Notes from text book - sufficient?

I've been making notes from the Biology OCR AS text book, which follows the specification that I'm doing. I always thought that if I know everything in the book then I'll be fine in the real exam. But today, I asked my biology teacher about this, but he said no, and that I'll have to revise from his notes as well, and that text book isn't sufficient to give you grade A. I was told by the physics teacher that the Physics OCR AS text book is enough to get grade A, so I'm confused. There may be a difference between biology and physics, but I doubt it. I'm pretty sure if I learn everything in the book I'm okay. But again, my bio teacher said, which I kinda do agree on, that if text book is all there is to know, then students won't have to come to bio lesson and make notes from his talks.

I don't know what to do, I spent such a long time taking notes off from text book, and I don't have sufficient notes in class, because I find the teacher speaks too fast.

Please give me some advice on what I should do... I really don't wanna waste time copying up stuff from other people's notes... it's gonne take me forever. :frown:

Reply 1

picju96

OCR biology textbook is only supposed to get you a C, or that's what my teacher told me anyway. Just make notes from lessons, i don't know how you were taught, mine was copying notes off the board from the teacher then making notes on his explainations, along with presentations that we did that we had to research, which is helpful as it is reading around the subject. The textbook only gives you the basics, i found i needed to read more because often it didn't make sense, or miss out vital bits.

Reply 2

fionah

Bit of a stupid text book if you ask me!!

Reply 3

Missy B

I have the OCR (green) text book for AS, and I think it's pretty good. You can get a grade A from it.. if you know the book inside out, and if you do a lot of exam practise. I think exam practise is the most important, as OCR tests you a lot on interpretating graphs from the knowledge you have gained throughout the course. It isn't just a simple comprehension.

But I find that the exam boards riducule the love of the subject. They create thin "text" books, and revision guides, knowing that the student will buy them, because they are from the board. the GCSE's "text" books are rubbish... simple bullet points listed that you have to know! As a test book? THat should be a revision guide... not a text book! Come on, what happened to actually interest students with deep down biology?

Reply 4

Helenia

20

I got something like 291/300 using the OCR green book, so your teacher is just being paranoid. Check the syllabus, but as far as I remember it covers pretty much everything :smile:

Reply 5

amyitfc

i did ocr as biol as last year, they told us (if i remember rightly) that if we knew everything in the textbook & could apply it to the questions given to us we should be able to get an A.

and i did. so don't worry. i think i used the textbook for main block of revision, then quickly looked at other notes, as well as doing practice questions. i prefer using the textbook (although i cant this year with geog & hist cos of lack of dedicated text books) for the course, cos at our school they have a habit of teaching us more than we need to know/stuff thats not relevant, which makes it confusing.

Reply 6

Mr White

7

Mikan18

I've been making notes from the Biology OCR AS text book, which follows the specification that I'm doing. I always thought that if I know everything in the book then I'll be fine in the real exam. But today, I asked my biology teacher about this, but he said no, and that I'll have to revise from his notes as well, and that text book isn't sufficient to give you grade A. I was told by the physics teacher that the Physics OCR AS text book is enough to get grade A, so I'm confused. There may be a difference between biology and physics, but I doubt it. I'm pretty sure if I learn everything in the book I'm okay. But again, my bio teacher said, which I kinda do agree on, that if text book is all there is to know, then students won't have to come to bio lesson and make notes from his talks.

I don't know what to do, I spent such a long time taking notes off from text book, and I don't have sufficient notes in class, because I find the teacher speaks too fast.

Please give me some advice on what I should do... I really don't wanna waste time copying up stuff from other people's notes... it's gonne take me forever. :frown:

Never even bothered to open mine. Ah, the joys of having a photographic memory. :smile:

Reply 7

DazzYaa7

for OCR physics i jst used the textbook issued us which was endorsed by OCR - that got me an A in as physics as well as practicing the past papers

and as for biology - well i did that subject in GCSE and its a case of using a combination of notes that your teacher gave you as well as using revision materials and other textbooks!

Notes from text book - sufficient?

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