Year 12s: what will be the first way you research your future options? >>

The Journey to Success.

Welcome to my Grow your Grade thread.

I will be documenting my journey to get the best grades I can at the end of Year 12 from the internal exams (basically between A*AAA-A*A*A*A*). They aren't AS exams so I plan for the A*s unless the highest I can get is still an A but whatever.

GCSEs were meh for me because I had worked from the beginning and didn't exactly get what I wanted (even though they were more than enough to do my subjects and I had pretty serious circumstances but I hate using that excuse because crap happens to everyone at some point in their life and I should have done better regardless of what happened).
.
The subjects I am currently taking are:

- Edexcel A Level Maths
- Edexcel A Level Further Maths (After school)
- AQA A Level Physics
- OCR Computer Science

I might do a weekly update instead of daily because it'd be more conveient for me and I can just cram it into all one big post. Every Friday.

Thank you for reading and hopefully you find my thread interesting enough to keep reading as I work for my goal.

(edited 6 years ago)

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Reply 1

qam

aqa is the easiest exam board ever , it ll be so easy you ll be fine

Reply 2

GcseStudent9

Just out of curious, what did you get in your GCSE's, and GOOD LUCK ON YOUR JOURNEY :smile:

Gary

Reply 3

usfbullz

Original post by qam

aqa is the easiest exam board ever , it ll be so easy you ll be fine

Difficult or not, I plan to perform to the best of my ability.

Original post by GaryYeh

Just out of curious, what did you get in your GCSE's, and GOOD LUCK ON YOUR JOURNEY :smile:

Gary

Thank you. Also: gone now because i dont like them

(edited 6 years ago)

Reply 4

qam

AQA is actually easy on another level , just do all the available past papers after your revision , then start doing IAL's or MEI past papers master everything

Reply 5

usfbullz

Week 1:
- Made my revision timetable for Week A and B. [Monday]

- Did lots of homework [Tuesday]

- Did homework in my free periods for 2 hours. [Wednesday]

- Did Further Maths revision for 3 hours at home (going over stuff that I didn't
understand due to my teacher speeding through it; he says he has to in order to finish the content on time). [Wednesday]

- Did past paper questions on topics I've learnt over the past week. [Wednesday]

- Did Core 1 and S1 homework in maths (took a while) [Thursday]

- Bought more exercise books so that I could have one per module for maths/further/physics. [Friday]

- Did all my homework tonight in Maths/Further Maths. [Friday]

- Did my mechanics homework in Physics and my FDE work in Computer Science. [Saturday]

- Made Further Maths notes and stuck them on my wall to remember. [Sunday]

- Did more homework that wasn't finished on Friday/Saturday. [Sunday]

(edited 6 years ago)

Reply 6

GcseStudent9

Original post by usfbullz

Difficult or not, I plan to perform to the best of my ability.

Thank you. Also: gone now because i dont like them

Wondering if i can have your help, cause im struggling in english lang and lit ^^
PM me for details :smile:

Reply 7

usfbullz

Original post by GaryYeh

Wondering if i can have your help, cause im struggling in english lang and lit ^^
PM me for details :smile:

I'm not very good at English and I really do not want to remember it.

Sorry dude

Reply 8

usfbullz

Week 2:
- Went over my notes from Mechanics module Physics in my frees. [Monday]
- Did homework. [Tuesday]
- Went over notes from Mechanics and Particle Physics at home. [Wednesday]
- Did Past Paper questions in FP1 during my frees. [ Wednesday]
- Read ahead in Stats 1 in Maths. [Wednesday]
- Did more homework [Wednesday]
- Revised Mechanics. [Thursday]
- Did my Computer science homework which involved coding. I really enjoyed it and I am really excited to learn more :biggrin:

[Friday]
- Did some Further Maths homework and revision afterwards because I have a test this coming Tuesday. [Saturday]
- Did 2 hours of Particle Physics revision. [Saturday]
- Did Further Maths revision. [Sunday]
- Did some Stats revision. [Sunday]
- Did Core Maths Homework. [Sunday]

Thoughts so far: Physics is taking becoming really interesting and I'm excited to learn more. Core Maths hasn't really picked up yet as we're just recapping over GCSE stuff. Also stats is really boring for me. Further is a challenge as expected. Computer Science is fun.

Stay tuned folks.

Reply 9

usfbullz

Week 3:
- Did Mechanics homework in my frees. That was legit fun to do. [Monday]
- Did past paper questions for Matrices and that went pretty well. [Monday]
- Looked over my code for CompSci [Monday]
- Read ahead in Further Maths [Tuesday]
- Did some homework at home and Computer Science revision for a test soon. [Wednesday]
- Did some Further Maths revision/homework. [Thursday]
- Revised Mechanics physics by doing past paper questions for about 2-3 hours. Used physicsandmaths tutor to do it. [Thursday]
- Revised Computer Science for an hour.[Friday] - Revised Complex numbers from FP1 for about an hour. [Friday]
- Did 2 hours of Particle Physics revision. [Saturday]
- Did some Stats past paper questions. [Saturday]
- Did some Computer Science past paper questions for an hour. [Sunday]
- Did some Mechanics past paper questions. [Sunday]

Thoughts through the week: Had a test on Tuesday it was meh for me. CompSci has picked up and is getting more and more interesting. Got my results from the test on Tuesday and got 71% . I made a lot of dumbass mistakes so I have a lot to work on. Didn't do much on Wednesday as I felt content with my effort for Further and also I was extremely tired so I did some homework then called it a night and watched some japanese drama (guilty). Thursday was cool.

