trying to stay afloat except I&#x27;m on the titanic - jess&#x27; y13 gyg :) [2020/21]

OP

~things I've done this week~

MATHS
- finished the booklet our teacher had set us
- completed the mixed exercise for chapter 5 in the A2 textbook

GERMAN
- finished watching charité at war! was watching this to hopefully get some ideas for my IRP (no I still haven't decided what to do it on. oops?)

BIOLOGY
- did the practice questions in the textbook for chapters 11, 23 and 24!
- made some notes on the specification for those same chapters

so overall it doesn't look like a ton but these are the tasks I've been procrastinating ~forever~. as for general life stuff, I added some ideas to my personal statement and, thank god, finally passed my driving theory test! originally had it booked for march but uh... for obvious reasons it got cancelled extremely last minute. my plan for this final week of the holidays is honestly just to kind of chill out a bit, but ideally I'd look at some AS papers and have a go at them just so that I can sort of get back into the rhythm of things - and see exactly how much I've forgotten over the months of lockdown!

Reply 2

Hi,

I’m also going into Y13

Happy to be tagged and we can all go through this stressful year together :redface:

Reply 3

Getoutamaswamp

9

Hi I'm also in year 13 and will happily be tagged in GYG :wink:

Good luck!

Reply 4

jemima0103

18

I'm year 13 too. Can I be tagged please

Reply 5

studyingpeach

13

I'm in year 13 (I do maths and biology as well!) so I'd love to be tagged :smile:

x

Reply 6

StudentMania

10

I'm doing maths as well. Can I be tagged please :smile:

Reply 7

OP

sorry for not replying to your messages but i've added you all to the tag list :biggrin:

as a quick note before I do today's update, I'd love to change the title of this gyg to something more punny but absolutely can't think so any suggestions would be appreciated!! anyway on to the update

last week of the holidays:
I really don't remember much from it if I'm honest! I finally got a draft of my personal statement done (more on that later) which I'm so glad about! I've only included one book in it so I might read more and include that too but it really depends on a) how much space I have left and b) whether I have time and energy to find and read another book. other than that I just sort of generally spent time emotionally preparing myself to go back into school. and the most exciting update: I got two kittens!!

Spoiler

the one on top is Olive and the one below is Iris :smile:

I love them so much and they've settled in so nicely, they're curled up on the sofa next to me sleeping as I write this! so that's all I got up to in the last week of the holidays pretty much. now the reason I didn't update on Friday and instead waited until today is because today was the first day back! so thought it'd be nice to update on that so:

first day back at school!
didn't have to go in until 9:30 which was nice. we had form for p1 and 2 so I managed to narrowly avoid double maths - would certainly not have been an easy start to the term. we had an assembly which went over the covid rules and all that. they have the slogan 'if you use it, wipe it' which... doesn't feel like the best phrase to say in front of the whole year group in an otherwise 'serious' assembly. but we move. except we don't, because as a sixth form we are confined to one small 'bubble' in the school so all my subjects in this school have been moved into different classrooms which is.. fun. our common room has also been dismantled and it's generally harder to find a space to sit w your friends that isn't the silent library. I'm sure we'll figure it out.

I had double german, where we just sort of quickly recapped the topics we covered during lockdown (and man is my German rusty!! I need to get back into practicing it asap) and I got some advice for my IRP. I'm thinking of doing something about the role of women in Germany around wartime, but I need to develop a more specific question to base my research around. quite frankly I'm just glad to have a more solid base now!

I also had a free where I compiled a big timetable of all my friends' timetables (so we know where to find each other) and I also started my German homework, which is just some reading comprehension. overall a fairly chill day, but tomorrow I have all 3 of my subjects so it'll be a bit more intense. I'll be updating again on Friday so I'll have a bit more to say!

finally, I said I'd loop back round to my personal statement. I emailed my first draft to my tutor at break because she mentioned she was happy to read anything we'd written, and she actually had read it by the end of the day and gave feedback on it! she said it was pretty decent, she just thinks I should mention my other subjects more and how they actually relate to my desired course. which makes sense I suppose. so I'll edit that when I get a chance - luckily I have a little bit of wiggle room on character count atm, but I'm going to have to cut some stuff out I'm sure. and that was my first day back!! sorry if this is really rambly, it feels like I'm just using this as my personal diary except it's on the internet for anybody to read... so anyway. until friday!

