where to start with revision ?
hi,
so my college is letting me stay another year to resit my a-levels, and apply for uni next year (as i wasn’t interested in any of the uni courses offered at clearing). however, i’m a bit lost where to start for revision, and how much i should be doing this early into the year. is going through my notes and doing past papers my best bet? my grades weren’t bad last year, but i could’ve done a lot better.
thanks
so my college is letting me stay another year to resit my a-levels, and apply for uni next year (as i wasn’t interested in any of the uni courses offered at clearing). however, i’m a bit lost where to start for revision, and how much i should be doing this early into the year. is going through my notes and doing past papers my best bet? my grades weren’t bad last year, but i could’ve done a lot better.
thanks
(edited 4 years ago)
Going over notes just isn't the optimal method of revising at any point during the year and past papers are good but it might not be the best choice to do them this early on since if you have a limited amount of past papers you'll want to save these until the end so you can use them for mocks allowing yourself to be properly prepared for the actual exams.
A decent method to organise your time is to divide it into two sections: "the work set by your teachers" and "extra work". The extra work is as essential as the teacher work since a large part of your A-Levels is your independent study. You're in an easier position than you were in last year since you already completed your entire course and you have the experience of sitting all your A-Levels so it's really up to you how you balance out these two sections. One option would be looking at all the content within your courses and asking yourself what you understood the least, create a list of these and work on them in your spare time. I don't know what subjects you do but one way of doing this could be taking your textbook, re-writing all the notes on the topic (I found this gave me a fresh mental picture of the entire thing) then condense this into the aspects you need to remember and then put away these notes and try to write down everything you had after you condensed the topic (this is active recall and strengthens your long term memory on the topic you are covering). Another option would be taking specific types of questions you struggled with in the exams and working on them in your extra time.
The real answer is that it's mostly up to you. I don't know what subjects you do, what exam boards you do or what you struggled with so I can't give you much specific advice. There is no cookie cutter one size fits all guide to acing your A-Levels since every subject has it's own nuances and every student has their own method of learning and thinking. I'd say your best bet is to use the advantage you have, think back and identify what made you struggle last year so you can work on improving it now.
A decent method to organise your time is to divide it into two sections: "the work set by your teachers" and "extra work". The extra work is as essential as the teacher work since a large part of your A-Levels is your independent study. You're in an easier position than you were in last year since you already completed your entire course and you have the experience of sitting all your A-Levels so it's really up to you how you balance out these two sections. One option would be looking at all the content within your courses and asking yourself what you understood the least, create a list of these and work on them in your spare time. I don't know what subjects you do but one way of doing this could be taking your textbook, re-writing all the notes on the topic (I found this gave me a fresh mental picture of the entire thing) then condense this into the aspects you need to remember and then put away these notes and try to write down everything you had after you condensed the topic (this is active recall and strengthens your long term memory on the topic you are covering). Another option would be taking specific types of questions you struggled with in the exams and working on them in your extra time.
The real answer is that it's mostly up to you. I don't know what subjects you do, what exam boards you do or what you struggled with so I can't give you much specific advice. There is no cookie cutter one size fits all guide to acing your A-Levels since every subject has it's own nuances and every student has their own method of learning and thinking. I'd say your best bet is to use the advantage you have, think back and identify what made you struggle last year so you can work on improving it now.
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