Another thought I had was "is it worth me spending a lot of time revising now?" because at GCSE, even though I put in more work than anyone, I didn't get what I wanted. I just hope its not the same for A Level.

Anyways, do you guys want me to do daily updates instead of weekly? (don't know why it matters though because nobody reads this lol)

(edited 6 years ago)

Reply 10

_gcx

Study Forum Helper

Good luck! Nice to hear you're enjoying maths. :h:

Reply 11

usfbullz

Original post by _gcx

Good luck! Nice to hear you're enjoying maths. :h:

Thank you.

Also apologies for the extremely late response, don't have my notifications turned on for this thread. Also I bookmarked your website for maths notes, looking forward to it!

Reply 12

usfbullz

Week 4:
- Did Particle Physics/Mechanics past paper questions in my frees. Did alright on them. [Monday]
- Did 2 hours of Core Maths revision by doing past paper questions from physicsandmathstutor. [Monday]
- Did an hour of Computer Science revision/past paper questions. [Monday]
- Did practise questions from FP1 and Mechanics/Particle physics during my free periods. [Tuesday]
- Did more past paper questions during my free. [Wednesday]
- Did revision on Computer Science/Complex numbers during my frees. [Thursday]
- Did some FP1 revision after school. [Thursday]
- Did nothing on Friday since our Year Group had a school trip. [Friday]
- Did FP1 revision. [Saturday] - Did Stats Revision. [Saturday]
- Did Computer Science revision. [Saturday]
- Did FP1 questions (Roots and Coefficients) and it went really well. Did it for about 2 hours. [Sunday]
- Did Stats revision for a test on Tuesday (gaben have mercy). [Sunday]

Other thoughts throughtout the week: Had a test on Wednesday for Core Maths. Straight forward enough but I probably made dumb mistakes like usual. Had a test on Thursday for Physics, went horrible for me as I made dumb mistakes like I always have which has resulted in me getting lower grades than I should have gotten. Oh well.... We started Chapter 3 in Further Maths which is the Roots of Polynomials. A little pissed off about how there are sometimes little resources for particular topics in maths and the teacher expects us to learn it by ourselves..

Stay tuned.

(edited 6 years ago)

Reply 13

_gcx

Study Forum Helper

Original post by usfbullz

Thank you.

Also apologies for the extremely late response, don't have my notifications turned on for this thread. Also I bookmarked your website for maths notes, looking forward to it!

Glad that someone likes it :h:

Original post by usfbullz

A little pissed off about how there are sometimes little resources for particular topics in maths and the teacher expects us to learn it by ourselves...

Indeed, that was my motivation for starting the notes :tongue:

Reply 14

usfbullz

Week 5:

-Did Stats revision. Monday]
-Did FP1 revision. [Monday]
-Did two hours of Computer Science Revision. [Tuesday]
-Did FP1 revision. [Tuesday]
-Did FP1 revision. [Wednesday]
-Did some core maths revision. [Thursday]
-Did FP1 revision. [Thursday]
-Did two hours of Computer science revision. [Friday]
-Did two hours of Mechanics questions for physics, it went really badly.. [Saturday]
-Did some stats revision. [Saturday]
-Did FP1 revision. [Saturday]
-Did the entire particle physics test paper from PMT and got 86/110 which is about a B. [Sunday]
-Did Computer science revision. [Sunday]

Thoughts throughout the week: This week was so dead. Didn’t learn anything interesting since we just finished tests for all subjects so we haven’t started anything new yet. Further maths has been my priority this week since I actually learnt new stuff. Got my physics results back, got a C and was one mark off a B....... My curse had come back. I corrupted my hard drive in my laptop so this week has been chaotic as a result. Stats test went alright and I ****ed up on the complex numbers test.

Stay tuned for next time

Reply 15

usfbullz

Week 6:

Did Core Maths revision. [Monday]
Did FP1 revision. [Monday]
Did FP1 revision. [Tuesday]
Did Stats revision. [Tuesday]
Did FP1 revision [Wednesday]
Did Physics (Mechanics) revision. [Wednesday]
No revision [Thursday]
No revision [Friday
No revision [Saturday]
No revision [Sunday]

Thoughts throughout the week: Got a B in the Computer Science test, 5% off an A. At least I don’t have to retake. In Further Maths, we started chapter 4 which is sums and series. Interesting topic. I stopped revising around Thursday as I had family matters at home and I wanted some time off to enjoy my self. I watched so much anime.. I plan to get back into the usual routine tomorrow, I want the grades.

