notes on each topic. I would allow myself one A4 page to put all of the key details on to make sure I was only getting what I needed down and no extra waffle. Download the specification off the website of your exam board to help you understand what you need to know. You can also use this as a kind of checklist of what you know and don't, colour coding green for confident, orange for a little more revision and red for need to revise now!

Hope I've helped and if you have any more questions just ask!

I'm doing biology in Year 13 now but last year I got AAAA at AS Level.

I revise by using flashcards and past papers mainly.

Flashcards are great for memorising facts and definitions. There's two main ways people use them: Write an exam question on the front and the markscheme on the back OR making their own little fact check questions with answers on the back e.g. "What sugar is in DNA?" then on the back "Deoxyribose sugar". I personally use the second type.

Past paper questions are the best thing you could probably do. I do AQA biology and my spec is very specific about what it needs to get a mark. The best way to get used to what they want in an answer is to do past questions and mark them yourself using the mark scheme.

I found that going to my local library with a mate was also really helpful in revision as there's much less distractions than at home. We go every Tuesday and Sunday and it helps out so much!

Mindmaps were also really helpful in making concise notes on each topic. I would allow myself one A4 page to put all of the key details on to make sure I was only getting what I needed down and no extra waffle. Download the specification off the website of your exam board to help you understand what you need to know. You can also use this as a kind of checklist of what you know and don't, colour coding green for confident, orange for a little more revision and red for need to revise now!

Hope I've helped and if you have any more questions just ask!

Are you aiming for an A*? Are you doing the new spec? If so, how do you use the past papers? Find it difficult to find papers on the relevant content I am studying at a certain time if you get what I mean.

Are you aiming for an A*? Are you doing the new spec? If so, how do you use the past papers? Find it difficult to find papers on the relevant content I am studying at a certain time if you get what I mean.

(I don't know if I mentioned but I'm on AQA Biology btw)

Personally, yes I am aiming for an A* but I'd be beyond happy with an A (which is what my teacher has predicted me)! And yes I am also on the new spec which makes everything just that much harder.

The past papers aren't actually all that different from our spec. There are some new things that have been added in (like the phosphorus cycle for example) and old things that have been taken out but they are generally very similar and it's practice nonetheless. If anything it helps you get exam technique down. If you're looking for questions by topic, http://www.physicsandmathstutor.com/ is great (despite their name they do biology and chemistry stuff too) however there are a lot of old questions that we don't cover anymore so you'll have to pick and choose what is actually on your spec. As for old papers I don't believe they're on the website anymore so you can find them here https://freeexampapers.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1&Itemid=101&jsmallfib=1&dir=JSROOT/A-Level/Biology/AQA if you prefer to do them by paper and not topic. It's annoying that there's almost no papers for us but doing these questions is necessary practice anyway! Just answer the best you can and mark them yourself and it really helps with understanding what they want in each kind of question as the markschemes can be quite picky.

Hope I've managed to help out and anymore questions, feel free to ask!

Yeah I'm doing AQA too.

Ahh okay, thanks for your help!
Speaking of the phosphorus cycle, I see it mentioned onn the spec but it doesn't say we need to know it in detail like the nitrogen cycle, so how much do we really need to know?

(I don't know if I mentioned but I'm on AQA Biology btw)

Personally, yes I am aiming for an A* but I'd be beyond happy with an A (which is what my teacher has predicted me)! And yes I am also on the new spec which makes everything just that much harder.

The past papers aren't actually all that different from our spec. There are some new things that have been added in (like the phosphorus cycle for example) and old things that have been taken out but they are generally very similar and it's practice nonetheless. If anything it helps you get exam technique down. If you're looking for questions by topic, http://www.physicsandmathstutor.com/ is great (despite their name they do biology and chemistry stuff too) however there are a lot of old questions that we don't cover anymore so you'll have to pick and choose what is actually on your spec. As for old papers I don't believe they're on the website anymore so you can find them here https://freeexampapers.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1&Itemid=101&jsmallfib=1&dir=JSROOT/A-Level/Biology/AQA if you prefer to do them by paper and not topic. It's annoying that there's almost no papers for us but doing these questions is necessary practice anyway! Just answer the best you can and mark them yourself and it really helps with understanding what they want in each kind of question as the markschemes can be quite picky.

Hope I've managed to help out and anymore questions, feel free to ask!

thanks for the help .

I m in year 12 now ,about practicing past papers that you mentioned above ,how can you improve your wording of sentences and come across the right way to explain what you mean in an exam question .like I know the right answer in my head but how do I answer it correctly when I write it out so I get full marks .2) how doo you build a more deeper and strong knowledge between each section of the book i.e. between each topic ,like if you would need to answer a question regarding two topics where the understanding of one is needed in the other .
How do you improve on your basic knowledge of things in biology ,as that I what you need to get the higher grade and not be stuck at a D/C borderline ???

Getting the right answer to get all of the marks is really just practice! I have a friend who made flashcards with a generic mark scheme for generic questions/topics. For example she'd have one for enzymes where she'd list what would generally get you a mark e.g. Tertiary structure, active site, enzyme substrate complex, complimentary shape. You can do this by looking through mark schemes and seeing common marking points in topics.

I'm not quite sure if I've ever ran across something that requires strong links between two separate topics except the essay at the end of paper 3 in A2. I'd suggest that by revising each topic you'd begin to see links where things crossover.

As for getting into the higher grades I did a few things. Flashcards for everything and I mean everything. Go over a few a week and before you know it you can list off the stages of transcription or the binomial naming system! If you find your notes are quite full and dense, get an A4 bit of paper and mindmap the important parts for one topic. Don't allow yourself more than a page of A4 and cut out any unnecessary information. This makes later revision much easier. And, I know I've said it before, but past papers are key. You're not going to do amazingly on everyone and that's fine! It's part of the learning process. I find I remember my mistakes better than my successes anyway so failing a question is key to remembering what to do next time!

If you feel that you're not getting enough information from your lessons, grab a textbook and find the section on your topic. Read through and see if any important details were missing. Also do this if you don't understand something in class (or ask the teacher). Print out the specification and split it into the topics. Colour code it once you've done that part of the course, green for I understand well, yellow for I'm not 100% confident and red for really need to go over this again. This will really help you visualise what you need to know and what you already know well so you can adapt your revision accordingly.

Hope I've helped and feel free to ask more questions!

Do you have a grow your grades blog? If not, I think you should make one. You give some really useful advice!

Haha, no I don't but thank you for the compliment! I thought about it at one point but I knew I either wouldn't spend enough time on it or spend too much time and too little on work (I have very little self control lmao). If you have any questions or need any advice feel free to post here or DM me tho, it's never a burden I just love helping people since I've been in the same situation!

Hi there I don’t have a problem with the biology I have problem with exam techniques for example for OCR we have suggest questions and these type of question are not from content they are applied content and I find it hard to apply content is there anyway to master apply content technique

Thank you so much

Are you aiming for an A*? Are you doing the new spec? If so, how do you use the past papers? Find it difficult to find papers on the relevant content I am studying at a certain time if you get what I mean.