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All 7,8,9s at GCSE - advice

Hey guys,
I got 9s in english literature and language, maths, biology, chemistry, physics, geography and religious studies, 8 in french and 7 in art. I'm happy to give advice on anything GCSE related!

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Reply 1

damnit1

What did you do during Easter for the three sciences :smile:

Reply 2

username4436614

How much hours of revision per day did you do in the Easter holidays and the days leading up to the exams?

Reply 3

asoar

For the sciences, I made went through all of my notes and flashcards, especially on the topics I struggled with. I watched freesciencelessons on youtube and went through each topic thoroughly. I particularly made sure I knew all of the required practicals very well, memorising all of the methods, and also tried applying the practicals to different topics as well to try and prepare me for any application questions they could ask - would highly recommend doing. Also, I did loads of past papers and exam questions from my cgp grade 9 workbook (again if you can, would recommend buying this). Hope this helped x

Original post by damnit1

What did you do during Easter for the three sciences :smile:

Reply 4

TakeMeToHogwarts

How did you revise for maths?

Reply 5

damnit1

by went through every note do you mean like reread?

Original post by asoar

Reply 6

EliteWhovian

How did you get 9s in Lit and Lang??? Thanks!

Reply 7

asoar

Firstly, just want to say I did not revise every day in the Easter holiday and would not recommend doing so as you will just get tired before the actual exams. On the days I revised I probably revised around 4-5 hours on average. Some days I did much less, some days I did more. I would say the days I did more, my revision was much less effective so if you want to spend a whole day revising, do it in chunks. Do a couple of hours, an hour break, repeat etc.
I did a lot more on the days leading up to the exams. The week before exams started, I was revising from when I got home till when i went to bed. BUT this was very stressful and although you should be revising at this time, you don't need to do that much as long as you do some now because even tho I tried revising, it was kind of useless as I was just stressing the whole time and I didn't really process much.

Original post by students118

How much hours of revision per day did you do in the Easter holidays and the days leading up to the exams?

Reply 8

TheHistoryNerd_

I've got mocks coming up soon, any advice on how to revise? I'm unmotivated and they're at the start of May! I usually just re-write a bunch of old notes but I feel like it's just not working. I want to do well on these mocks as the top 30 students go on a trip.

Reply 9

asoar

For maths, I mainly did exam questions. If you can I would recommend buying the cgp grade 9 workbook asap and doing all of those questions. If not, there are plenty online on websites like physicsandmathstutor and mathsgenie. I also watched youtube videos on math paper walkthroughs to see how people would approach the questions. Defore you do this though, make sure you are 100% solid on all of the basics; use mathsgenie for this. Also I made sure I revised the stuff I didn't know and didn;t waste time doing exam practice on topics I was good at.

Original post by TakeMeToHogwarts

How did you revise for maths?

Reply 10

AB2907

What would you recommend to year 10s who are aiming for grades as good as yours?

Reply 11

asoar

Yes. I learnt well by repeatedly reading things aloud until I could explain the topic to someone without my notes and use all of the correct terminology. Also forgot to mention, I did active recall of all the topics, so wrote down on paper what I could remember about a topic without looking at my notes and then went over anything I didn't remember.

Original post by damnit1

by went through every note do you mean like reread?

Reply 12

asoar

For Englih lit, my main advice would be to memorise a few really good analysis points for each text/poem you are studying. You can get some good ones from Mr Bruff, Mr Salles and Stacy Reay on youtube, or ones you have come up with yourself, or from teachers/classmates. Get these idea for a few quotes that are adaptable for each theme/character in each text/poem. You DON'T need to learn loads, just a few really good ones! For each analysis point and quote, make a mindmap, showing how they can connect to each character/ theme. Also, how they connect to the context as well - that is really important to get the high marks.
For english language, I read descriptive/narrative passages in books/online and analyse the language used to get into the habit of doing this to make it easier in the exams. For the descriptive writing section, I searched up descriptive writing inspiration images and picked random pictures and wrote descriptive/narratives about them. This actually helped me in the exam as I was able to write a similar description to what I had written before and had had my teacher mark and give improvements! For the articles/letter etc section, make sure you are familiar with the different formats of writing eg if you need to include titles and subheadings etc. Make sure you a familiar with the format for EACH type of writing. It should say on the spec of your exam board what types of writing they could ask you to do.