Stay tuned...

Reply 16

usfbullz

Week 7:
Did Core Maths revision. [Monday]
Did Computer Science revision on logic gates. [Mon]
Did FP1 revision. [Tue]
Did Stats revision. [Tue]
Did Quantum Physics revision. [Wed]
Did Stats revision. [Wed]
Did Sum and series revision. [Thurs]
Did Momentum past paper questions. [Thurs]
Did Core Maths revision. [Fri]
Did Computer Science revision. [Friday]
Revised matrices and roots of polynomials on top of sums and series for a test. [Sat]
Did Momentum revision by doing past paper questions. [Sat]
No revision. [Sunday]

Stay tuned folks.. (even though nobody cares)

Reply 17

usfbullz

Week 8:
Did FP1 revision. [Monday]
Did Particle/Quantum Physics revision. [Monday]
Did Proof by induction questions. [Tuesday]
Did No revision [Wed]
Did FP1 Revision [Thurs]
Did Momentum past paper questions on PMT. [Thurs]
Did 3 hours of Proof by induction past paper questions. (Was in a jolly mood) [Fri]
Did Past paper questions on Wave Physics. [Sat]
Did Core Maths revision for half an hour. [Sun]
Did Mechanics/Wave/Particle physics revision. [Sun]

Thoughts throughout the week: No Computer Science revision because we haven't actually learned anything new. First lesson was having a discussion on ethics as the teacher hasn't been given anything to teach us. Second lesson was going through our tests. Third lesson was cancelled because of stupid enrichment. That's the reality of it for CompSci at the moment. Further Maths never fails to keep me up to toes as I'm presented with new challenges. Physics has taken a interesting turn as well as we plunge into waves, we started off with calculating phase difference between two points over a distance. Stats is still dead, Core Maths is GCSE geometry at the moment..

SMC on Tuesday, don't really want to do it as I've actually never done it before but oh well.

Reply 18

usfbullz

Week 9:
- Did Core Maths revision on the factor theorem. [Mon]
- Did more proof by induction past paper questions [Mon]
- Did lots of coding, pseudocode and flowcharts. [Mon]
- Did no revision. [Tue]
- Did FP1 revision. [Wed]
- Did Wave Physics revision. [Wed]
- Did Stats revision. [Wed]
- Did complex numbers revision. [Thurs]
- Did Core Maths revision by doing Solomon Papers. [Fri]
- Did more coding and pseudocode. [Fri]
- Did modulus and argument questions [Sat]
- Did Mechanics SUVAT questions for Physics [Sat]
- Did coding and pseudocode and flowcharts [Sun]

Thoughts throughout the week: I actually need to relax with the FP1 revision because I'm having a bit too much fun doing them that I end burning myself out and making dumb mistakes in other subjects. I can't help it though since the other subjects aren't very interesting atm. Looked up sum of a series to infinity and learnt something interesting. Waves physics is a little confusing for me at the moment but I plan to go over the concepts again. SMC was ok, don't really care about it though. Was in a really **** mood on Wednesday. Thursday was alright, we started chapter 6 of FP1, we skipped chapter 5 since we haven't learnt integration yet in Core Maths. Friday was great in terms of lessons, I really enjoyed them. I was able to go home early on Friday because our maths teacher wasn't in and work wasn't set for us so the head of maths told us to go home. Weekend was alright.

If you want me to tag you then say something.

Stay tuned my readers.....

(edited 6 years ago)

Reply 19

usfbullz

Week 10:
- Did flow charts and rewrote notes into my book for Computer Science. [Mon]
- Did FP1 revision. [Mon]
- Did Wave Physics revision. [Mon]
- Did FP1 revision. [Tue]
- Did Core Maths revision [Wed]
- Did Wave Physics revision [Wed]
- Did No revision. [Thurs]
- Did Coding [Fri]
- Did FP1 revision. [Sat]
- Did Coding [Sun]
- Did FP1 revision. [Sun]

Thoughts throughout the week: This week's revision has mostly been homework.

Want to improve my problem solving skills but have no idea how to. I was so ****ing pissed off on Saturday because there was something I didn't understand and it ruined my whole day. To be honest, sometimes I wonder what is the point because no matter how much I revise, there will be people who are just natural at it and can easily achieve what they want. I know I said something like "wanting to attend Cambridge" but that's just a load of **** if I can't get the grades. I mean can someone like me really get there in the end? No (in my opinion).

I think I understand how the year 13s feel when year 12s speak about going to Oxbridge like it's some realistic goal or some **** (but there is a person on TSR that I think has the most realistic chance out of everyone I know of getting in). At least anime can make me feel better. I may drop Further Maths but I don't actually want to.

Man I'm in a *****y slump at the moment... I am sorry if anyone is offended by what I've expressed in this short paragraph.

Let's hope this coming week is slightly better although I have two FP1 tests coming this week.