tag list

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Reply 8

OP

week one: survived! my week Bs (this week) are busier than week As so it's been eventful! so here's a little run down of the week :smile:

biology
I'm actually so excited to study these new topics!! we're doing nerves and synapses and all the neuronal communication stuff with one of my teachers, and homeostasis with the other. considering I was looking into neuroscience this feels like kind of a big make or break topic as to whether I dedicate a whole degree to it or decide to take optional modules about it as part of a more general biological sciences degree. either way, it's actually really interesting so far, even though for the most part we've just been revising GCSE content. we did do a practical involving mealworms though which was... a fun time.

german
we've started our new topic of integration which I think is definitely more interesting than the whole environment and world of work stuff. we've also started doing more in depth studies into the characters of the play (der Besuch der alten Dame) so I've got some fun essay paragraphs to do about that. also did some grammar revision and I'm realising just how much I've forgotten over the summer/lockdown... time to dig up my old notes I suppose!

maths
we have the joy of 11 maths lessons a fortnight as opposed to the usual 9, which I suppose will be a good thing in the end because I need to revise maths the most but at the moment I'm not in the emotional headspace to be dealing with that. we started doing ch2 of A2 with one teacher and ch3 with the other - so we're doing modulus functions and arithmetic and geometric sequences and all that. it's actually not too bad but we're doing a lot of content in one lesson plus getting homework for each bit so it's a lot to be dealing with.

other life stuff
sent my first draft of my personal statement to my tutor so my goal for the weekend is to make the improvements she suggested! it's not as bad of a first draft as I thought it would be but at the same time I'm excited to just get it sent off. also had a driving lesson only for the school to ban leaving in the middle of the day for lessons so now I don't really know what to do. but on the plus side if we have a free fifth lesson we can leave at lunch so I have for sure taken advantage of that... and of course used the time to scroll tiktok. oh well.

I'm thinking I'll also do Sunday updates just to make myself do all my homework but that's it for this week! I feel like it was boring and rambley but I dunno, maybe somebody cares. see you in a couple days after I've inevitably avoided all my work and instead just cuddled with my cats! (who i think I'm slightly allergic to but... we move).
oh and if there's anything anybody things would make this gyg more interesting or more ~interactive~ just let me know! :biggrin:

tag list~

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Reply 9

sadforsadboys

18

Hello - can you please tag me? :h:

Reply 10

OP

Original post by emilynxlan

Hello - can you please tag me? :h:

of course! :biggrin:

Reply 11

XViconX

10

Hi i'm year 13 as well,good luck for this year! Can i get added to the tag list ? :smile:

Reply 12

OP

Original post by XViconX

Hi i'm year 13 as well,good luck for this year! Can i get added to the tag list ? :smile:

good luck to you too!! of course you can :^_^:

Reply 13

Original post by procrastinatingb

week one: survived! my week Bs (this week) are busier than week As so it's been eventful! so here's a little run down of the week :smile:

biology
I'm actually so excited to study these new topics!! we're doing nerves and synapses and all the neuronal communication stuff with one of my teachers, and homeostasis with the other. considering I was looking into neuroscience this feels like kind of a big make or break topic as to whether I dedicate a whole degree to it or decide to take optional modules about it as part of a more general biological sciences degree. either way, it's actually really interesting so far, even though for the most part we've just been revising GCSE content. we did do a practical involving mealworms though which was... a fun time.

german
we've started our new topic of integration which I think is definitely more interesting than the whole environment and world of work stuff. we've also started doing more in depth studies into the characters of the play (der Besuch der alten Dame) so I've got some fun essay paragraphs to do about that. also did some grammar revision and I'm realising just how much I've forgotten over the summer/lockdown... time to dig up my old notes I suppose!

maths
we have the joy of 11 maths lessons a fortnight as opposed to the usual 9, which I suppose will be a good thing in the end because I need to revise maths the most but at the moment I'm not in the emotional headspace to be dealing with that. we started doing ch2 of A2 with one teacher and ch3 with the other - so we're doing modulus functions and arithmetic and geometric sequences and all that. it's actually not too bad but we're doing a lot of content in one lesson plus getting homework for each bit so it's a lot to be dealing with.

other life stuff
sent my first draft of my personal statement to my tutor so my goal for the weekend is to make the improvements she suggested! it's not as bad of a first draft as I thought it would be but at the same time I'm excited to just get it sent off. also had a driving lesson only for the school to ban leaving in the middle of the day for lessons so now I don't really know what to do. but on the plus side if we have a free fifth lesson we can leave at lunch so I have for sure taken advantage of that... and of course used the time to scroll tiktok. oh well.