Original post by EliteWhovian

How did you get 9s in Lit and Lang??? Thanks!

Reply 13

Jacob960

When did you start revising? I’ve only got 4 weeks until my GCSEs and haven’t started revising, have you got any advice? Also i never actually revised for my mocks so I have no notes, other than thoae made in class. Thanks 😃

(edited 5 years ago)

Reply 14

asoar

Firstly, you need to find a long term source of motivation. The only way you are going to do good in exams is if you want good grades for a strong reason. Think about what you may want to do in the future, whether that be going to university, doing a specific job, doing an apprenticeship, starting your own business etc. Whatever it is, it probably will need decent grades, at least in english and maths. Even if you don't know what you want to do in the future, really just remind yourself that these exams and grades are going to be important for the next stage of you lives. Yes, you can still do amazing things without good grades, but it would be a lot easier with them!
Secondly, you need to STOP with the rewriting of old notes. It is not helping! Trust me! Instead, try different methods such as not looking at these notes, getting some scrap paper and writing down everything you remember from a topic. When you're done, look at your notes and see what you have missed and go over these things. This helps you focus your time on what you need more help on. Use the website quizlet for more active recall for subjects where you need to learn facts. There are online flashcards where there will most likely already be flashcards made by someone on your subject. Also, do more exam questions! You need to have good exam technique and need to know what the examiners want. Find some examiner reports for each subject online and see what common mistakes people have made in the past that cause them to lose marks. Hope this helped x

Original post by TheHistoryNerd_

Reply 15

asoar

Honestly, I would say just make your notes as you go along. Even doing them in the summer holiday will help a lot. You can also do some exam questions to get more of a headstart. However, I didn't really do much in year 10 except work hard in lessons and do my homework to the best of my ability. If you are doing any coursework based subjects like art, do as much as you can now so that you can have more time next year to revise for other subjects. Make sure you comfortable with your teachers as well because it makes it a lot easier to get help in year 11 when you need it. But, you really don't need to be doing much, I would actually say make sure to have fun - it's probably the last time in school that you are going to be able to chill. I'm in year 12 and you definitely do not get the amount pf relaxation as you do in year 10 so make the most of it!

Original post by AB2907

What would you recommend to year 10s who are aiming for grades as good as yours?

Reply 16

asoar

I probably started revising properly around march time. However, it is definitely not too late as long as you start revising now. Don't waste time trying to make any notes now, instead use ones that are already made, for example use the website/app quizlet. It has online flashcards that other people have already made and you can use. If you want actual flashcards, you can find some online and print them off. Use youtube videos for all subjects, particularly useful for sciences, maths and english. For essay based subjects, read exemplar answers and try to memorise ideas from them, or from youtube videos (eg ideas from Mr Bruff videos on youtube for english). Also, don't waste time revising things you already know. To find out what you don't know, look at the specification for each subject or look at the contents page on textbooks/revision guides to see all of the topics. First work on the ones you struggle with more. Write down what you can remember about each topic and then use revision guides/class notes/websites/videos to see what you don't. Make sure to focus on the things that you didn't remember. Just make sure you are focused from now on and use the Easter holiday wisely. Make sure to organise your revision so that you include everything. Hope this helped and good luck!

Original post by Jacob960

Reply 17

blixious

How did you structure your paragraphs for English Literature for the texts studied as well as the poetry anthology?
For English Language how did you also structure your answers for each of the questions?
For the creative writing aspects was there any specific techniques you used?