I'm thinking I'll also do Sunday updates just to make myself do all my homework but that's it for this week! I feel like it was boring and rambley but I dunno, maybe somebody cares. see you in a couple days after I've inevitably avoided all my work and instead just cuddled with my cats! (who i think I'm slightly allergic to but... we move).
oh and if there's anything anybody things would make this gyg more interesting or more ~interactive~ just let me know! :biggrin:

tag list~

Spoiler

Well done for getting through the first week - hopefully it’s the start of a good year :woo:

Reply 14

OP

Original post by Becca216

Well done for getting through the first week - hopefully it’s the start of a good year :woo:

I hope so!! :thumbsup:

Reply 15

OP

~the weekend~
okay realistically I'm not going to do weekend updates all that much because even though to some extent they hold me accountable for my work, I'm trying to keep weekends fairly chill (at least for now) because I want to maximise my frees. I made a to-do list for the weekend and I split it into high, mid, and low priority in an attempt to keep me on track. I only managed to do one high priority task and two low priority tasks, but the high priority task took so. much. more. time. than I thought it would - it was supposed to be set to cover a one hour lesson, plus 2 hours of work outside of lesson. through a combination of intense procrastination and generally being too much work to realistically complete in that time, it took me forEVER so everything else kind of got pushed to one side. at least that's over with I suppose! it was exercises 2A-2D in the edexcel maths textbook, looking at modulus functions, domains, ranges, all that fun stuff.

but anyway, hopefully my brain fog will clear up and it'll be a productive week! wishing everyone a good week and I'll see you Friday!
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Reply 16

Original post by procrastinatingb

~the weekend~
okay realistically I'm not going to do weekend updates all that much because even though to some extent they hold me accountable for my work, I'm trying to keep weekends fairly chill (at least for now) because I want to maximise my frees. I made a to-do list for the weekend and I split it into high, mid, and low priority in an attempt to keep me on track. I only managed to do one high priority task and two low priority tasks, but the high priority task took so. much. more. time. than I thought it would - it was supposed to be set to cover a one hour lesson, plus 2 hours of work outside of lesson. through a combination of intense procrastination and generally being too much work to realistically complete in that time, it took me forEVER so everything else kind of got pushed to one side. at least that's over with I suppose! it was exercises 2A-2D in the edexcel maths textbook, looking at modulus functions, domains, ranges, all that fun stuff.

but anyway, hopefully my brain fog will clear up and it'll be a productive week! wishing everyone a good week and I'll see you Friday!
tag list

Spoiler

I hate it when a task takes longer than expected, but unfortunately that is one of the downsides of sixth form :redface:

Glad to hear you plan to maximise your frees, if you do this well you definitely deserve to have a more laid back weekend :woo:

Have a good week! :biggrin:

Reply 17

OP

week two check! this week is definitely my more chill one of the two, and even more so now bc the school decided to introduce home study thank god!! so now I can go home as soon as I've had my last lesson of the day (which half the time is period 3 or 4 so i'm not missing a ton but it's still nice to get out a bit earlier, even if I potentially use the time to sit with my cats... anyway)

biology
with one teacher we were looking at the liver and we did some exam questions on it, which didn't go *too* bad but reminded me how much I suck at writing what the mark scheme wants me to! it also doesn't help that during one lesson I was stressing out booking a driving test and not really paying attention. with the other teacher we were looking more at neuronal communication and studied resting/active potential, which I'm still not entirely sure i understand but we have a homework on it so guess I need to figure it out pretty quick lol

maths
i genuinely don't remember much.. we finished doing chapter 3 which is the sequence stuff, and with the other teacher we looked at modulus graphs. exciting times. I think I do actually understand it, I just hate drawing so many graphs out!! the actual bane of my existence.

german
did a whole bunch of stuff! we're doing more in depth character studies for everyone in the play so I've got an essay to finish for that, plus we just looked at integration a bit more and did some reading exercises. had a look at the a level specimen paper 1 and didn't do too badly on the bits we went over so i'm feeling kind of optimistic about mocks after half term, esp since I'll have revised more by then.

other (mostly uni related)
edited my personal statement based on my form tutor's feedback and then sent it off to my biology teacher since she can give me more specific feedback for the actual degree I want to do. also spent some time looking through my list of potential uni courses and I think i've cut my list down to six unis, but a couple of the unis I need to choose between degrees. getting there slowly but surely!! I also managed to book my practical driving test for the 20th Nov but I want to try and find a cancellation that's a bit sooner since my instructor says I really only need a couple more hours and then I could theoretically pass. also my academic planner that I ordered finally arrived so hopefully I can keep myself a bit more organised!! but I already have a bunch of homework stuff that I need to do..

anyway I've been home since half 12 for home study but have spent the entire 2 hours on tiktok or eating so maybe I should make the most of this nice weather putting me in a good mood and actually get some work done!! might do a weekend update, might not, but either way I'll see you later!

tag list~

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(edited 4 years ago)

Reply 18